5TH WHEEL TRAINING INSTITUTE

Ranches of the American West

The American ranch embodies a rich architectural tradition that has been passed down through generations of ranchers. This book presents twenty-five of the most spectacular Western ranches, including important historical structures and those designed for today’s newest ranch owners. With three hundred newly commissioned color photographs of ranches in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, California, Oregon, New Mexico, and Texas, the book will appeal to ranch dwellers as well as homeowners inspired by this rustic and romantic architectural style. The original ranches included property for livestock and structures that were built to withstand the natural forces of a harsh climate. Today, as in the past, life in the West means long winters and a need for shelter that encloses and protects. House designs and rooflines mimic the forms of the surrounding foothills and mountains, and today’s ranches often feature reclaimed materials—rubble, abandoned artifacts, cut stone, and forged iron—put to new use. Materials, often cut by hand, are basic and echo those used in past: logs, shingles and shakes, branches, fieldstones, sandstones, and flagstones. The prevalence of renowned architects and interior designers working in the West, as well as an increasing number of celebrity owners, demonstrate that ranch living is popular and on the rise.

Born as war clouds gathered. Alleyton was a key point on the supply line of the Confederate states of America during the Civil War. It was both beginning and end of the cotton road leading to the Confederacy's back door on the Rio Grande River.
By 1860 the Buffalo Bayou Brazos and Colorado Railroad extended from Harrisburg, near Houston to Alleyton. as a railhead. Alleyton became the site of an important cotton station and quartermaster depot during the war.
Cotton came here from north and east Texas. From Louisiana, and from Arkansas on the Rails of the B.B.B.&C. and via wagon roads from Alleyton the South's most precious trading commodity was carried to a point on the Colorado River across from Columbus. It was then ferried across for the start of a long, tortuous journey to the Rio Grande. The bales of cotton were hauled on big-bedded wagons and high-wheeled Mexican carts, pulled by mules horses or oxen.
The cotton road led to Goliad, San Patricio, the King Ranch and finally to Brownsville. The cotton was taken across the river to Matamoros, Mexico and subsequently placed on board ships bound for Europe as the only major gap in the Federal navy blockade of the Confederacy. Neutral Matamoros was the place of exchange for outgoing cotton and imported munitions, clothing and medicine.
When federal forces took Vicksburg in 1863 the Mississippi River was sealed off and the Confederacy divided. the Texas-Mexico trade routes then became the Souths major military supply lines in the Trans-Mississippi west.
Alleyton was a main destination of the wagon trains returning from the Rio Grande. Rifles, swords, shirts, pants, alum, arrowroot and other items needed by soldier and civilian in the harried Confederacy were unloaded here for new destinations.

A fake building at Enchanted Springs Ranch- part of the facade. I rather liked the worn wood, and the strong shadow the wheel cast on the wood. I waited a bit for the sun to move a bit so that the shadow was fully contained within the facade.

This was part of my exploration of shapes, lines, textures, lighting and shadows.

Sophie Edwards is doing just fine alone, until a strange-yet oddly familiar-man rides into her life, insisting on rescuing her and her four daughters. Can she find a way to love a headstrong mountain man? When Clay McClellan discovers his brother has been murdered, he's bent on finding the killers and seeing them properly hung. But first his Christian duty demands that he marry his sister-in-law. After all, Sophie needs someone to protect her - right? Faith and love help unruly wed newlyweds find common ground and a chance at love on the Texas frontier.

Sophie Edwards is doing just fine alone, until a strange-yet oddly familiar-man rides into her life, insisting on rescuing her and her four daughters. Can she find a way to love a headstrong mountain man? When Clay McClellan discovers his brother has been murdered, he's bent on finding the killers and seeing them properly hung. But first his Christian duty demands that he marry his sister-in-law. After all, Sophie needs someone to protect her - right? Faith and love help unruly wed newlyweds find common ground and a chance at love on the Texas frontier.