Cantankerous Cowman Gave Montanans Courage
(Page 3 of 4)
January/February 1979
By the Mother Earth News editors
The next day, along came the bank man. The old rancher happily paid him, insisting upon getting a receipt. The bank man rode off with the money. A mile down the road, the gang jumped him and took possession of the useful $3,000.
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Boyd took great pride in being trustworthy and expected the same of others. If someone betrayed his trust, he took immediate and direct action. When he was a cowboy near Jackson, he rode into town one day and stopped off at his favorite saloon.
"Hey Boyd," yelled one of his cronies at the bar, "you must be hard up these days. "
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"Rentin' your favorite horse to that movie company," his friend replied.
"You've been seeing things. That horse is summering in a pasture out east of town. "
"Hell it is! It's your horse all right, and what's more they're swimmin' him back and forth across the river.
" So Boyd hightailed it for the river, and sure enough, there was the movie star on his horse.Incensed, Boyd walked up to the man and said,"Git down off my horse."
"This is a horse we rented for this movie," said the man.
"Git down off my horse! " said Boyd.
The man protested again.
Boyd picked up a stone. "Git down off my horse, dammit, or I'll GIT you off my horse!
" The man got off.
Many years later Boyd got a letter from his cousin in Oklahoma. The cousin said that he had recently been introduced to John Wayne. When Wayne heard the cousin's name, he said, "Charter ... Charter ... you have any kin in Wyoming? " The man said, "I have a cousin Boyd
Charter who used to live in Wyoming." "Boyd Charter! " exclaimed Wayne. "That's the name. Meanest man in the West!
" But Boyd wasn't mean at all. Feisty, and quite often cantankerous, yes. Mean, no. You could tell by how gentle and trusting all his animals were. For a long time Boyd had a string of about 50 buckin' horses that were rented for use in rodeos. Boyd maintained that the best buckin' horses are those that simply like to buck, not those that buck through fear, anger, or meanness. Many of his buckin' horses were so tame and gentle that his kids could ride them bareback around the corrals.
Few people are so sure of exactly what they need for comfort and happiness that they cannot be tempted by the offer of money or power. Boyd was sure. He and Anne were comfortable and happy in their tiny log house. Their land was precious to them and important to their happiness. They didn't want any amount of money for it. They wanted it to remain healthy and unscarred.
