The Cowboy Band Returns!

Yee-haw! I am excited to announce that I am giving two encore presentations of my Montana Cowboy Band talk on Monday, November 14. Both presentations are free and open to the public. The events are sponsored by the Vintage Band Festival (VBF).

G. Oliver Riggs is in the back row, third from the left.

The first talk will be at 3:30 p.m. at the Northfield Retirement Center Chapel (900 Cannon Valley Drive West), and the second one will be at 7 p.m. at the Northfield Senior Center (1651 Jefferson Parkway). Each will last about 45 minutes.

This is essentially the same presentation I gave in July to a standing-room-only crowd at the Northfield Historical Society during the 2016 Vintage Band Festival. Because many people who wanted to attend that evening were not able to do so, including some members of the Vintage Band Festival board of directors, I told VBF President Jan Stevens I would be happy to present it again as part of the VBF’s ongoing educational series.

My July 30 talk at the Northfield Historical Society (photo by Bill Lowell)

I will use photos and old newspaper articles to help explain the adventures my great-grandfather, G. Oliver Riggs, had as a member of the Montana Cowboy Band in 1912. The band was hired by Great Northern Railway President Louis W. Hill, son of James J. Hill, to travel to expositions in Minneapolis and Chicago with a group of Blackfeet Indians to promote newly developed Glacier National Park and the state of Montana.

If time allows, I will tell an additional Cowboy Band story I did not explain at the August event; the time the Cowboy Band “shot up” the State Capitol in St. Paul during the 1917 St. Paul Outdoor Sports Festival (now known as the St. Paul Winter Carnival).

G. Oliver’s experiences in the cowboy band are described in Chapters 8 and 10 of my book-in-progress, Finding My Musical Family. I am currently working on the cowboy-free Chapter 20, which covers the Great Depression years when G. Oliver directed the St. Cloud Municipal Boys’ Band.

I hope to see you at one of the events!