{"id":240,"date":"2011-07-01T08:57:52","date_gmt":"2011-07-01T15:57:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/?p=240"},"modified":"2011-07-01T10:03:43","modified_gmt":"2011-07-01T17:03:43","slug":"jess-tharp-fourth-of-july-36-years-ago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/?p=240","title":{"rendered":"Jess Tharp — Fourth of July, 36 Years Ago"},"content":{"rendered":"

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In the middle of June 1975, Laurelei Mullens, Modesto Bee features editor, sent me to south Modesto to photograph Jess Tharp, an 80-year-old cowboy saddle maker.\u00c2\u00a0 Mullens was doing an advance story for the big Modesto Independence Day Parade.\u00c2\u00a0 She wanted to do the story about Tharp because he would be the oldest rider in the parade and had been making and repairing saddles for over half a century.<\/p>\n

When Tharp returned home in 1919 after serving our country in World War I, he changed careers.\u00c2\u00a0 Before the war, he had been a full time cowboy.\u00c2\u00a0 After the war he was offered $35 and beans for breaking horses, a job that had paid twice as much before the war.\u00c2\u00a0 He said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Forgit it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 From 1922 on, he would be a saddle maker.\u00c2\u00a0 He got his start in a saddletree shop in Utah.<\/p>\n

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Jess\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s saddle shop in Modesto was full of smells that were familiar to me.\u00c2\u00a0 I grew up in my father\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s shoe repair business.\u00c2\u00a0 Golub\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Shoe Repair smelled of freshly tanned leather just like this saddle shop.\u00c2\u00a0 There was a heavy coat of dust that came from shaving leather and the tools were similar to those I played with as a kid. \u00c2\u00a0To see Jess’s images on Photoshelter click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Jess took cheerful pride in the saddle he was going to use in the 4th<\/sup> of July parade.\u00c2\u00a0 He used a saddletree that was older than he was, made in 1882.\u00c2\u00a0 He restored the saddle the year before, but this would be the first time he used it since the restoration.<\/p>\n

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He told me he would be the oldest rider in the parade and would wear his 60-year-old spurs, saying \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve rode many broncs with those spurs since 1915.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

Jess gave me a quick lesson in hand tooling.\u00c2\u00a0 He let me practice making an acorn pattern on a scrap of leather.<\/p>\n

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He hand tooled the Main & Winchester trademark on the fender of the saddle. The Main & Winchester Saddlery was one of the best known among the Old West Saddleries.\u00c2\u00a0 They were a San Francisco based business that started up during the Gold Rush of 1849.<\/p>\n

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When asked why he kept on working into his later years he said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153If I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d just sit down and do nothing. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d be a mess.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Sure, I worked as a cowboy for three years steady, getting $70 a month for breaking horses, but that was before the war.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

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Jess works a hand-operated cutting machine for making leather strips to be used as reins and other rigging.<\/p>\n

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Special sewing machine is used to groove and stitch leather reins together.\u00c2\u00a0 Being in Jess\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s saddle shop was like going back in time.\u00c2\u00a0 Jess told me about his days in Colorado when he carried a .32-20 Colt in his chaps pocket.\u00c2\u00a0 \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It was one of the long barreled jobs.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

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On the cantle of the saddle was the original trademark.\u00c2\u00a0 Jess\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s pride and craftsmanship reminded me of my father and the shoemakers that worked with him.\u00c2\u00a0 I know my craftsmanship and sense of pride for my photography comes from what I learned from my father.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the middle of June 1975, Laurelei Mullens, Modesto Bee features editor, sent me to south Modesto to photograph Jess Tharp, an 80-year-old cowboy saddle maker.\u00c2\u00a0 Mullens was doing an advance story for the big Modesto Independence Day Parade.\u00c2\u00a0 She … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,82,164,190,4,1,28],"tags":[258,126,131,6,95,263,89,48,266,26,38,261,133,127,264,259,25,260,267,257,268,270,192,128,31,154,330,262,35,32,47,37,265,269,29],"class_list":["post-240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-california-west","category-cowboy","category-gold-rush","category-historical","category-news","category-news-assignments","category-photography","tag-258","tag-beef","tag-boots","tag-california","tag-camera","tag-cantle","tag-cattle","tag-chaps","tag-colt","tag-cowboys","tag-cows","tag-craftsmanship","tag-dust","tag-fence-al-golub","tag-fender","tag-fourth-of-july","tag-horses","tag-independence-day","tag-jess-tharp","tag-july-02","tag-leather","tag-leatherwork","tag-modesto","tag-nature","tag-outdoors","tag-parade","tag-photography","tag-reins","tag-riding","tag-roping","tag-saddle","tag-spring","tag-stirrup","tag-tanning","tag-western"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golubphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}