In this Book
- Confessions of a Horseshoer
- Book
- 2012
- Published by: University of North Texas Press
- Series: Western Life Series
summary
Confessions of a Horseshoer offers a close and personal look at the mind-set of a professional horseshoer (farrier) who also happens to be a college professor. The book, an ironic and playful view of the many unusual animals (and people) Ron Tatum has encountered over thirty-seven years, is nicely balanced between straightforward presentation, self-effacing humor, and lightly seasoned wisdom. It captures the day-to-day life of a somewhat cantankerous old guy, who has attitude and strong opinions. Throughout the book, Tatum ponders the causes that led him into the apparently opposing worlds of horseshoeing, with its mud, pain, and danger, and the bookish life of a college professor. He tells the reader that it is his hope that writing the book will help him understand this apparent paradox between the physical and the mental. Tatum provides a detailed description of the horseshoeing process, its history, and why horses need shoes in the first place. The reader will learn about the dangers of shoeing horses in “Injuries I Have Known,” in which Tatum describes one particular self-inflicted injury that he claims no other horseshoer has ever, or will ever, experience. “Eight Week Syndrome” demonstrates the close, often therapeutic, relationship between the horseshoer and his or her customers. Tatum relates the story of an old Wyoming cowboy who could talk with horses, and consistently cure their injuries, lameness, and other physical problems after the veterinarians had given up. The humor in the chapters on chickens and rabbits will entertain any reader, as well as the sections on various dogs, ducks, llamas, goats, flies, and a sexually disoriented pig. Readers of western life and lovers of horses will find Confessions of a Horseshoer an informative, quirky, and delightful work full of humor, attitude, and off-beat insight.
Table of Contents
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- Acknowledgments
- p. xv
- The First Horse
- pp. 8-10
- Starting Out
- pp. 11-12
- What Do Horses in the Wild Do?
- pp. 13-15
- Recalcitrant Horses
- pp. 16-23
- A Wyoming Cowboy
- pp. 24-35
- Druids, Celts, and Blacksmiths
- pp. 36-39
- Horses and Marines
- pp. 40-44
- Going It Alone
- pp. 45-47
- The Tools of the Trade
- pp. 57-73
- Injuries I Have Known
- pp. 83-105
- More Injuries and Violence
- pp. 115-117
- Insensitivity?
- pp. 125-127
- The Marin County Rodeo
- pp. 134-138
- The Newspaper Reporter
- pp. 139-140
- The Bad Job?
- pp. 141-143
- A Different Kind of Bad Job
- pp. 144-146
- Crime in a Small Town
- pp. 147-149
- The Bird Man
- pp. 150-152
- Culinary Aspects
- pp. 153-155
- People and Their Animals
- pp. 156-161
- Other Kinds of Creatures
- pp. 177-183
- Two People and Three Cats
- pp. 191-193
- The Pig Who Thought He Could
- pp. 194-197
- More Pig Stories
- pp. 198-201
- Youth Rodeo
- pp. 202-212
- The Youngest Cowboy
- pp. 213-216
- Graduation
- pp. 217-218
- The Eight-Week Syndrome
- pp. 226-229
Additional Information
ISBN
9781574414615
Related ISBN(s)
9781574414530
MARC Record
OCLC
793193215
Pages
272
Launched on MUSE
2012-06-26
Language
English
Open Access
No