The most famous gunfight in the history of the West took place on October 26, 1881, in a vacant lot behind the OK Corral in Tombstone, Arizona. Anyone who’s seen the movies/TV series, or read any of the uncounted books knows that the winners were legendary gunman Wyatt Earp, his brothers Morgan and Virgil, and their friend, a shady, alcoholic dentist known as Doc Holliday. But who were the losers? Did they deserve to die as they did? Let’s take a closer look.
Ike and Billy Clanton were two of three brothers from a small ranching family. Ike, the elder, wasn’t the brightest light in the candelabra. Known as a loudmouth who liked to drink and gamble, he was also a hard worker. Younger brother Billy was still in his teens.
Tom and Frank McLaury, also small ranchers, were known to be honest and respectable. They’d made good money selling cattle to the army, but were planning to move away because of the growing Apache problems. Their only fault, it appears, was being good friends with the Clantons.
A complicated trail of events led up to the gunfight. It started when some stolen government mules were found on the McLaury ranch. Tom and Frank were away at the time and it was later proven that a friend had left them there. Tom and Frank were never charged but the Earps publicly branded them as thieves. Other incidents and accusations followed, fueling the bad blood.
On the night of October 25, Tom McLaury and Ike Clanton rode into Tombstone. Ike planned to buy supplies for his ranch and find a card game. Tom was there to settle his accounts prior to moving away. In the saloon, Ike ran into Doc Holliday, drunk and spoiling for a fight. Doc began baiting Ike and challenged him to a gunfight. He was soon joined by Wyatt Earp (photo) and his two brothers. The slow-witted Ike fought back with the only weapon he had, his mouth. He shouted that he and his friends would come looking for the Earps and Holliday, and they would have to fight.
Fade to the next day. After more blustering and baiting, Frank McLaury and young Billy Clanton rode into town, unaware of what had happened. When Frank was told, he tried to calm things down and get Ike and his brother out of town, but it was too late. Like a giant clock, fate moved the players toward the final confrontation. Here’s how the two sides stacked up.
Carrying guns was patently illegal in town. But Morgan and Virgil Earp were both peace officers. They’d deputized Wyatt and Doc Holliday, so all were legally armed. All of them had pistols, and Doc also carried a deadly sawed-off shotgun.
Billy Clanton had a pistol and had been told he could keep it because he and Ike were leaving town. Frank McLaury also had a pistol, which he was about to turn over to Sheriff John Behan. Ike Clanton and Tom McLaury were unarmed.
The Earps and Doc walked onto the scene with their guns drawn. Ike put up his hands and Tom opened his vest, both declaring they weren’t armed. But the Earps and Doc opened fire. Frank and Billy fired back in self defense.
When the shooting ended thirty seconds later, Frank McLaury was dead. Tom and Billy were mortally wounded. Virgil Earp had been shot in the leg; Morgan had a bad shoulder wound, and Doc was winged. Ironically, the only member of the “Clanton Gang” to escape unscathed was Ike, who knocked Wyatt Earp off balance and fled.
There’s a lot more to this story. I’ve cut some wide corners for the sake of brevity. If you have any corrections or anything to add, I’d welcome your comments. Did Wyatt Earp deserve all his “fame and glory?” What do you think?
I thought it might be fun to run an occasional (once a year or so) blog that highlights western movies, TV, music and any other cowboy news of interest. So here it is, folks. All the western news that’s fit to print and maybe even some that ain’t. Let me know what you think.
Mother Nature Will Make or Break Three Montana Ranching Families in this New Series-
A new documentary series The Last American Cowboy profiles three Montana cattle-ranching families. Freak storms, deadly diseases, forest fires and hungry predators are just some of the challenges these families will battle in the weeks ahead. Who knew that ranch life could be this tough? Love the show but not so much the name. The last cowboy? It airs Mondays at 10 p.m. on Animal Planet.
Look who just landed in the Cowboy Hall of Fame!
Tom Selleck was recently inducted into the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma for his body of work—and what a body it is. His work ain’t bad either. He’s starred in such favorites as the The Sackets, Quigley Down Under, The Shadow Riders and Last Stand at Saber River.
Known for his witty charm, craggy face and sparkling eyes he looked great in his Hawaiian duds, but he’s a natural in cowboy boots and hat. On or off the screen, Tom is the real McCoy Not only did he do many of his own stunts, he enjoys puttering around his 63 acre ranch (although now that I’ve seen The LastCowboy holding down the fort is more like it). His many acting awards include an Emmy and Golden Globe, but he claims none meant more than this one. “I don’t think for an actor who works in westerns there is a bigger thrill,” says Tom. That’s our boy.
