OxLand by Rodney Hoover

The Birth of the Bovinians and the story of OxLand.

This project all started on a fluke while scanning historical family photos to create digital files to share. I had
come across one of my grandfather and his siblings and thought it would be fun to use them as source images for
some new composites, my grandpa would have loved it if he were still with us!

Next was the challenge of creating something for the Columbian Artist Group’s “Dorothy’s Closet” exhibit. I
chose to create a magical “cow” shoe for my grandmother’s new persona, yes her name really was Dorothy,
and I have been character & plot building and just can’t put down the pen ever since.

The story OxLand starts with a visit to my grandfather in a nursing home. Suffering from the early onset of
forgetfulness and dementia, he tells wild and unbelievable stories of the lost colonies of Rockwell and Oronoque,
Kansas and the inhabitants that lived there. While visiting Norton to work on a genealogy project for my family,
We discover an old parchment map folded and left in the back of a county historical book, the interesting thing
was...the faint handwritten notations of “the colony” and “Oronoqe to the west of Norton.

Could the stories of the lost colonies be true... things begin to unfold with the discovery of a buried root cellar,
in the middle of a tract of farmland.

I can’t wait to share the magical story of Oxland, Ms. Dorothy Shoemaker, the Wizard, Zuberi Watusi &
Necromancer, Madam Raven McPhee.