"When you think of rodeo, you probably think of men. Men of the swaggering Marlboro variety. After all, rodeo has always been considered a supremely masculine sport, a rough and tumble display of macho strength and skill. But there's another side of rodeo: the world of rodeo queens - part cowgirl and part pageant princess - who wave and smile and keep the dream of the ideal Western cowgirl alive.".

"So who are the women of the rodeo; the women behind the candy-red chaps, Farah Fawcett curls, and rhinestone tiaras? Author Joan Burbick traveled the back roads of the rural West for years, trying to find out. She interviewed dozens of queens, including rodeo royalty from the 1930s and 1940s, women who grew up breaking wild horses, branding calves, and witnessing the sad decline of the ranching life.

Stories from white and Native American rodeo queens in the 1950s and 1960s, the golden age of rodeo, reveal the conflicts over gender and race that shaped the rodeo and the Cold War politics of small Western towns. Finally, rodeo queens from the 1970s to the present describe a more fiercely commercial rodeo, driven largely by TV-ratings and sponsorships, glitter and hairspray.".

"The result is a rich tapestry of women's voices that echoes and challenges our cliches of the rural West. Their stories of fulfilled dreams and lost hopes reveal the tenacity of the myth of the American West, a place of muscled men, golden-haired women, relentless beauty, and tragic limits."--BOOK JACKET.