The Old West has Gone Virtual
If you’re a fan of video games (and even if you’re not) you might want check out this trailer for “Red Dead Redemption.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEMxSUGZ6TU. Okay, so it’s not how we played cowboys and Indians, and John Wayne is nowhere in sight, but the old west is looking pretty good—even if it’s only virtual. (Warning this game is R rated)
Mark your Calendars:
Hee-Haw! July 24th is the National Day of the Cowboy and we fillies plan to celebrate big time.
An outlaw calls a man out for tampering with his horse – only to find out there’s nary a pistol in town. You can’t have a showdown with an unarmed man! This north of the border Wild West tale had me in stitches!
I love Paul Gross. Love him. I loved him in Due South and I was so impressed with Passchendaele (despite the Oscar ending rather than the Hollywood ending, and yes, I’m still bitter about that). So when I heard that he was in a new movie – and that he played an outlaw – I knew that I had to see it. So one afternoon my writer friend Julianne MacLean and I headed to the theatre to sneak in a matinee.
Gross plays The Montana Kid, who after a failed attempt at being hanged (never hang a man from a dead tree branch) ends up in Barclay’s Brush. He doesn’t realize he’s crossed the border into Canada, and his mere presence puts the town’s residents (all dozen or so of them) in a state of excitement. Within minutes he’s challenged the town smithy to a shootout – except Mr. Montana Kid has the only pistol in town. Well, almost. You see, the widow Jane has a pistol. It’s broken, but wouldn’t you know it’s the blacksmith that sets out to fix it. In the meantime, Jane exchanges the pistol for some hard labour on the farm. The Montana Kid is dirty. I mean really dirty. And he’s rough around the edges. And of course, there’s a bounty on him.
It has all the making of a gritty western, but it’s not. It’s firmly tongue in cheek. If there’s one thing we seem to be able to do in Canada, it’s not take ourselves too seriously. So when the Kid gets cleaned up, it’s hard not to snicker when he reappears from the Chinese laundry wearing this:
It takes a special kind of man to get away with that particular shade of purple. And silk. Especially with the long hair.
Come to find out his real name is Sean, and this hardened outlaw is no match for Jane, played by Sienna Guillory. Add in the town doctor, who is very adept at removing bullets from posteriors, an unflappable Indian (played by the always wonderful Graham Greene) and a host of Mounties (including one particularly fresh-faced man in red serge who is quite sweet on Jane as well) and there are some true gems. We have horses and donkeys, a sweet school marm and a pair of bumbling “boys” quite awestruck at having a real live outlaw in their midst.
And yes – we must get back to the baddie. I was thrilled to see that Callum Keith Rennie was playing Ben Cutler. I like Callum a lot – most recently as Leoben in Battlestar Galactica and as Lew Ashby in Californication.
It goes without saying that two things needed to happen in this movie – there has to be a shootout, and the guy has to get the girl.
Check out the trailer if you don’t believe me. I guarantee you’ll have a giggle!
Not much happened in the telegraphy office of the St. Louis-San Francisco railroad, especially not on the late shift. To pass the time, the young clerk brought his guitar and played to amuse himself. On one of those lonely nights, he received a visitor. That visitor was legendary humorist Will Rogers, and Rogers liked what he heard from a young man called Orvon Gene Autry.
The chance meeting launched a career spanning six decades that included 640 records with over 100 million copies sold. And that’s just the start of it. Gene Autry starred in 95 movies, had a long running radio program, and produced and starred in his own television show. When he retired from Hollywood, he went on to own the California Angels and KTLA, a Los Angeles television station. He’s also the only entertainer to have five stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for every category established by the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce. No wonder he’s on a postage stamp honoring Hollywood cowboys!
His success was quite a leap for the young man born Sept. 29, 1907 in Tioga, Texas. At the age of five, Gene’s preacher-grandfather taught him to sing. His mother encouraged her son’s interest in music with hymns and folks songs. Gene was 12 when he bought his first guitar for $8 out of the Sears Catalog. After graduating from high school, he took the telegraphy job that led to his chance meeting with Will Rogers.
