Source: Ron Wilson, 785-532-7690, rwilson@k-state.edu

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

K-STATE'S RON WILSON NAMED AMBASSADOR FOR NATIONAL MULTICULTURAL WESTERN HERITAGE MUSEUM

MANHATTAN -- Ron Wilson, a Kansas cowboy poet and rural development specialist at Kansas State University, has been named the first outreach ambassador of the National Multicultural Western Heritage Museum in Fort Worth, Texas.

"We are pleased to bestow this honor and look forward to a partnership of educating a nation about the positive and important contributions of multicultural peoples to the settling of the American West," said Gloria Reed Austin, executive director and co-founder of the museum.

"I am honored to receive this designation, which is really an opportunity to celebrate the men and women of many cultures who helped build the American West," Wilson said. "From the Buffalo Soldiers to the Spanish vaqueros to Bill Pickett, who invented bulldogging, we find many examples of cowboys of color and Hispanics who enriched Western history."

Wilson is director of the Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development at K-State. He also writes and performs cowboy poetry and studies Western history.

The National Multicultural Western Heritage Museum and Hall of Fame was founded to give recognition to the outstanding pioneers who played a role in settling the early American western frontier. Its primary objective is to provide a true and complete historical perspective of the people and activities that built the special culture of the American West. This includes the contributions of Hispanic Americans, Native Americans, European Americans and African Americans in the settlement of the Western American frontier.

More information on the museum is available at http://www.cowboysofcolor.org or by calling 817-922-9999.

More information about Wilson is available at http://www.ronscowboypoetry.com.