Hoo-Doo Cowboys and Bronze Buckaroos: Conceptions of the African American West

296 Pages·2014·5.47 MB·English

by  Michael K. Johnson

Hoo-Doo Cowboys and Bronze Buckaroos
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★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Michael K. Johnson
UNIVERSITY PRESS OF MISSISSIPPI ★ JACKSON
Margaret Walker Series in African American Studies
www.upress.state.ms.us
Designed by Peter D. Halverson
The University Press of Mississippi is a member of the Association of American
University Presses.
Copyright © 2014 by University Press of Mississippi
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
First printing 2014
∞
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Johnson, Michael K. (Michael Kyle), 1963–
Hoo-doo cowboys and bronze buckaroos : conceptions of the African American
West / Michael K. Johnson.
pages cm. — (Margaret Walker Alexander series in African American studies)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-61703-928-7 (hardback) — ISBN 978-1-61703-929-4 (ebook)
1. American literature—African American authors—History and criticism.
2. American literature—West (U.S.)—History and criticism. 3. African Americans
in popular culture. 4. African Americans—West (U.S.)—Intellectual life. 5. African
Americans—West (U.S.)—History. 6. Frontier and pioneer life in literature. I.
Title.

PS153.N5J645 2014
810.9’896073—dc23 2013025422
British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available
Contents
Acknowledgments
vii
IntroductIon
3
1. Performing (in) the African American West
Minstrel Shows, Brass Bands, Hoo-Doo Cowboys, and
Other Musical Tricksters
16
2. “Try to Refrain from That Desire”
Self-Control and Violent Passion in Oscar Micheaux’s
African American Western
51
3. “This Strange White World”
Race and Place in Era Bell Thompson’s American Daughter and
Rose Gordon’s Newspaper Writing
75
4. Cowboys, Cooks, and Comics
African American Characters in Westerns of the 1930s
102
5. Oscar Micheaux, The Exile, and the Black Western Race Film
127
6. Sammy Davis Jr., Woody Strode, and the Black Westerner of the
Civil Rights Era
154
7. Looking at the Big Picture
Percival Everett’s Western Fiction
vi Contents
186
8. The Post-Soul Cowboy on the Science Fiction Frontier
212
conclusIon The D Is Silent
234
notes
242
BIBlIogrAphy
258
Index
270
Acknowledgments
Writing a book is hardly a solitary experience. As many hours as I may
have logged sitting in front of my laptop, just as important to the com-
position of Hoo-Doo Cowboys and Bronze Buckaroos were the multiple
conversations about the African American West and about the genre
Western that I have enjoyed over the past few years.
Many of the chapters here started as conference papers, presented at
conferences held by the Western Literature Association, the American
Literature Association, and the Science Fiction Research Association. My
colleagues at the WLA, especially Neil Campbell and Christine Bold, have
contributed in multiple ways—through conversations, through their writ-
ing about the American West—to my thinking on the African American
West. Past WLA president Sara Spurgeon gets a nod of thanks for her
enthusiasm and encouragement in all things Whedonesque. Thanks go
as well to Sabine Barcatta, Melody Graulich, and Nicolas Witschi, who
helped guide to their initial publications a couple of the pieces expanded
into chapters here. Likewise, thanks go to Charles Braithwaite, Wheeler
Dixon, and Joycelyn Moody, for their editorial insights and assistance and
to Walter Biggins at the University Press of Mississippi for guiding the
book through the editorial process.
I also thank the many scholars who have taken part in conference pan-
els on the African American West over the years and whose work has
greatly influenced and helped shape my own: Bertram D. Ashe, Carolyn
Dekker, Hollis Robbins, Kimberly N. Ruffin, and Joshua Damu Smith;
Cynthia Miller, with whom I have presented on several occasions and
with whom I share interests in the African American West, Oscar Mi-
cheaux, B movies, and science fiction and horror films; and especially
Eric Gardner, Kalenda Eaton, and Emily Lutenski, who have joined me on
panels at both the ALA and WLA.
Thanks go as well to Craig Jacobson, who organized a Science Fiction
Research Association conference on science fiction and the Western that
provided a venue for trying out my ideas on the African American sci-
fi Western and that informed much of my thinking on the relationship

vii
viii Acknowledgments
between the two genres. And thanks to Karen Hellekson for leading me
down the path to the SFRA.
I thank as well several of my colleagues at the University of Maine at
Farmington who offered encouragement, insight, and good conversations
about both literature and popular culture: Eric Brown, Dan Gunn, Sabine
Klein, and especially Steven Pane, whose enthusiastic advocacy of sound
studies contributed to my attention here to the role of sound and music
in the depiction the African American West.
The Montana Historical Society in Helena holds the Emmanuel Taylor
Gordon Manuscript Collection. Over the years, I have had many excellent
conversations with Jodie Foley about Taylor and Rose Gordon.
Several chapters here are revised and expanded versions of articles
originally published elsewhere:
“‘This Strange White World’: Race and Place in Era Bell Thompson’s
American Daughter.” Great Plains Quarterly 24.2 (Spring 2004): 101–11.
“‘Try to Refrain from That Desire’: Self-Control and Violent Passion in
Oscar Micheaux’s African American Western.” African American Review
38.3 (Fall 2004): 361–77.
“Cowboys, Cooks, and Comics: African American Characters in West-
erns of the 1930s.” Quarterly Review of Film and Video 22.3 (2005): 225–35.
“Looking for the Big Picture: Percival Everett’s Western Fiction.” West-
ern American Literature 42.1 (Spring 2007): 26–53.
“African American Literature and Culture and the American West.”
A Companion to the Literature and Culture of the American West. Ed.
Nicolas Witschi. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011. 161–76.
Hoo-Doo Cowboys and Bronze Buckaroos