Rogers advised him to purse a career in show business, and a year later Gene went to New York to audition for RCA Victor. He didn’t win immediate favor. An executive told him to come back when he’d gotten more experience, and Gene did just that. He returned in six months and made his first recording, “My Dreaming of You” with a flipside of “My Alabama Home.”
In 1929 he signed with Columbia Records and went on to star in “National Barn Dance,” a popular show on a Chicago radio station. By the 1930s, he was one of the most beloved country singers in America, and his sales proved it. Gene Autry earned the first Gold Record ever awarded. No wonder he’s known as “America’s Favorite Singing Cowboy.”
Movies came next for Gene. He first appeared on the screen in 1934, but the film that made him a star was “Tumbling Tumbleweeds” in 1935. It led to several more “singing cowboy” movies, produced by Republic Pictures at a rate of a movie every six weeks. By 1937, Gene was rated a top box office attraction in the class of Clark Gable, Mickey Rooney and Spencer Tracy.
In addition to the movies, Gene had a radio presence. His “Melody Ranch” show aired from 1940 to 1956. Just about everyone knew the words to Back in the Saddle Again. When television became the main source of family entertainment, Gene was the first major movie star to make the shift. He produced and starred in the Gene Autry Show for six years.
The stats for Gene Autry go on and on, but there are two things he’s known for that don’t have a number attached. One of those things is “Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer.” Gene recorded this Christmas song in 1949, and it’s a true American Classic.
The second is even more fitting for Petticoats & Pistols, a blog dedicated to western romance. Gene Autry is credited with “The Cowboy Code.” Here is it:
1. A cowboy never takes unfair advantage – even of an enemy.
2. A cowboy never betrays a trust. He never goes back on his word.
3. A cowboy always tells the truth.
4. A cowboy is kind and gentle to small children, old folks, and animals.
5. A cowboy is free from racial and religious intolerances.
6. A cowboy is always helpful when someone is in trouble.
7. A cowboy is always a good worker.
8. A cowboy respects womanhood, his parents and his nation’s laws.
9. A cowboy is clean about his person in thought, word, and deed.
10.A cowboy is a Patriot.
If that doesn’t sum up what it means to be a western hero, I don’t know what does.
The Singing Cowboy stamps go on sale Saturday, April 17th. It’s fitting the official unveiling will be at the Autry National Center in the Museum of the American West in Los Angeles.
Published at April 14th, 2010 in category Western Movies
William S. Hart was one of the first great stars of the silent screen motion picture western. (read oh, so carefully to find a chance to win my May 1st release Wildflower Bride-I just got my author’s copies and I’M SUPER EXCITED AND IN THE MOOD TO SHARE!)
Westerns with their classic situations – the fight in the saloon, the faithful horse, the dude who goes west, the sheriff who cleans up the town, the showdown, the trip west in a covered wagon — what are now considered film clichés were first introduced to film audiences in 1914 with the arrival of William Surrey Hart.
Hart was a stage actor until the age of 49. At that age, after a long career of playing Shakespearean theater in the United States and England, he headed for Hollywood and silent films. And—get this—he made 65 films in the next eleven years. How’s that for productive, huh?
When he got to Hollywood, Hart was disgusted by the “pretty boy” Westerns that were currently being produced. He began directing and acting in his own productions. His films reflected his rugged vision of the West. Hart often used real Indians, gamblers, prostitutes, and saloon entertainers in films.
The themes of his films generally relied upon a “transformation,” where the love of a good woman, a “Sunbonnet Sue” tamed the wild man and transformed him into the man of virtue we knew him to be all along. And now, aren’t we all still in love with that formula in romance novels, huh?
Sometimes the roles were switched: Hart as the noble cowboy who tames the bad girl. Often the bad-woman-turned-good redeemed herself by dying for her man, stepping in front of him to take the bullet. How come the man gets to be transformed but the woman has to die? Huh? Ask yourself that?
But by the late ‘teens, Hart, now sixty saw his career wane in popularity. Hart’s age and unwillingness to tamper with the formula was supplanted by Tom Mix, with his “action and excitement spiced with a boyish sense of fun.” Westerns began catering to an increasingly younger audience, and Hart faded from view.
Disheartened, Hart retired from the screen, only to try one last comeback in 1925 with, Tumbleweeds. The film was only a minor success. Hart retired from films, making one last public appearance in 1940 with a sound prologue to a re-issued Tumbleweeds. Just listen for a few minutes to William S. Hart in the clip below. He has a fantastic voice. You can easily believe he was trained in Shakespearean theater.
