MANDAN Dakotah Territory--a Western Historical Romance set in the Old West as you always imagined; horses, cowboys, wagons, women, floods, hail storms, grasshoppers, trail dust and guitars.

(Catch the scent of delicate yellow Sweet Clover upon the plains as Eileen Callahan rides aboard the freight wagon driven by old bullwhacker Whiskers Jorgeson. His age and wisdom provide the balance Eileen needs as she searches for the husband that abandoned her and the little one four years earlier.)---Whiskers knelt beside her, lifting her in his arms, holding her against his fatherly chest. "Nah, Ma'am, it ain't called stupid. It's just called green, like them eyes you flash around, that calls every man in seeing distance. Green onliest means you got lessons to learn. Some come easy, Ma'am, but most come mighty damned hard."

(Feel the tide changing in the Missouri River, while aboard the steamboat Turning Bull--and discover the feelings of the dashing riverboat captain, Levi Turnbull.)---"Never," he began slowly, choosing his words as carefully as he chose his course along the ever-changing river, "In my twelve years of wedded bliss have I ever been tempted, Eileen, except for this very moment. And, I somehow feel as if fate has thrown a great sandbar in my way, disallowing every virtuous deed I have performed throughout the course of my life. She is a good woman, like you, and has given me everything, everhything except what you have--little Spring Coleen."

(Stand beside the handsome rancher, a man who has vowed never to love again, as he first meets Eileen at the landing, Yankton, Dakota Territory.)---Stuart knew...if he had been playing a bluff in a hand of stud poker...every man at the table would have called him on it. Disappointment turned his eyes to the color of wet granite. He cleared his throat, squashing a grasshopper with the toe of his boot, knowing she could never be single...looking like that...

To read the First Chapter of "MANDAN Dakotah Territory", click in the upper left on MANDAN D.T....from book. 

Also available: My CD of  
Original Western Music and Cowboy Poetry. Most selections have been performed at Cowboy Poetry Gatherings across the West, (North Dakota, Montana, Nebraska, Minnesota, Nevada) in front and alongside of many of todays Top Notch Poets and Musicians. Email to order. $10.00 includes postage.--It's been a great ride so far, but the best is yet to come!

(poem from within the covers of MANDAN Dakotah Territory)

     WEST RIVER AMEN       (C)  1995                                                                                        A cowboy prays for simple things, sun and grass and rain,                                            -       A healthy heard of cattle, Lord, a wheat bin filled with grain.                                            -  A woman who will hold him tight, a fast, two-stepping band,                                         -    And children he can teach with pride--the meaning of the land.                                      -     A pair of boots with leather soles, a hat that fits his head,                                           -         A place to hang his gun at night when it comes time for bed,                                           -    A gentle horse with fiery eyes, stamina and speed,                                                           -   A hand-made saddle, tooled and dyed to cinch upon his steed.                                   -   Lord make me the kind of gal a cowboy needs to hold,                                                  -  Make silver conchas of my eyes and ears of Black Hills Gold.                                        -   With feet that dance and hair so thick it billows in the wind,                                          -   And carve my mind of Cottonwood so it knows how to bend.                                          -Make my skin a silken scarf with leather for my soul,                                                       - And resin up my heartstrings so his fingers can't let go,                                                     -And help me raise his children, Lord, to know and love the land,                                     -And please make them all cowboys with a South Dakota Brand.                                       -     

In the meantime you can reach me at my e-mail address: Blanche@BlancheEvridge.com or at b_evridge@yahoo.com

In brief, you should know the following about me: I was born breathing the Clover-scented dust of the Great Plains of South Dakota where my great-grandparents homesteaded in the late 1800's, and later my grandparents also homesteaded. My mother and grandmother were also born there--close to the Bismarck to Deadwood Trail which is nearby to where the Great Medicin Man Sitting Bull was born and killed. With four generations of prairie history galloping through my viens, MANDAN Dakotah Territory rolls across the pages in graphic precision of places and people who have long awaited the chance to tell their tales. 

This photo copy was
purchased from the
Montana Historical
Society from the
copyrighted F.J.Haynes
Collection, entitled:  
Bull Freight Team, Crook
City, Dakota Territory,
1877, by F.J.Haynes,
H-135                 The "Bull Team" part of
this photo was edited out
and used as the Main
Picture on my novel's
cover:
MANDAN 
Dakotah Territory.