For 70 years, stories about legendary fur trappers have been editorial mainstays, but on the cover, they’re a rare gift to readers. Since 1953, True...
Mountain Men, Grizzlies and Christmas
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Features & Gunfights
Guns of the Young Wild West
Here’s a rundown of some of the more famous guns—and their modern replicas—from before 1873, when the Old West was young. The year...
The Reign of Terror
How the Osage murders in Oklahoma in the 1920s led to the rise of the FBI At three in the morning an explosion rocked the small Oklahoma town of...
Justice Served
Ten U.S. Marshals and Deputy U.S. Marshals who defined the legendary West All Illustrations by Bob Boze Bell and All Images Courtesy True West...
Hays in an Uproar
Wild Bill Hickok vs. The 7th Cavalry Hickok Almost Gets an Earful July 17, 1870 Deputy U.S. Marshal James Butler “Wild Bill” Hickok...
Django Unchained
A decade since the highest-grossing Western was released, the film remains controversial. There are many disconcerting issues that a...
Cowboy & Actor Ben Johnson
He truly knew his horses. Ben Johnson arrived in California in the late 1930s after Howard Hughes bought some horses from an Oklahoma ranch where...
U.S. Marshals, Oklahoma and Wild Bill
For 70 years, Western law and order history has been popularized by True West’s editors. From Joe Small’s first issue in the summer of 1953 to the...
Today’s Art of the American Indian
No Longer Just About Yesteryear In the 19th century, art of the American Indian was usually viewed through the canvas and brush of...
Tombstone: A Reckoning
Thirty years after the popular film’s release, it might be the most influential Western of all time. In 1993, Walt Disney’s Hollywood...
The ‘Western’ Godfather
Kurt Russell spills the beans. It didn’t surprise me that Kurt Russell was willing to go off topic during our interview. After all, it was...
Doc Hits Bottom (but not much else)
Doc Holliday vs Billy Allen “Doc Holliday is ten feet tall and weighs a ton.” —The Arizona Daily Star August 19, 1884 Broke, sick and usually...