William S. Hart, the Western matinee idol of the silent screen died June 23, 1946 in Los Angeles. On April 17, 2010, the United States Postal Service will release a series of four stamps, Cowboys of the Silver Screen. Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, and Tom Mix, and William S. Hart
And now here’s your chance to get your name in the drawing for a signed copy of Book #3 in the Montana Marriages series, Wildflower Bride. Have you ever seen a silent movie? I’ve seen clips. Usually a charging train, belching smoke, scary piano music in the background. Simple question, yes or no. If it’s yes, tell me about it.
Published at April 13th, 2010 in category Western Movies
”I was born a cowboy, have lived as a cowboy and will die a cowboy,” Tom Mix liked to say and he was as good as his word–or was he? I’ll let you be the judge. Born in Texas, Tom grew up on a ranch near El Paso. In his teens, he ran away and joined the circus and later fought in the Mexican Revolution, joining Pacho Villa’s army. He was saved within an inch of his life from being shot by a firing squad. Undaunted, he fought in Cuba, China and both sides of the Boer War—and had the medals to prove it. As a sheriff and Texas Ranger he was shot by horse thieves and Indians, and single-handedly captured…
Hold Your Horses This is beginning to read like fiction—which of course, it was. Some was made up by his publicists, some by Tom, himself. The stories of his life are so convoluted that even his biographers have trouble separating fact from fiction. The ironic part is that his real life was even more interesting that his made-up life, but this was Hollywood and, back in the early days, they wanted their cowboys to be real and their heroes to be, well, heroes.
Will the Real Tom Mix Please Stand up?
www.b-westerns.com
Thomas Hezikiah Mix was born in Pennsylvania in 1880, the son of a lumberman. He reportedly never liked his middle name and always signed his name Tom E. Mix, E for Edwin. When Tom was nine, his family moved to Dubois, where his father worked as handyman and stable man. Tom loved hanging around the stables and, after seeing Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, decided he wanted to be a cowboy.
www.b-westerns.com
At 18 he joined the army to fight in the Spanish American war but saw no action. He reenlisted but went AWOL after marrying his first wife and was listed as a deserter, though the Army never pursued him or, for that matter, discharged him.
As far as anyone knew, he was never more than an honorary Texas Ranger. Richard D. Jensen writes in The Amazing Tom Mix: The Most Famous Cowboy of the Movies that Tom worked as a night marshal in Oklahoma territory rounding up bootleggers. This appears to be the extent of his lawman days except on screen.
He eventually joined the Miller Brothers 101 Wild West Show. His big break came when he landed a job as a bronc buster in the movie Ranch Life in the Great Southwest. His action based sequence started him on the road to box office success.
What About All those Gun Wounds?
Though he was never shot by Indians or desperados except on screen, he was in actuality shot twice—once when he was 12 and once by his fourth wife. The first time occurred while he and a friend were playing with a pistol. Since his family couldn’t afford a surgeon the bullet remained in his leg for years before it was removed. This episode may have had something to do with his dropping out of school and having only a fourth grade education.
www.b-westerns.com
As for being shot by his fourth wife: According to a 1933 Berkeley Daily newspaper, his wife shot him through the shoulder, claiming self-defense. Tom Mix testified that he was shot after “I came home and threw a gigolo out of our place.” Apparently Tom didn’t learn his lesson as went on to marry a fifth time.
King of Cowboys
The first to be called King of Cowboys, Tom Mix made an estimated 300 movies including nine talkies and eventually wrote and directed his own films. He was the highest paid western actor of the times, making in excess of $17,000 a week. Known for his fancy high hats, he reportedly owned over 600 pairs of custom-made boots. Tom’s horse Tony was almost as famous as his owner. Tony died following a hip injury and was replaced by Tony II.
Though Tom’s heroic real life claims were mostly fabricated, on screen he was the real McCoy His movies were full of action and no one could match his daredevil stunts, which he did himself. Not only did he jump off horses, fall off trains and face real bullets, he suffered as many as 80 injuries during his career, including knife wounds, broken ribs, and a near fatal brush with dynamite.
Tom’s death in 1940 was almost as strange as his life. During an Arizona traffic accident a metal suitcase in his car hit him on the head causing fatal injuries. He was 60 years old. His popularity continued for most of the ‘40s through his radio show and comic books.
Two years to the date of his death, his faithful horse Tony II died. We can only imagine what kind of tall tale Tom would have spun from that.
