gender roles

Before the 1950’s women were not were not allowed to be a part of the work force.  Daphne Spain described the women work force in the 1950’s really well in her book Women's Rights and Gendered Spaces in 1970s Boston. She stated: “that if am women wanted or needed a job in the labor force, she would look in the classified ads- Under Help Wanted—Female. She also, stated that they women got paid less than the men”(Spain 3). I think about how the women in the 1950’s were not allowed to be cowgirls because the men didn’t think they were capable of handling the work. In all the western movies I have watched, the women always were inside cleaning and cooking and never outside working with the men.

            Comparing the past to the present, shows me how much women’s roles have changed. Women weren’t allowed to be cowgirls and now they have proved that they can handle the work of a cowgirl. They cowgirls started their dreams of being a cowgirl at a young age. When I was younger I was dreaming of being a cowgirl, but the new proposed child law would have ruined my dream. I started learning how to be a cowgirl when I was a younger girl because I worked with my mom and saw all the experience it takes. Also, I was able to experience it too.  Bob Confer states: that “under the new rules, the Department of Labor would end most child labor exemptions that currently exist in farming by denying work to anyone under the age of 16, unless the farm is owned by their parents and one of the parents is directly overseeing their work” (Confer). With this new law, the girls dreaming of being cowgirls will not have the opportunity to experience a cowgirl lifestyle. They will not have the opportunity to start to learn the skill and the personality traits that it takes to make a cowgirl.

            A cowgirl has many personality traits that make her take on the challenges that she faces. I had the opportunity to grow up with a cowgirl. My mom inspired me to learn the personality traits it takes to be a cowgirl. If I didn’t have the opportunity to work with my mom and learn from her, I would not be the person I am today. She taught me how to be hard working and passionate about everything I do. Cowgirls have many traits that make them capable of handling many difficult obstacles.

Working side by side with the Cowboys

Cowgirls have to have the ability of working side by side with the cowboys. There are not a lot of cowgirls out there, so they have to work with cowboys. Cowboys can have a strong opinion of girls working with them and how much they will let them do. Cowgirls have to gain the cowboys respect, so they can work side by side.

            I have seen firsthand of a cowgirl gaining a cowboy’s respect. My mom has worked side by side with my dad for 27 years now. At first, my dad wouldn’t let my mom complete some of the tasks because it would have been too hard on her to complete. My mom finally earned his respect by showing my dad that she can do everything he can. My mom proved to my dad that she could lift the feed bags, change tires, work on tractors, and complete all the tasks he does. It took my mom many years to prove herself to him. Now he goes to her and asks advice on what they should do for the best of the cattle.

Experience

It takes many years of experience to be able to complete the tasks a cowgirl can complete. You can’t wake up one morning and be a cowgirl. It takes many years of experience to perfect the skills a cowgirl uses to complete a simple task.

            Roping a calf off a horse may seem simple but it’s a lot harder than it looks. I have been taught to rope and it is a lot harder than it looks. My dad gave me a rope and showed me how to rope a plastic steer head off of a bale. He showed me how to hold my elbow and to use my pointer finger and point where I want to throw the loop. I finally was able to swing my loop from my horse, but never tried roping a calf off of my horse. When I got the chance to rope a calf, I started with younger calves because pulling my slack and dallying is dangerous. If I get my finger caught in the rope, I could lose it. After I practiced and practiced roping, I move my way up on being more experienced about roping in the wide open.  Roping takes experience to be able to handle how your horse acts when you throw your loop.

hardworking

Another trait a cowgirl has to have is hard working. Working on a ranch is not easy. It is very stressful and takes motivation to keep working towards the goals set for the best interest of the cattle. It takes hard work to reach these goals because they are not easily reached. Most of these goals are multiple tasks needing to be completed before the goal is accomplished.

            I have seen my mom wake up every morning in pain, but she deals with the pain and goes to work. My mom is over 50 years old and I see her completing the tasks that she completed when she was my age. These tasks take strength and leave you hurting once you complete them. Fencing is one of these tasks. Fencing may seem pretty simple and easily completed, but it actually takes more strength and exercise than people would think. My mom walks the fence line, which is not flat. It is up and down steep sandy hills. While walking the fence, she carries a bucket full of staples and a hammer. I was very surprised, when I had to carry the bucket how heavy it was. When she walks, she hits every post with the hammer to see if it is broken and checks if the staples are all the way into the post. Staples are used to hold the barbed wire to the posts.  If a post is broke, my mom takes all the staples off and breaks the post completely off. After they broken post is out of the way, she grabs the post-hole diggers and digs a hole that is about two to three feet deep. When the hole is dug, she puts the post in the hole and fills the hole in, so the post is stable. Then she takes staples and staples the wire to the new post. From there she continues down the fence line until she has finished walking the entire fence that needs to be walked. That may not seem very hard, but you feel the strenuous work your muscles used the next morning.

