"The Lavender Cowboy" was originally a 1923 humorous poem by American pulp editor and publisher Harold Hersey about an unmanly cowboy "with only two hairs on his chest" who comes out a hero. It was then set to music and appeared in the 1930 Western film Oklahoma Cyclone. Several versions have since been recorded.
It has been banned from radio airplay because the lyrics are considered suggestive of homosexuality.[1]
Other versions are somewhat less sympathetic to the hapless wrangler. In one, having failed to impress Nellie, he goes on a binge and breaks into the local saloon at night, "making off with the strawberry gin". This leads to his demise.