Almost two years ago my husband and I adopted a dog from an organization that rescues abandoned animals. His name is Hartley and he’s a Jack Russell / Beagle mix. He’s a tad bit . . . odd. He licks furniture (gross), and he’s terrified of little girls. Little boys don’t bother him at all. The poor dog doesn’t know how to chase a ball or play “Fetch,” but he plays catch by pushing the ball with his nose for a distance of about a foot. We roll it back and he’s happy.
More than once, my husband has looked at our beloved mutt and said, “Hartley, you’re no Rin Tin Tin.”
That got me thinking about the famed German Shepherd who starred in the 1950’s TV show, “The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin.” In the show, Rin Tin Tin belongs to a boy named Rusty who’s been orphaned in an Indian raid. The boy and dog are adopted by the soldiers at Fort Apache and the adventure begins.
The series was only one of Rin Tin Tin’s Hollywood credits. His fame goes back to films from the 1920s when he stared in several movies, many of them with western settings. His continued to star in movies up through the 1940s, then moved to television.
The first Rin Tin Tin has quite a story. He was born in Lorraine, France in September 1918 in the thick of World War I. He was just five days old when Lee Duncan, an American serviceman, rescued him from a bombed out war dog kennel along with the pup’s sister. Duncan named the dogs Rin Tin Tin and Nenette after French puppets given to WWI soldiers for luck.
Duncan was fascinated with the abilities of the new breed known as a German Shepherd, and he became acquainted with the man who’d trained the dogs. He worked regularly with the dogs to teach them to perform on command. When the war ended, Duncan took the two dogs to Los Angeles. Sadly, Nenette didn’t make it. She died en route from distemper.
Duncan returned to his job as a clerk in a hardware store, but his interest in dogs continued and he took Rin Tin Tin to dog shows. In February 1922, Rin Tin Tin amazed the audience at the Shepherd Dog Club by jumping a phenomenal 11 feet 9 inches. Quite by chance, a man named Charlie Jones asked if he could try out his new camera that made moving pictures by filming Rin Tin Tin. Duncan said yes, and a film company later offered Duncan $350 to film the dog in action.
It took a while for Rin Tin Tin’s career to take off. Duncan tried to a sell movie script starring his dog, but he found no takers. It wasn’t until he happened on a film company struggling to shoot a scene about a wolf that Rin Tin Tin got his big break. Duncan said his dog could do the scene in a single take, and that’s what Rin Tin Tin did. The producer hired him for the rest of “The Man From Hell’s River.” The success of that film saved the studio making it from financial ruin. The name of that littlle studio on the brink? Warner Brothers Pictures.
The first Rin Tin Tin made 26 movies before he died in 1932. Warner Brothers didn’t want to lose their star, so the mantle was passed to the Rin Tin Tin’s son, known as Junior. The two dogs weren’t identical in appearance, so a publicity campaign began. Junior was the first dog to fly in a commerical airplane. Duncan and Rin Tin Tin No. 3 later particiated WWII by training 5,000 soldiers and dogs for the war effort.
Thanks to protected breeding, the legacy of Rin Tin Tin continues today. Every dog that has ever played Rin Tin Tin is related to the original one. The most recent is Rin Tin Tin #11, born July 8, 2009. May the legacy of Man’s Best Friend continue!
I heard a song on the radio the other day that took me way back to the days when westerns dominated the movie screen and the television airwaves.The song was The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.Hearing the song immediately put me back in front of the screen reliving scenes from that great movie.
Got me to thinking about other Cowboy/Western ballads I love – not all of them movie related – and I thought I’d do a list of my top ten favorites for this post.And for those of you who want to hear them again (or for the first time), I’ll post links to videos that feature them as well.
As the old cowboy saying goes, ‘It’s the last thing you take off and the first thing that is noticed.’
Top hats, derbys, tams, fedoras, berets, bowlers – hats do more than cover a man’s head. They make a statement about the wearer.
If I say Bogart, can you see him, fedora pulled down low, collar turned up?
Or Charlie Chaplin in his bowler?
How about President Abraham Lincoln?
Or Sean Connery in his Panama?
Hats say a lot about the personality of the man – and some, like President Lincoln’s black stovepipe hat, will be forever linked with the man who wore it.
I believe the most recognizable type of hat, hands down, is the cowboy hat.
Did you see John Wayne in The Quiet Man and wonder where the heck his Stetson was?
