Although Arthur Rothstein grew up in New York City, he developed a great affection for the cowboy lifestyle during extended photo assignments west-of-the-Mississippi. While he was experiencing cowboy culture directly at ranches, feedlots and rodeos, the American public was absorbing the cowboy mythos from radio shows and western movies starring the popular singing cowboys Gene Autry and Roy Rogers. Most Americans didn’t know that these popular western stars were also promoting the Roosevelt administration’s New Deal initiatives through their sophisticated coordination of live performance, multi-media, and merchandising.

Gene Autry called himself a “New Deal Cowboy” because he supported FDR’s programs to improve western states and, in his films, Autry depicted New Deal public infrastructure projects and promoted the West as a vacation destination. His “Cowboy Code” of honesty, fair-dealing, non-discrimination, and support for the downtrodden resonated with the president’s approach to governing. For more on this rich topic, see Michael Duchemin’s remarkable 2016 book, New Deal Cowboy: Gene Autry and Public Diplomacy.