Awards: Hall honors Western figures for their life’s work
literature, music, television and film that best portray the history and culture of the American West.
Wrangler Awards, a bronze sculpture of a cowboy on horseback, created by noted Western artist Harold T. “H” Holden of Kremlin, will be presented for works completed in 2015.
This year, Wranglers will be bestowed on creators of Western-genre works in 13 categories and to inductees into the Hall of Great Westerners and the Hall of Great Western Performers as well as the recipient of the Chester A. Reynolds Memorial Award.
Richards said he is “absolutely astounded and deeply honored” to be receiving the Reynolds award.
“I haven’t touched the ground yet. I may write a new book, ‘How to Get a Cowboy to Levitate,’ ” Richards said. “The greatest compliment I can ever receive is when someone calls me a ‘cowboy.’ ”
The 55th annual awards weekend opens at 5:30 p.m. Friday with a cocktail reception, a casual ticketed event honoring award winners and hall of fame inductees. Festivities will include live entertainment by the music honorees, booksigning and autograph sessions, hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar.
Richards said he is planning to play the guitar and sing during the reception, despite being thrown from a horse a month ago, resulting in three broken ribs and a sore back.
“I’m OK. I’ll just be moving a little slower,” Richards said. “I just performed at an event in Portola (California) a week ago with my son, so I know I can do it.”
The black-tie awards dinner and ceremony will begin at 5 p.m. Saturday. “Hell on Wheels” actor Anson Mount and country-western singer Wynonna Judd will serve as presenters for the event.
Great performers
Honorees to be inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers this year include actor/ director Tommy Lee Jones and the late actors Lee Marvin (19241987) and Bob Steele (19071988). To be inducted, actors must have made significant contributions to the perpetuation of the Western film, radio or theatre.
Jones, a Texas native, has received four Academy Award nominations, winning as best supporting actor for his performance as U.S. Marshal Samuel Gerard in the 1993 thriller film “The Fugitive.”
After graduating cum laude from Harvard University in 1969, Jones made his Broadway debut that same year and his film debut the next year in “Love Story.”
Since then, Jones has appeared in more than 63 films and television series, seven of which have been Westerns. He won a Wrangler award in 2006 for “The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada,” a film he starred in, produced and directed.
Born in New York City, Lamont Waltman “Lee” Marvin Jr. began his acting career in the 1950s, portraying vicious characters and heavies in roles of increasing size and importance. Through leading parts in “Eight Iron Men,” “The Big Heat” and “The Wild One,” Marvin became established as a major screen villain.
Marvin received a Wrangler award in 1963 for the film “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” and a best actor Oscar in 1965 for his dual roles in the Western comedy classic “Cat Ballou.”
Born Robert North Bradbury Jr. in Pendleton, Ore., Steele starred in nearly 100 B-Westerns between 1930 and 1946. He began the “Billy the Kid” serials in 1940, appeared as Tucson Smith — one of the “Three Mesquiteers — until 1943 and then worked on the “Trail Blazers” series with Hoot Gibson and Ken Maynard.
After World War II and the advent of television, Steele appeared in a variety of supporting movie roles and in various TV Westerns, including a regular supporting role on the ABC series “F Troop.”
Great Westerners
Two legendary ranchers and cattlemen, the late Enrique E. Guerra (1929-2016), of Linn, Texas, and the late George Lane (1856-1925), of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, will be inducted into the Hall of Great Westerners. People receiving this honor are being recognized for extraordinary achievement and historical significance and must exemplify traditional Western values of honesty, integrity and selfsufficiency.
A respected cattleman, historian/collector and seventhgeneration Texan, Guerra lived on San Vincente Ranch, part of an ancestral land grant, and was affectionately known as “the last Spanish don.” Guerra died unexpectedly on March 16.
Lane was one of the founders of the annual Calgary Stampede celebration and an early proponent of integrating the U.S. and Canadian cattle markets.
Film, music and literary awards
The 2016 Western Heritage film, music and literary award winners are as follows:
“Texas Rising,” A+E Studios, ITV Studios America, and Thinkfactory Media.
“Hell on Wheels,” the “Hungry Ghosts” episode, Entertainment One Television, Nomadic Pictures, Endemol, American Movie Classics, Endemol Entertainment UK, and H.O.W. Productions. “Unbranded,” Fin & Fur Films and Implement Productions.
“Red Steagall Is Somewhere West of Wall Street,” Thunderhead Productions. “Endangered: A Joe Pickett Novel,” by C.J. Box.
“The Western Cattle Trail,” by Gary and Margaret Kraisinger.
“Painted Journeys,” by Peter H. Hassrick and Mindy N. Besaw.
“Laguna Pueblo,” by Lee Marmon and Tom Corbett.
“Texas Tales Illustrated: The Trail Drives,” by Mike Kearby.
“Finding the American West in Twenty-First Century Italy,” by Renee M. Laegreid.
“Woe to the Land Shadowing,” by Red Shuttleworth.
Mary
“Ride a Wide Circle,” by “Singing Songs by Waddie & Pipp,” by Waddie Mitchell and Pipp Gillette.