There, that’s better.
How about the hat Clint Eastwood wore in Pale Rider?
John Stetson was the creator of what we think of today as the cowboy hat. The son of a master hatter, John made his first cowboy hat as a demonstration to his buddies about making felt from fur. The wide-brimmed hat was so useful in keeping off the sun and rain, his companions wanted one of their own. And an empire was born.
Stetson started his company in 1865. By 1866, the “Hat of the West” or “Boss of the Plains” set the John B. Stetson Company on the path to becoming the most famous hat in the world. Originally sold in one grade (2 ounce felt) and one color (natural), that original Stetson hat sold for five dollars. The equivalent hat today would cost close to $1,000.
Check out these two Montana dudes (1885) in their brand new Stetson ‘Boss of the Plains.’ The guy on the left is wearing Levi’s.
Made of a blend of rabbit, wild hare and beaver fur, today’s Stetson sets the mark for cowboy hats. You can get your Stetson in felt or straw, black, white, grey, tan; choose your style, for casual or dress, for outside wear or for going to church.
If you want to see how these famous hats are made, visit StetsonHats.com and click on the “The Making of a Stetson Hat” from the list on the left.
Stetson isn’t the only hat maker in the U.S. In Dallas in 1927, the Byer-Rolnick company began making the Resistol hats, so named because they were made to “resist all weather.”
But Stetson is the name most associated with the west.
Here’s some eye-candy, just because.
“Even after the wild aspect of the West was somewhat tamed, the cowboy hat never really lost its ability to lend that reckless and rugged aura to its wearer.”
Please start by telling us a little about yourself.
I jokingly call myself the World’s Greatest Literary Janitor, when it comes to the career of Louis L’Amour my job has basically been to organize what he left behind in order to extend his career twenty years or so.That meant going through virtually every piece of paper that he left behind searching for clues with which I could recreate various aspects of his life for Bantam Books, our web sites and, occasionally, the movie industry.
On the personal side I’m just guy who lives in a little house in Los Angeles, creates fun projects to do with his friends, likes traveling, reading, and messing around with old cars.This is beginning to sound like one of those dating site profiles …I’ll move on.
Your father is famous for living a lot of the life he wrote about, was this true by the time you were able to remember him or did he live a more sedate desk bound life after his books started coming out.
Louis never lived the life of a cowboy, though he was a miner and worker on a number of farms.Much of this was done in a period, the 1920s, that had a greater resemblance to the frontier west than our world of today and some of the people who had lived in that earlier time were still alive.However, it was a time that had it’s own fascinating aspects … I always wished Louis had written more about his own time.
Once he settled down in Los Angeles right after World War Two most of that lifestyle was in the past.By the time I came along Louis was fairly tied to his desk by the responsibility of supporting a family.Writing, in those days, didn’t pay particularly well.To live a relatively middle class lifestyle and prepare for problems that the future … protracted unemployment was always a risk … Dad had to write three to four books a year.It was quite a load of work.
I have to ask, as a writer myself, how did your dad manage all these books without a computer? I am profoundly impressed. I do so much editing and revising and it would be so much harder with a typewriter. I feel like a pure wimp, but I find writers who produced as much work as your dad did especially impressive because they didn’t have computers. . .don’t even ask about James Fenimore Cooper and Jane Austen without even a typewriter. Did he tear out pages and throw them away and start over and scribble on the pages a lot? Did he write his books longhand first then transcribe it to a typewriter? Did he talk his books and have a secretary?
Louis learned to write by trying to sell to the pulp magazines.The pay was usually between $25 to $250 a story … and many, many, stories didn’t sell.He set a goal of writing a story a week in those days so there wasn’t much time for rewriting or even over thinking them.I’m sure that in the early days, long before I was born, he threw out a great many pages.Later, however, he perfected a manner of “stream of consciousness” writing that allowed him to produce an incredible number of stories but at the cost of losing some of his ability to rewrite.Perhaps a more accurate way of saying that would be that ‘he lost some of his will to rewrite’ … he was not so inclined to think about what he was writing, he made it more of a reaction than an intellectual process.That delivered a boiling energy to his work but left some of it sort of rough around the edges.Take a look at some of the writing in Yondering, stories that were highly polished in order to be sold in literary magazines, then compare them to many of the pulp westerns, where speed of production was of the essence.There is a difference.
