Editor’s note: This week, writer Davalynn Spencer Norris Burkes is filling in.
Back when flip phones were new, I worked as a police reporter, photographer, and religion page editor for Colorado’s The Cañon City Daily Record. Life was never dull.
But I wanted to be a novelist.
Writing reports satisfied my desire to be more creative, and my newspaper’s “Back to the Past” section often led me to dig into the local history museum for all sorts of fascinating facts.
Like the story of the Utes in the 1860s who ran away with a settler’s child. The mother quickly retrieved her son and traded him for a tray of freshly baked biscuits. Another settler, camping along the Arkansas River, dropped his gun on a rock in his fire pit and shot himself.
Who needs fiction?
Apparently I did, because all of these 19th century stories awakened a writer’s heart in me. I began developing the historical novel series “The Cañon City Chronicles.”
No gold was ever found in Cañon City, but its fertile fields and orchards provided gold for miners in Cripple Creek, Leadville, and elsewhere. And the gold, most important of all, trickled down the mountain ravines in yellow aspen trees, reflecting the character of the brave souls who populated the town.
Such background details made it into my first book in the series, Loving the Horseman. The same goes for the part about the guy who shot himself.
Over time, the fictional Hutton family developed against the backdrop of actual local events such as the Royal Gorge Wars and the Bone Wars. One book mentions Old Mose, a famous grizzly bear, and uses moving pictures or flickers shot in the area in the early 1900s.
Most of the characters in these books are my own creations, but others sneak up on me when I’m not looking and leave me feeling like I’ve met them before and just can’t remember when or where.
One of these characters fits into the latter category – a little cowboy named Kip.
He is the youngest of three brothers and the follower. The one who is mostly left out.
Recently I realized where I met Kip, even though that wasn’t his real name. He was a student from my other life as a sixth grade teacher – my Dandelion Cowboy.
Every morning he stood in a line outside my classroom with the other students from the first period. However, he was not quite like the other students.
With his Wranglers and worn cowboy boots, he wasn’t dressed like the others.
As a blonde among dark-haired children, he stood out inconspicuously, even though he tried very hard not to.
But in the spring, when the dandelions sprout, he is often at the front of the line with a short-stemmed bouquet of flowers and a shy smile.
The little cowboy was a loner. Perhaps a throwback to a long line of people who preferred the company of their horse and a good view of the herd.
I only realized he was Kip afterward, after he had become a popular supporting character in books 4, 5, and 6 of my series.
Today, when I see a piece of what most people call weed, I wonder if my Dandelion Cowboy has remained true to his habit despite the quantity.
I like to imagine that he embodies a verse from the New Testament that says, “Of course, I am not seeking approval from men, but from God” (Galatians 1:10 NLT).
And maybe there’s a bit of me in Grace Hutton, the main character in Book 6, when she says about her favorite nephew Kip: “That boy could smile the sun out of the sky.”
Davalynn Spencer is the author of the award-winning, inspirational western series The Cañon City Chronicles, 14 other novels, and a devotional for women. You can reach her through her website at www.davalynnspencer.com.
Contact Norris Burkes via voicemail at (843) 608-9715 or email at [email protected]. Mail should be sent to 10566 Combie Rd. Suite 6643 Auburn, CA 95602.
