Spur Awards

Wyoming's colorful story of water management illuminates the powerful forces that impact water use in the rural American West. The state's rich history of managing this valuable natural resource provides insights and lessons for the twenty-first-century American West as it faces drought and climate change. Public Waters shows how, as popular hopes and dreams meet tough terrain, a central idea that has historically structured water management can guide water policy for Western states today. Drawing on forty years as a journalist with training in water law and economics, Anne MacKinnon paints a lively picture of the arcane twists in the notable record of water law in Wyoming. She maintains that other Western states should examine how local people control water and that states must draw on historical understandings of water as a public resource to find effective approaches to essential water issues in the West.

An engrossing, engaging, and superbly written account of ‘Fearless Fred’ Funston’s formative years in rural Kansas, which molded the individual who would go on to command forces in the Philippines, earn a Medal of Honor, and ultimately command in 1917 the largest US Army since the Civil War.

Is it Possible to 'Cowboy' on Six Continents? That is just what J.B. Zielke did in his early twenties. Argentina to Mongolia, Mexico to Australia this book takes you to places that you may not have even realized there are cowboys. Gunfights, feral bulls, bank truck robberies, and little old men riding reindeer are all part of this modern-day international cowboy journey. Being a cowboy is a dangerous occupation no matter where in the world it's done. There are many similarities among cowboys all over the world but even more, differences are discussed in this book. It will leave you with a new appreciation for the problems ranchers face all over the world. Whether you live in a big city high-rise or on a ranch this collection of true stories will have you on the edge of your seat.

A former Border Patrol agent's haunting experience of an unnatural divide and the lives caught on either side, struggling to cross or to defend it.