Rick O’Shay and Hipshot ride again in Stan Lynde exhibit
The Montana Historical Society will have a free grand opening of its new exhibit, “From the Heart: Stan Lynde’s Comic Creations,” from 5-8 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 21, at Montana’s Museum just east of the State Capitol in Helena.
Rick O’Shay and Hipshot will be there and other fans of legendary Montana cartoonist and author Stan Lynde will want to be there too.
The retrospective exhibit features a re-creation of a comic-style Old West town and Lynde’s studio. Artifacts showcase many never-before-seen works from Lynde’s early cartooning years. It also will feature artifacts from his life as a cowboy and Montana promoter, as well as gifts and tributes given him by his fans over the years.
“I’m really excited to share Stan’s passion for the West and to showcase his many talents. We want visitors to feel immersed in Stan’s comic world and my hope is that people walk away with a sense of how much Stan loved Western life and how skilled he was at presenting it to others,” MHS Museum Curator Amanda Streeter Trum said.
Lynde’s comic strips were published for many years in nearly all of the nation’s major newspapers. One of his biggest fans, actor Charlton Heston, wrote an introduction to Lynde’s memoir. Lynde and his wife, Lynda, donated many of his works and artifacts to MHS shortly before he died in 2013.
After studying journalism and art at the University of Montana, Lynde moved to New York to pursue his life-long dream of becoming a cartoonist. In 1958 his career began with his Rick O’Shay strip, which eventually was picked up by 100 newspapers across the nation. Hipshot followed.
In addition to his famous comic strips, Lynde in later life became a novelist and continued to draw on his experiences growing up on an isolated ranch near Lodge Grass to tell the story of the people who pioneered the state of Montana and the West.
Near the end of his life, Lynde wrote these words that came from a heart as big as Montana: “Mine has been a very good journey indeed. May yours contain an abundance of sunshine and pleasure, and only such rain and pain as you may need to provide you with the perfect, balanced life … Hasta luego!”
There will be a tribute to Lynde by family and friends, as well as free “cowboy fare” refreshments at the opening.
“We already knew that Stan was an inspiration for Montanans when he created his comic strips, and I hope that this exhibit will inspire a new generation,” Trum said.
For more information on this and other exhibits, visit mhs.mt.gov.