Broadus (Amber Dunkerley) and Field (Katherine) Western Sketches, 1934-1951

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Summary

Title:
Amber Dunkerley Broadus and Katherine Field Western Sketches
Dates:
1934-1951
Creators:
Los Angeles Union Stock Yards Company
Abstract:
Extent:
(Boxes: 1 legal)
Language:
Preferred citation:

Amber Dunkerley Broadus and Katherine Field Western Sketches. Seaver Center for Western History Research, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

Background

Scope and content:

51 pen and ink drawings of cowboy life by Katherine Field, signed and dated 1934, 1936, 1937, 1940, 1941, 1942, 1948, 1949, 1950, and 1951; commissioned for use in calendars and in the Western Livestock Journal published by the Los Angeles Union Stock Yards Company. 49 drawings of cowboy and western life by Amber Dunkerley Broadus, all undated but signed either "D" or "Dunkerley." Items are not chronologically organized. The Los Angeles Union Stock Yards Company hired the artists.

Biographical / historical:

Biographical information compiled from http://www.cowboypoetry.com/openrange.htm#Photos regarding the book "Open Range; collected poems of Bruce Kiskaddon." The artists' drawings were published collaboratively with Kisaddon's cowboy poetry. Katherine Field was the daughter of a New Mexico rancher, friend to the Journal's associate editor, Frank M. King. The calendars may have begun publication in 1933. "In 1935 Field had married John Guerro, a Navaho who had worked for her father the previous year, and by the end of the year she was pregnant with the first of their two children..." "...Katherine is the youngest of nine girls that Mr. and Mrs. Nelson A. Field raised up there in high mountains of Northwest So­corro County, New Mexico and she has never been very far away from the ranch where she was born, except the four years the family lived at Santa Fe, during the father’s term as State Land Commissioner for New Mexico Nelse Field is known to New Mexicans as “Navajo” Field on account he has conducted an Indian trading store on his ranch since he established it in 1889..." "By the end of 1942 Katherine Field’s family situation left her unable to continue illustrating Kiskaddon’s poems. Both her parents were in poor health and in need of constant care, and her two children were of school age. She had moved to Albuquerque to be near doctors and schools, and her husband John worked on the ranch during the week and drove to the city on the weekends. Taking over Field’s work of illustrating poems for the Stock Yards calendars and Western Livestock Journal was Amber Dunkerley, a trained commercial artist about fifteen years older than Field..." "Some time in 1948 Kiskaddon and Field arranged to renew their partnership, and their published collaborations resumed with the January 1949 Stock Yards calendar."

About this collection guide

Collection Guide Author:
Finding aid created by Seaver Center for Western History Research, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County staff.
Date Prepared:
1934-1951
Date Encoded:
This finding aid was produced using Record Express for OAC5 on July 14, 2025, 2:55 p.m.

Access and use

Restrictions:

Research is by appointment only

Terms of access:

Permission to publish, quote or reproduce must be secured from the repository and the copyright holder

Preferred citation:

Amber Dunkerley Broadus and Katherine Field Western Sketches. Seaver Center for Western History Research, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

Location of this collection:
900 Exposition Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90007-4057, US
Contact:
(213) 763-3359
seavercenter@nhm.org
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