Join the Tulsa City-County Library’s “Blacks on the Oklahoma Frontier” virtual event on Thursday, June 10, 2021 from 6:00-8:00 p.m. to learn about the history of Black cowboys, cowgirls, and rodeo in the Black towns of Oklahoma through an interview with Marcous Friday, African American professional rodeo announcer, and Keith Ryan Cartwright, author of Black Cowboys of Rodeo.

Watch the virtual event here!

Black Cowboys of Rodeo is a collection of one hundred years of stories, told by these revolutionary Black pioneers themselves and set against the backdrop of Reconstruction, Jim Crow, segregation, the civil rights movement, and eventually the integration of a racially divided country.

Keith Ryan Cartwright is a communications specialist for the Rutherford County Board of Education in Tennessee, an adjunct professor at Middle Tennessee State University, and a journalist. He previously served as editorial director and senior writer for Professional Bull Riders Inc. and is the author of Professional Bull Riders: The Official Guide to the Toughest Sport on Earth. His newest book, Black Cowboys of Rodeo (Nebraska, 2021) will be published this November.