Bruce Dillman, who graduated from Independence High School, admits it can be difficult trying to describe who he is and what he does.
I guess I’m an artist,’ he says, quoting an old Will Rogers’ saying: ‘An artist is the only thing a man can be and nobody can prove that he ain’t.”
Dillman reflected on his life experiences during a visit last week in Independence, where his mother, Lucile, still lives. After graduating from IHS, Dillman obtained both his bachelor and master’s degrees from the University of Kansas, where he majored in journalism then broad- casting. Since then, he’s worked a variety of different jobs in Kansas, Nebraska and western states.
Yet one theme has been constant for most of his life – his admiration for the American cowboy and cowboy culture.
“My aunt Pat sent me a cowboy outfit for Christmas one year (as a child),” he said. Since then, “anything involving that subject was fair game for me.”
Dillman recently completed a revised edition of “The CowBoy Handbook,” published by; Lone Prairie Publishing in Lincoln, Neb. Its topics include (cowboy) movies and television, prose and poetry, cowboy collectibles, ‘cowtown capers’ and ‘rangeland lingo.
The front cover also has an endorsement by the late cowboy star Gene Autry. He says, “ ‘The CowBoy Handbook’ has something for everyone who values our cowboy heritage.’
COWBOY CALLING — Bruce Dillman, an Independence High School graduate, holds a copy of his book, “The CowBoy Handbook,” published by Lone Prairie Publishing in Lincoln, Neb.
(Photo by Fred Hunt)
The first edition, published in 1994, sold out its first printing. A 300-page book, it was a compilation of research and material Dillman learned during ‘most of my conscious life.”
“One of the reasons I started this is because there’s so much misinformation (about cowboys),” he said, adding how he wrote the book for those with “some interest but not a lot of knowledge.”
The book’s publication gave Dillman some added recognition and opened the door for additional opportunities to share stories about the cowboy. He says most of the questions he is asked relate to history and factual matters.
Since 1995, Dillman has made regular appearances as a cowboy entertainer at the annual Gene Autry Film and Music Festival in Gene Autry, Okla. He has also attended a major cowboy festival held annually in January in Elko, Nevada.
He spent t He spent two years working at a Colorado Dude Ranch, and has performed in several gunfight entertainment acts. He also had a part as a cowboy in an educational film made for Nebraska students.
His other life experiences include working 10 years at a radio station in Lincoln, which he calls ‘my official residence,” and a stint selling advertising for the High Plains Journal in Dodge City.
He also spent some time teaching college classes in Dodge City, and in recent years he created some web- sites on cowboy topics. “I have a pretty checkered career,” he said. ‘I’ve done so many a things.”
Asked if his degrees were put to good use, he laughed and replied, “Sure.”
Dillrnan speculated that the “break out’ of mass media, such as dime novels, newspapers and magazines, might, have contributed to making the cowboy a central figure in American lore.
“It didn’t hurt,” he speculated.
Dillman said being a cowboy is more about attitude and spirit than anything else.
He describes the original western cowboys on the open ranges as ‘highly loyal and fiercely independent.’ They were also ‘common people, not royalty or demigods.”
‘You can work at the office at a computer and have (the attitude),’ he said.
© 2000 Independence Daily Reporter. Used by permission.