Description

Goldie Griffith didn't know how to ride a horse, much less perform tricks or tame a bronco, when she was hired by a famous Wild West show, but she didn't let that stop her. She traveled the country with several companies, part of a small group of professional cowgirls, and in 1913 Buffalo Bill himself gave her away at her wedding. She was married during one of the famous showman's Wild West shows at Madison Square Garden before a crowd of 8,000. A few years later, she discovered that not only was her cowboy husband wanted for murder in Texas, but he was already married when they wed. Furious, she pulled out her gun, aimed it at him, and pulled the trigger. As she waited in jail to learn her fate she regaled reporters with her life story. She was one of our country's first professional female athletes, and she not only boxed and wrestled and rode bucking broncos, she also ranched, trained war dogs, owned boarding houses and restaurants, and was an actor and stunt rider for the brand-new Western movies that were taking the country by storm.

• A Willa Literary Award finalist for creative non-fiction.
• With over 120 photographs and images.