Montana The Magazine of Western History’s editor Diana DiStefano and author Dr. Tracey Hanshew were on hand to receive a Wrangler Award from the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City in April. The ceremony honored individuals who have made significant contributions to Western heritage through creative works in literature, music, television, and film.

The “Outstanding Magazine Article” winning the award was “`Here she comes wearin’ them britches!’ Saddles, Riding Skirts, and Social Reform in the Turn-of-the-Century Rural West,” published in the Winter 2020 issue of “Montana.” This was the eleventh Wrangler Award for the Montana Historical Society’s magazine.

“This is an extremely prestigious award,” Montana editor Diana DiStefano said. “Tracey’s article tells how rugged terrain, and the rough work of ranching, fomented a change in women’s riding styles from sidesaddles to riding astride and contributed to the women’s reform movements in the American West and nationally.” DiStefano goes on to say, “Hanshew examines these changes in saddlery and dress, women’s labor and recreation, and the larger effects on women’s suffrage and civil rights around the turn of the twentieth century.”

Hanshew is an assistant professor of history at Washington State University Tri-Cities. She is the author of Oklahoma Rodeo Women and recipient of the Muriel H. Wright Award from the Oklahoma Historical Society for her article “Rodeo in Oklahoma is Women’s Business: How Lucille Mulhall’s Fame Created Opportunity in Rodeo,” published in the Chronicles of Oklahoma in April 2015.  

To read the Winter 2020 article, check your local library or order a copy from the Montana Historical Society by calling (406) 444-4708.