On March 27, 1836, Mexican troops placed a wounded Texian officer in a chair in the courtyard of Fort Defiance. His back was to a 1779 Catholic...
Texas Kids Revolt
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Mark Boardman
Traywick’s Tombstone
Twelve or 13 years have passed since this tenderfoot Midwesterner first visited Tombstone, Arizona (relatively late in life, but hey - better late...
The Brilliant Bandit of the Wabash
Thank God—a book that looks past Tombstone to share the exploits of the West! Respected historian Dugan tells the story of a small-time Midwestern...
They Call Me Doc: The Story Behind the Legend of Doc Holliday
Let’s get this straight—author Herda channels Doc, who tells his tale in his own words. It could be an interesting approach, except the deadly...
Mattie: Wyatt Earp’s Secret Second Wife
Mattie Blaylock was one of Wyatt Earp’s skeletons in the closet, but she was never totally unknown. Ted Meyers wants to put her out front and...
Alamo’s New Defender
James Butler Bonham faced his moment of truth in the pre-dawn of March 6, 1836. He and a handful of Texians reportedly manned an elevated artillery...
Where the Bodies Are Buried
In the hills outside the northeastern Oregon town of Baker City is a cemetery not unlike many that dot the old mining towns of the West. Except this...
A Sweet Search for History
James Coryells’s sweet tooth proved fatal. On May 27, 1837, the Texas Ranger and four or five fellow Rangers headed out from Fort Milam, a frontier...
A View of Vasquez
If you’d visited San Francisco back in 1967, you might have found a 14-year-old kid doing something a bit unusual for a teenager. He spent time in...
Old West Shootists
The Johnson-Sims Feud: Romeo and Juliet, West Texas Style (University of North Texas Press, $24.95), by Bill O’Neal, features as the star-crossed...
The Tunstalls Return
You could call the visit a “belated family reunion.” Five members of a proper English family gathered in a New Mexico canyon in July 2010 on an...
Rediscovering the O.K. Corral
“You sons of bitches, you have been looking for the coroner’s report, and you can have it!” Okay, that’s not exactly Cochise County Sheriff John...