From the Santa Fe New Mexican, 10 June 1963.
Taos lost one of its best known citizens Saturday, when Doughbelly Price passed away. Perhaps the best obituary of Doughbelly would be the introduction to the book he published in 1960, titled "Short Stirrups," introduction by Richard Hubler.
"In Taos, N.M., lived Doughbelly Price, a man who for 50 years has made his living by being a character.
"He has been a cowpuncher, bootlegger, petty thief, champion rodeo rider, short order cook, gambler, short change artist, con man, carnival grifter, unorthodox real estate agent and champion of human rights.
"A pugnacious little man in high heels, he has never gotten over the fact that nature sawed him a little short. As a cowboy and champion bronc rider, the fact that the stirrups had always to be taken up on all the bad horses he has ever ridden; has been an everlasing tragedy to Doughbelly.
"Because he was cut to bantum size, he has spent a lifetime in trying to prove he was a man, and with a masculine margin to spare. The shocking ins-and-outs of his lifetime formed the gist of this bronc rider's testament.
"But it is in the telling that makes this book a delight. Its orthography belongs to Doughbelly by right of invention. Its use, and abuse of words, punctuation, grammar and spelling--and above all, its unmatched turn of phrase--are all his. No meddling editor has touched him. To do so would be to desecrate a masterpiece of primitive Americana."
Doughbelly Price had sojourned in Taos since that unlucky hour when a bronc took final revenge on him by landing on his leg. From bootlegger, during the prohibition era, to restaurant owner and finally New Mexico's most ubiquitous real estate agent, he traveled from problem child to mellowed respesctability.
That he would name his real estate office "Doughbelly's Clip Joint" is not at all astonishing. What is astonishing is the renown that has gathered around this bucolic philosopher. His weekly column, of pungent wit and acid utterance, written in his scrambled vernacular, appeared in the Taos News and earlier in El Crepusculo. It attracted a wide readership, but Doughbelly's dressing-down and raising-Ned was a phony.
The name Doughbelly, which was the only first name Price was known by for years, was the result of years as a cow camp cook. Price said he always had a "round little belly" which was usually covered with flour and dough from rubbing against the kitchen table or chuck wagon tail gate where he made biscuits.
Price spelled the name "doughBelly".
It should be noted that the quotation from the introduction to Short Stirrups contains substantial material not actually found in the book, and the solecisms of punctuation and spelling were introduced by the newspaper's extracting.