The story
Elko National Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Elko
The National Cowboy Poetry Gathering is a six-day celebration of cowboy poetry, music, and Western ranching culture held each January in Elko, Nevada. Founded in 1985 with backing from the National Endowment for the Arts, it began as the Elko Cowboy Poetry Gathering and has since grown into the signature event of the Western Folklife Center, drawing ranchers, poets, and musicians from across the working West.
Cowboy poetry existed long before it had a stage of its own, passed among ranch hands as a way to turn long, isolated days of herding cattle into shared stories, jokes, and rhythmic verse recited around bunkhouses and campfires.