Dad wrote a minimum of five pages a day, using two fingers, on a typewriter.He wrote six to ten hours a day, six to seven days a week for most of his adult life.At his best he could do sixty words a minute for a pretty extended amount of time.Most of the trick though, was just sticking to it and never doubting that what he was doing was right, the right scene, the right dialogue, whatever.
Did your dad travel to research his books? I’m wondering if you had adventures as a child that stemmed from having Louis L’Amour as a father.
Sometimes.Mostly he was already aware of the locations he wanted to use from his own, earlier, travels,But we did research on many of our trips and, later on, I did research for him on my own.My sister and I saw a lot of dirt roads when we were kids.
Have you met the actors and actresses who have performed in movie’s based on his books, like Tom Selleck and Sam Elliot?
I have had the privilege of working with both of those guys but meeting people or working with them and knowing them are two different things.I’ve tended to leave the celebrity types to themselves as much as possible.Some are really nice people. Some are absolute jerks.In my opinion, nothing about being a movie star is wonderful or interesting.Quite a few live difficult lives and are often not really the kind of people that you’d want to hang around with once the novelty of their being famous wore off.
That said there is a great difference between stars, who tend to exist in a bubble of fear and alienation, and a great number of actors, some of whom are my closest friends.It’s amazing how many actors, who often get a bad rap based upon a few of the worst examples, are alert, intelligent, people who are amazingly hard workers and able to both do so many different things and to train themselves in new disciplines at the drop of a hat.I really count myself lucky.
And how involved are you with current work on the books.
I had been involved with production of our dramatized audios from the start.For years we have done a series of audio books in a style similar to old time radio dramas … I use that term loosely because most of our productions do not try to be nostalgic or the least bit “old timey.”Anyway, I was in charge of the scripting and casting of the vast majority of those shows, each needing a script that was an adaptation of the original story rather than a dogmatically faithful transcription.Prose does not automatically make the best drama, just like including back and forth, script style dialogue in a novel or short story could be a mistake.Prose is a visual art, more like painting than good drama … and drama is usually more auditory, even in the movies.I also wrote and directed several of our audio dramas … in fact I’m at work editing the most recent, number seventy, I believe, even as I answer these questions.
For awhile I was doing six a year but now production has slowed considerably and we do only one every several years, however, the stories are much longer and the productions vastly more involved.This production is an audio of one of my dad’s movies that I produced several years ago, The Diamond of Jeru.It has been a wonderful opportunity to revisit that script and evolve it into something new and different.In a way it is as much of an adaptation of that film as the film was of the novella.I don’t know when it will be released, we only get about a week a month to work on these and we have to take the end of the year off as Christmas is our big sales time at louislamour.com.We are two years in and only about half done.
Back to the books.Starting with Haunted Mesa I began to be involved with doing some of Louis’s research and then occasionally doing some minor editing.After his death the work expanded to planning how to re-present the entire catalogue of his works, to art directing a new set of covers, rewriting all the jacket copy, and editing or rewriting many of the unpublished or unfinished short stories.My friend for many years, Paul O’Dell and I run the louislamour.com website and have created hundreds of pages of material on Louis and his stories.Our latest creation is Louis L’Amour’s Great Adventures, a website featuring all of Louis’s writing in the adventure genre and an examination of the world that the stories were written in.It’s full of Paul’s amazing art and maps and photos from the time period … many straight from Louis’s own archives.Also of note is louislamourslosttreasures.com, and ongoing project to catalogue many of Louis’s partially completed projects, false starts, and alternative versions of many of his published works.
I see that you’re a writer and involved in many ways in the film industry. How has being Louis L’Amour’s son helped? How as it hurt?
Being Louis’s son has helped because I inherited a catalogue of material that was already famous … it would seem that might make it easier to sell than my original material.Certainly studios and networks would rather talk about material written by my dad … at the same time they don’t really want to make westerns, so the whole situation is sort of self limiting.That said, I only occasionally work in film and don’t need to go there to earn a living so it’s not really a problem.When I want to do drama, work with actors and script and such I can do an audio.I love film but the business is very dysfunctional and time consuming … I’m glad I have publishing.Really glad.
I am a huge fan of all the L’Amour books and I don’t think I’ve missed a single one.
My personal favorite is The Sackett Brand. Here’s a bit about it (for the Petticoats & Pistols readers) I found on http://www.louislamour.com/ .
Forty gunslingers from the Lazy A have got Tell Sackett cornered under the Mogollon Rim. They’re fixing to hang him if they can capture him alive, fill him extra full of lead if they can’t.
