'Cowboys & Saurians' Combines High Strangeness with Stories of Undiscovered Animals

Cowboys & Saurians: Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Beasts as Seen by the Pioneers, written by John Le May, author of The Real Cowboys & Aliens: UFO Encounters of the Old West, and published in September of 2019, is a collection of accounts from the late 19th and early 20th century detailing encounters with seemingly impossible saurians.

According to the book’s synopsis:

No, this book is not merely about the Tombstone Pterodactyl and the notorious (possibly nonexistent) Thunderbird photo. This book is in fact about every dinosaurian creature to ever have a rifle pointed at it by a cowpoke along the trail. Courtesy of real newspaper articles collected from the Pioneer Period, you’ll marvel as pterodactyls invade Van Meter, Iowa; a plesiosaur attacks spelunkers in Arkansas; and ghost dinosaurs glide across the Badlands of South Dakota!
In the pages ahead you’ll ask yourself: Did Brigham Young really try to catch Utah’s Bear Lake monster? Did a Crow Medicine Man carry an enchanted Meganuera with him to Custer’s Last Stand? Was the first Komodo Dragon discovered in 1910 Indonesia or actually 1883 Indiana? Could the Marfa Lights just be bioluminescent pterodactyls? Did a theropod dinosaur kill a young boy in Crosswicks, Ohio? What was the serpent of San Marcial, New Mexico? And finally, did the Tombstone Pterodactyl live on to terrify Utah in 1903?
Courtesy of newspaper reports of yore, uncover the truth of remnant dinosaurs in the Old West…

LeMay provides a helpful introduction at the beginning of the book to those for whom the idea of remnant dinosaurs might be new, which can be skipped by experienced cryptozoologists already familiar with the subject, before launching directly into the tales of Old West-era monsters with ‘The Pterodactyl of Tombstone.’ New fans and experienced researchers alike will appreciate his approach to the topic, as LeMay provides a nuanced, well-researched history of the controversial story and its associated photograph—which may or may not exist.

This author isn’t afraid to delve into high strangeness, either, and if there are elements thereof existent in an account, LeMay will tell you about them. From the Piasa Bird to the Van Meter Visitor to the Marfa Lights, LeMay offers a wide array of phenomena from off the beaten path. He provides a plethora of sources for each, drawing from historical newspaper accounts and the previous explorations of his fellow cryptozoologists; even peppering the book with the original art and illustrations that went to print, whenever possible.

LeMay doesn’t offer a lot of definitive solutions to the mysteries presented in this book, being content to provide the reader with the tools to make their own determination. These stories are wildly entertaining, but hard facts, let alone proof, are difficult to come by, and LeMay is well aware of the struggle intrinsic to the field. To that end, there’s no agenda here; he’s not trying to sell you a paradigm. The only bill of goods within this book is a batch of intriguing stories, retold with excellent research.

Cowboys & Saurians is a well-researched, open-minded tour of the Old West’s most fantastic tales of saurian encounters; sure to appeal to both new seekers and established cryptozoological researchers alike.

The book is available for purchase through Amazon.

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