Home on the Mall

"Before Teddy Roosevelt's time, cowboys had a nasty reputation, thanks to Billy the Kid and other violent outlaws who ran roughshod over the frontier. Buffalo Bill's Wild West shows and late-19th century dime novels combined to recast the cowboy's image as an Anglo-Saxon hero and heir to the Arthurian Knights of the Round Table.
"The curators argue that presidential cowboys have since been perceived as wearing either black or white hats; the ascendant color often correlated with the success or failure of their policies."

In the Los Angeles Times, Irene Lacher reviews "Cowboys and Presidents," a new exhibit at the Autry National Center.