I know some cowboys will take exception to that last rule but I feel qualified to discuss the matter because I’ve been a bit, spur and spur leather collector since I was a little boy. I have over 250 single spur leathers alone. Now you might ask, “What good is one spur leather?” I could give the old smart-aleck answer and say that if one side of the horse goes the other side will soon follow, but the truth is I collected them so I could copy the styles and tooling patterns and replicate them.
Basically there are three styles of spurs: the “Texas style” which is very much like Texans: bold, strong, very practical, often with swinging buttons and not much gaudy ornamentation. On the other end of the spectrum is the “Californio vaquero style“ that is very flashy with lots of silver and beautiful engraving. Lastly, there’s the “Plains style” which is a crossbred of the Texas and vaquero styles.
In both the Californio and Plain’s traditions the spur leathers often featured an engraved concho and beautiful tooling. You don’t pay for silver conchos and beautiful leathers and then hide them on the inside of your leg so that all your showing is a two dollar buckle. In every pair of spurs I have that came from as far back as the 1800s on those that still have their original leathers the spurs buckle on the inside. IN EVERY CASE! If you need further proof look at old photos of vaqueros and you’ll see great big conchos on the outside of their espuela grandes.
I think it was the great cowboy historian Andy Adams who said, “Any cowboy riding a stud horse who buckled his spurs on the outside would have been shot at early sunrise.”
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