we're up early and off to the national cowboy hall of fame and western heritage museum in oklahoma city this morning. we figured that no news is good news about loki, and we haven't heard back from the vet today, so our hopes are up that he will be fine to travel tomorrow. i'll have to get back to you on that when i know more from the vet. we spent about four hours at the museum and only saw about half of it, but we were dog-tired when we left there. i am posting some photos of us at the museum and you can judge the enormity of some of the sculptures, especially "end of the trail" by james earle fraser. nancy said that this was my day and several times she took small breaks and rested on a bench outside one of the exhibits, and that's okay. i feel fortunate that she would give up part of her day for me. i loved the exhibits, western paintings, sculptures, and everything else about the visit to the cowboy museum. there is an area dedicated to pro rodeo from the "old days"; an area about the old movie cowboys, like gene autry, roy rogers, tom mix, james arness, and don't forget "the duke", john wayne. there was way too much to see to list here, so i won't even try. i think the greatest sculpture that we saw today was the "end of the trail" plaster sculpture created by james earle fraser for the 1905 san francisco world's fair and exposition. as you can see by the photo, it is huge and it is all made from plaster. the artist created it for the san francisco world's fair and afterward the city of san francisco didn't want to keep it and workers broke it into large chunks and they disposed of it. citizens of tulare county, california save it in 1927 by purchasing the broken pieces from the city and trucked it down to mooney's grove in visalia, which is where i first saw it as a child when our family had reunion picnics there. anyway, it was reassembled in 1927 and in 1968 the national cowboy hall of fame purchased it and moved it to oklahoma city and restored it completely. meanwhile the cowboy museum also had molds made and an identical statue cast in bronze in italy to replace the original plaster statue. well, we are finally back "home", it is getting dark, and a storm is looming outside. and that seems to be may in oklahoma...