It’s just about the best of the best in my opinion. I consider however, Jubal Sackett to be, again in my opinion, his epic story. I just loved that book. I have a question about it.
In Jubal Sackett. . .when Jubal went into that cave and saw those dead bodies and heard the words, “Find them. . .” I have ALWAYS been crazed to know what that meant. Find WHO?????
Any ideas? Even guesses would be appreciated. Was it something Louis was going to go into in a later book? Is it in Jubal Sackett and I somehow missed it?
It was a set up for the future but I don’t know where he was going with it.If that drove you crazy you really love Louis L’Amour Treasures.It’s hundreds of mysteries wrapped in riddles.Take a look …
The most famous gunfight in the history of the West took place on October 26, 1881, in a vacant lot behind the OK Corral in Tombstone, Arizona. Anyone who’s seen the movies/TV series, or read any of the uncounted books knows that the winners were legendary gunman Wyatt Earp, his brothers Morgan and Virgil, and their friend, a shady, alcoholic dentist known as Doc Holliday. But who were the losers? Did they deserve to die as they did? Let’s take a closer look.
A complicated trail of events led up to the gunfight. It started when some stolen government mules were found on the McLaury ranch. Tom and Frank were away at the time and it was later proven that a friend had left them there. Tom and Frank were never charged but the Earps publicly branded them as thieves. Other incidents and accusations followed, fueling the bad blood. 
When the shooting ended thirty seconds later, Frank McLaury was dead. Tom and Billy were mortally wounded. Virgil Earp had been shot in the leg; Morgan had a bad shoulder wound, and Doc was winged. Ironically, the only member of the “Clanton Gang” to escape unscathed was Ike, who knocked Wyatt Earp off balance and fled.
Look who just landed in the Cowboy Hall of Fame!
Not much happened in the telegraphy office of the St. Louis-San Francisco railroad, especially not on the late shift. To pass the time, the young clerk brought his guitar and played to amuse himself. On one of those lonely nights, he received a visitor. That visitor was legendary humorist Will Rogers, and Rogers liked what he heard from a young man called Orvon Gene Autry.
records with over 100 million copies sold. And that’s just the start of it. Gene Autry starred in 95 movies, had a long running radio program, and produced and starred in his own television show. When he retired from Hollywood, he went on to own the California Angels and KTLA, a Los Angeles television station. He’s also the only entertainer to have five stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for every category established by the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce. No wonder he’s on a postage stamp honoring Hollywood cowboys!
In 1929 he signed with Columbia Records and went on to star in “National Barn Dance,” a popular show on a Chicago radio station. By the 1930s, he was one of the most beloved country singers in America, and his sales proved it. Gene Autry earned the first Gold Record ever awarded. No wonder he’s known as “America’s Favorite Singing Cowboy.”
entertainment, Gene was the first major movie star to make the shift. He produced and starred in the Gene Autry Show for six years.
Westerns with their classic situations – the fight in the saloon, the faithful horse, the dude who goes west, the sheriff who cleans up the town, the showdown, the trip west in a covered wagon — what are now considered film clichés were first introduced to film audiences in 1914 with the arrival of William Surrey Hart.
love with that formula in romance novels, huh?
Almost two years ago my husband and I adopted a dog from an organization that rescues abandoned animals. His name is Hartley and he’s a Jack Russell / Beagle mix. He’s a tad bit . . . odd. He licks furniture (gross), and he’s terrified of little girls. Little boys don’t bother him at all. The poor dog doesn’t know how to chase a ball or play “Fetch,” but he plays catch by pushing the ball with his nose for a distance of about a foot. We roll it back an
d he’s happy.
The series was only one of Rin Tin Tin’s Hollywood credits. His fame goes back to films from the 1920s when he stared in several movies, many of them with western settings. His continued to star in movies up through the 1940s, then moved to television.
t. She died en route from distemper.
The first Rin Tin Tin made 26 movies before he died in 1932. Warner Brothers didn’t want to lose their star, so the mantle was passed to the Rin Tin Tin’s son, known as Junior. The two dogs weren’t identical in appearance, so a publicity campaign began. Junior was the first dog to fly in a commerical airplane. Duncan and Rin Tin Tin No. 3 later particiated WWII by training 5,000 soldiers and dogs for the war effort.
Or Charlie Chaplin in his bowler?
There, that’s better.
Please start by telling us a little about yourself.
