The cowboy culture of Hollywood is not the cowboy culture of America -- the thousands of Black, Hispanic and Indigenous cowboys and cowgirls living in ranches and participating in rodeos across the nation can attest to that. Over the years, the true history of cowboys has been whitewashed, and only a handful of riding clubs are keeping it alive.
The members of Circle L 5, the oldest Black riding club in Texas, have been living the cowboy lifestyle since the club was founded in 1951, and despite the racism and prejudice they have encountered over the years, Marcellous "Mo" Anderson, the club's president, told ABC News that "anyone who wants to ride, is welcome to ride" on their turf.
What Wild West movies don't show is that African Americans have always been an integral part of cowboy culture. Some experts have even argued that the term "cowboy" was first used exclusively to describe Blacks, as white owners often referred to Black slaves as "boys" -- a derogatory term.
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