As playwright Lance Belville and Gold Record-winner Dolan Ellis drove hundreds of desert backroads together interviewing rodeo women for their collaboration, the well-traveled hit, Cowgirls, Lance heard many a tale of the Old and the New West.

 One haunting story, in particular, that didn’t end up in Cowgirls, stuck with the writer. In 2019 he rounded up his posse—Eric Peltoniemi, Lance’s sidekick and the composer/lyricist of beloved History Theatre folk musicals, Plain Hearts and Down to Earth, new friend Wayne Hamilton, past President of the Minnesota Songwriters Association and tunesmith of more than 70 widely available bluegrass and country songs, and of course, Dolan, drafted to be the buffalo’s balladeer.

 Belville envisioned the play and music set and performed in a well-worn Western dive bar, a honkytonk. He saw a rough and ready Cowboy, a lonely, lovely Widow and a seen-it-all seer, the Trail Boss—all three trying to carve out a moment of light in the Dark and Stormy shadow of a Great Plains beast.

 First staged in “porch performances” in St. Paul in June of 2021 for audiences in sun and rain and the simmer of summer days and now ready to ride up to a watering hole near you.