READY TO RIDE

"I've wanted to interpret the women of the West for some time. I was pleased that my first subject was Phyllis Preator who delivers the mail in a Pony Express outfit at the time of the annual summer parade in Cody, Wyoming.

"In actuality, there were no female Pony Express riders but there were women who delivered the mail in the frontier days. Had there been women Pony Express riders, they, like the men, would have to be ready for anything, be it inclement weather, robbers or hostile Indians. And they would have definitely have had to be ready to ride-hard, fast and long!

"I enjoy capturing all the different textures of this particular outfit, which Phyllis wears in the mountains-from the leather, buckskin, cloth, wood and steel to the blond hair and tanned flesh. Sugar and spice and everything nice do not constitute the women of the West. I'd like to think that someone as strong as Phyllis does."