Cowboy Museums
Over the last few months two prominent Southern California museums have featured exhibits on cowboys.
To varying degrees, the exhibits included memorabilia about Western movies and movie cowboys. In this month’s column I’ll be sharing photos from my visits.
In December I visited the Autry Museum of the American West, which some readers may recall from photos I shared here in a 2019 column. The museum has just concluded hosting a traveling exhibit, Black Cowboys: An American Story, for the past six months.
This was a very interesting, informative exhibit about the history of black cowboys throughout the United States. Here I’m focusing solely on a small section of the exhibit featuring “B” movie Western star Herb Jeffries. Jeffries was also sometimes billed as Herbert Jeffrey.
Jeffries, of mixed-race ancestry, chose to reflect his black heritage by portraying a black cowboy in a series of Westerns beginning with Harlem on the Prairie (1937). Jeffries, an accomplished singer, specifically created his musical cowboy persona to acknowledge the history of black cowboys and provide a role model for children.
The Autry exhibit shared a poster for Jeffries’ The Bronze Buckaroo (1939) alongside another poster for a Western with an all-black cast, Black Gold (1928).
Although I sadly neglected to take a close-up photo, Jeffries’ own boots and holster were also on display, seen to the left of this wide shot. The boots were worn in Harlem on the Prairie (1937).
I haven’t yet seen any of Jeffries’ Westerns yet, but I intend to do so in the future! He’s immortalized on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, which by chance I saw the same day as this exhibit. His remains are interred in a columbarium with a lovely marker at Hollywood Forever Cemetery.
Black Cowboys: An American Story is currently on exhibit at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum in Michigan through July 2026.
The Ronald Reagan Presidential Library & Museum has also been hosting a six-month exhibit, Cowboys: History & Hollywood.
Ronald Reagan himself starred in a small handful of Westerns during his movie career, including Law and Order (1953), Cattle Queen of Montana (1954), and Tennessee’s Partner (1955).
Cowboys: History & Hollywood was an extensive exhibit spread across several rooms. As the title implies, it chronicled the history of “real” cowboys alongside movie cowboys, which is my focus here.
In a nice bit of serendipity, the Reagan Library exhibit showcased a different Herb Jeffries poster, for Harlem Rides the Range (1939).
It also featured a Gene Autry guitar, a nice coincidence given that this column began with a visit to the Autry Museum! A lunchbox from the Autry-produced Annie Oakley TV series, which starred Gail Davis, can be spotted in the background.
The Reagan Library exhibit also featured a poster for Gene Autry in Blue Montana Skies (1939).
Visitors of a certain age, who grew up watching Roy Rogers movies or TV shows, were moved (and perhaps a bit startled!) to see Trigger, Buttermilk, and Bullet alongside original Roy Rogers and Dale Evans costumes.
There were also some striking foreign Tom Mix posters.
A Winchester ’73 (1950) poster was side by side with a poster for a Winchester rifle search done to publicize the film.
There were also some actual Winchester rifles!
The many posters on display also included Decision at Sundown (1957), starring Randolph Scott, and the all-star How the West Was Won (1962).
There were props from Tombstone (1993), a film I wrote about here three years ago.
Numerous costumes on display included Clint Eastwood costumes from Pale Rider (1992), below left, and Unforgiven (1992), seen on the right.
My very favorite thing in the exhibit was John Wayne’s battered hat from Hondo (1953), a film I love which I wrote about here in 2018, in a column on favorite John Wayne leading ladies, and in 2024, in a post on Westerns for young viewers.
I hope readers have enjoyed a “virtual tour” of these terrific exhibits!
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– Laura Grieve for Classic Movie Hub
Laura can be found at her blog, Laura’s Miscellaneous Musings, where she’s been writing about movies since 2005, and on Twitter at @LaurasMiscMovie. A lifelong film fan, Laura loves the classics including Disney, Film Noir, Musicals, and Westerns. She regularly covers Southern California classic film festivals. Laura will scribe on all things western at the ‘Western RoundUp’ for CMH.
