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COWBOYS LIKE IT COMFORTABLE
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Under the influence of strong Texas bourbon, they would ride by with guns barking, and then N. Porter would discover bullet holes in his fine, laboriously-built saddles. So he went underground, digging a pit where his saddles could rest safely out of gun range.
Newton Porter moved to Abilene in 1881, then to Phoenix in 1895. The firm was known as the N. Porter Saddle fe? Harness Co. That is still its official corporate name and the source of occasional confusion. When Porters decided to install a line of men's suits and sent its initial order in to an Eastern manufacturer, signing it "N. Porter Saddle 6? Harness Co.," a pO' lite letter came back inquiring if some mistake had been made.
N. Porter died in 1906. His son, Earl, took over, and when he died, another son, Fred Porter, Sr., sueceeded him. Then the grandsons came home from World War II, and moved into active command. Harold Porter is manager at Tucson, Bill Porter is manager of Saddle Manufacturing and Mail Order, Fred Porter, Jr., is manager at Phoenix and Joe Porter is assistant manager there. The business grew and branched out, with the main object to corral the lush trade of Eastern dudes who swarm to the warm Arizona desert to escape frost' bite and chilblains.
Recently the Porter brothers opened up a new women's sportswear department on the second floor of their Phoenix store. They installed Arizona's first escalator leading up to it, an enchanting gadget to some of the old hands from the Lazy Bar L, who hadn't even got entirely accustomed
to elevators yet. The display cases upstairs are lined with expensive unborn calfskin trimmed with lariat rope, and the Western flavor is carried out even unto the door at one end labeled "Cow Girls."
But the cowboy trade is still the backbone of Porters' business, and Porters isn't forgetting it. The front part of the main floor in the Phoenix store is decorated prettily in pastel colors. But the back portion, where the saddle and harness department is located, has been kept almost selfconsciously plain, with just enough disarray to make a cowboy feel at home. And there is still the convenient side door where the cowpoke can come in without having to mingle with the rich dudes at the front door and have dirty old mink rub off on him.
WILL ROGERS traded at Porters and said he felt like "a kid in a toy shop." It's not unusual to see celebrities prowling happily amidst the counters at Porters, ignoring the worshipful stares of dudes and townsfolk. The firm has numbered among its customers such movie personalities as Clark Gable, Gregory Peck, Gary Cooper, Wayne Morris, Tom Mix and Buck Jones, and, of course, the ehte of the rodeo world.
Gary Cooper, browsing through the Phoenix store one day with Eugene Pallette, the roly-poly character player of many Westerns, inquired idly if "some of the old-time cowboys" were still around Arizona.
"Sure," replied Fred Porter, Sr., and pointed to a gnarled old cowhand lounging against a counter. "There's one. Want to meet him?"