Lurking behind a dumb, misleading title is a good book. (This is not some harum scarum melodrama by a dime novel Dickens.) True, persnickety readers...
Blood and Thunder
read more
Articles
THE YOUNG DUKE
At the University of Southern California in 1926, Marion Morrison, a.k.a. John Wayne, studied law and truly hoped to become an All-American football...
Old West in the Old World
Since the focus of American melodrama has mostly been on contributions from Eastern urban centers, it’s a pleasure to see Lawrence I. Berkove and...
JAY COOKE’S GAMBLE
The title here suggests you’ll get a dry history of financier Jay Cooke and his money problems building the Northern Pacific, but this big book is a...
Saddling Up Anyway
“When I got to him, he sat up and his lower lip was down under his chin. It was the danged-est lookin’ thing.... I had to put my knee against his...
Fort Worth Firefight
February 8, 1887 Long-Haired Jim Courtright strides into the White Elephant Saloon in Fort Worth, Texas, and has words with co-owner Jake Johnson....
Will Rogers Collection
When Will Rogers died in an airplane crash in 1935, America was devastated. The folksy rider, roper and vaudevillian from Oklahoma was the real New...
James Stewart: The Signature Collection
To the German-born Anthony Mann, the postwar Stewart must have seemed like the absolute physical embodiment of expressionism, all angles and angst...
The Adventures Of Brisco County, Jr.
Brisco County was a genuinely odd Western comedy that ran from 1993-94. It starred Bruce Campbell who was already something of a cult star based on...
Books to Film
The Great Train Robbery (1903) started it all. Not only was it the first narrative film ever made, but it was a Western and one based on an 1896...
In the Black
Never get into a card game with a guy named Canada Bill. That was a word of caution for folks who traveled the Mississippi in the steamboat era, or...
Who is Glendolene Myrtle Kimmell? She defends Tom Horn’s actions in a 1904 letter to the governor of Wyoming.
Who is Glendolene Myrtle Kimmell? She defends Tom Horn’s actions in a 1904 letter to the governor of Wyoming. John J. Tiffany II Lyme, Connecticut...