Mental toughness

Not only does a cowgirl have to be physically tough, but she has to be mentally tough too. Not every girl can handle the tasks of calving season or the challenges of working in blizzards.  Cowgirls have to be mentally tough to fight through these obstacles and rise above them.

On the ranch I grew up on, it just so happened that most of the blizzards came during calving season. My parents had to check the cows during the night in case cow had trouble having her baby. My mom and dad would both check at 9 p.m., then my mom would check at midnight, then the other hired hand checked at 3 a.m., and my dad checked at 6 a.m. while checking throughout the day too. When blizzards would come in during calving season, my mom and dad would split up and check the cows every hour. Checking cows is very important especially during blizzards because if a cow is having problems, we have to pull the calf. The reason we would have to pull the calf is the cow could die and so could the calf. Pulling a calf takes a certain mental toughness. I have helped pull many calves.  We first would bring the cow into the calving barn and put her into the shoot. The shoot helps protect us from getting slammed by the cow or kicked. Once the cow is secured in the shoot, one person would put gloves on and grab for the calf’s hooves inside the cow to put the chains on. After the chains are around the calf’s hocks or higher up the calf’s legs, I would connect the chain to the puller. The puller is a device that uses a pulley to help ease the task of pulling the calf. I would crank a couple times then lower the puller to help the cow deliver the calf. This process doesn’t take long and we will have the calf lying on the ground in a matter of minutes. After the calf was delivered, we would use another pulley system to raise the calf up off of the ground and stick straw up the calf’s nose. We did that to make sure all the membrane was off of the calf’s nose. If there is membrane on their nose, the calf will die because they will not be able to breath. To pull a calf takes a mental toughness because cowgirls have to be able to handle the smell, the blood, and the fact that these cows become very protective of their calves and could potentially charge you. You have to always be thinking one step ahead no matter what time it is or what the weather is like. Also, pulling a calf in a blizzard takes mental toughness because you can become tired and your job is to protect that calves and keep them warm. Sometimes nature has the advantage and you don’t save every calf, which hurts your mental state because you feel like you are failing at one of the most important job. A cowgirl has to learn how to let the death of one calf go so that they can concentrate on the other calves and their task at hand.

Physical toughness

How tough do cowgirls have to be? Surprising, they have to be tougher than what most people think.  A weak little girl would not be able to walk out onto a ranch and handle the physical work cowgirls have to do.  Cowgirls have to be physically fit to keep going without injuring themselves that would prevent them from working.  An example of physical toughness would be brandings.

            At brandings, the neighboring ranches get together and round up the cattle herd. They drive the herd into a coral and sort the cows out of the pen, leaving just the calves. Once all the cows are sorted out of the pen, they start the branding stoves to warm the irons up. When the irons are warm, a small group of people, on horses, ride into the coral to rope the calves and drag them out. When the ropers are dragging the calves out, there are a group of people standing outside the pen getting ready to flip the calves. The partners flip the calves then hold them down while other workers take the hot irons and brand the calves. Other workers take vaccine and vaccinate the calves and castrate the bull calves. When they are done the partners let the calves up, so they can go back to their moms.

            I have worked at many brandings. At first, vaccinating may seem like an easy job, but it takes a certain physical toughness to handle the task. At brandings, the host has asked me to vaccinate. After the host of the branding asked me to vaccinate, I would go to the pickup and get the vaccine to fill up the syringe. The syringe usually was connected to a bottle of vaccine, so I wouldn’t have to refill after every shot.  Once, I had the syringe ready, I would go from one calf to the next giving them a shot. To give a calf a shot, I had to stick them with the needle in a certain area. My mom taught me, that the area to correctly vaccinate a calf looks like a triangle located from the slope of the shoulder to the middle of the neck. I had to be careful sticking the calf with the needle, to make sure I didn’t accidentally stick one of the wrestlers, when the calf moved. Once the needle was in the calf, I had to squeeze the syringe, so the vaccine would be injected into the calf.  After the vaccine was injected, I would remove the needle from the calf’s skin and move onto the next calf.  This may seem like a long process, but it only takes 5 seconds to vaccinate one calf. It takes a physical toughness to vaccinate a calf because I could have ended up stabbing a wrestler with the needle or myself and I have to be physically fit to run from one calf to another so I wouldn’t get behind and have wrestlers waiting on me. Also, wrestling calves would be another job that acquires physical toughness.

           

Definition

                What is a cowgirl? The dictionary definition of a cowgirl is: “a woman who herds and tends cattle on a ranch, especially in the western U.S., and who traditionally goes about most of her work on horseback. Also, a woman who exhibits the skills attributed to such cowgirls, especially in rodeo.”   

My definition of a cowgirl is not just a girl that tends to cattle on horseback. A true cowgirl has to have a certain personality traits to handle the challenges of life on the ranch. The personality traits of a cowgirl are: physical toughness, mental toughness, hardworking, experience, and the ability to handle working side by side with the cowboys.