Books by "Robert K. DeArment"
3 books found
Think gunfighter, and Wyatt Earp or Billy the Kid may come to mind, but what of Jim Moon? Joel Fowler? Zack Light? A host of other figures helped forge the gunfighter persona, but their stories have been lost to time. In a sequel to his Deadly Dozen, celebrated western historian Robert K. DeArment now offers more biographical portraits of lesser-known gunfighters—men who perhaps weren’t glorified in legend or song, but who were rightfully notorious in their day. DeArment has tracked down stories of gunmen from throughout the West—characters you won’t find in any of today’s western history encyclopedias but whose careers are colorfully described here. Photos of the men and telling quotations from primary sources make these characters come alive. In giving these men their due, DeArment takes readers back to the gunfighter culture spawned in part by the upheavals of the Civil War, to a time when deadly duels were part of the social fabric of frontier towns and the Code of the West was real. His vignettes offer telling insights into conditions on the frontier that created the gunfighters of legend. These overlooked shooters never won national headlines but made their own contributions to the blood and thunder of the Old West: people less than legends, but all the more fascinating because they were real. Readers who enjoyed DeArment’s Deadly Dozen will find this book equally captivating—as gripping as a showdown, twelve times over.
Settlers in the frontier West were often easy prey for criminals. Policing efforts were scattered at best and often amounted to vigilante retaliation. To create a semblance of order, freelance enforcers of the law known as man-hunters undertook the search for fugitives. These pursuers have often been portrayed as ruthless bounty hunters, no better than the felons they pursued. Robert K. DeArment’s detailed account of their careers redeems their reputations and reveals the truth behind their fascinating legends. As DeArment shows, man-hunters were far more likely to capture felons alive than their popular image suggests. Although “Wanted: Dead or Alive” reward notices were posted during this period, they were reserved for the most murderous desperadoes. Man-hunters also came from a variety of backgrounds in the East and the West: of the eight men whose stories DeArment tells, one began as an officer for an express company, and another was the head of an organization of local lawmen. Others included a railroad detective, a Texas Ranger, a Pinkerton operative, and a shotgun messenger for a stagecoach line. All were tough survivors, living through gunshot wounds, snakebites, disease, buffalo stampedes, and every other hazard of life in the Wild West. They also crossed paths with famous criminals and sheriffs, from John Wesley Hardin and Sam Bass to Wyatt Earp, Butch Cassidy, and the Sundance Kid. Telling the true stories of famous men who risked their lives to bring western outlaws to justice, Man-Hunters of the Old West dispels long-held myths of their cold-blooded vigilantism and brings fresh nuance to the lives and legends that made the West wild.
Dodge City and the Birth of the Wild West
by Robert R. Dykstra, Jo Ann Manfra
2017 · University Press of Kansas
Raised on Gunsmoke, Bat Masterson, and The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp, we know what it means to “get outta Dodge”—to make a hasty escape from a dangerous place, like the Dodge City of Wild West lore. But why, of all the notorious, violent cities of old, did Dodge win this distinction? And what does this tenacious cultural metaphor have to do with the real Dodge City? In a book as much about the making of cultural myths as it is about Dodge City itself, authors Robert Dykstra and Jo Ann Manfra take us back into the history of Dodge to trace the growth of the city and its legend side-by-side. An exploration of murder statistics, court cases, and contemporary accounts reveals the historical Dodge to be neither as violent nor as lawless as legend has it—but every bit as intriguing. In a style that captures the charm and chicanery of storytelling in the Old West, Dodge City and the Birth of the Wild West finds a culprit in a local attorney, Harry Gryden, who fed sensational accounts to the national media during the so-called "Dodge City War" of 1883. Once launched, the legend leads the authors through the cultural landscape of twentieth-century America, as Dodge City became a useful metaphor in more and more television series and movies. Meanwhile, back in the actual Dodge, struggling on a lost frontier, a mirror image of the mythical city began to emerge, as residents increasingly embraced tourism as an economic necessity. Dodge City and the Birth of the Wild West maps a metaphor for belligerent individualism and social freedom through the cultural imagination, from a historical starting point to its mythical reflection. In this, the book restores both the reality of Dodge and its legend to their rightful place in the continuum of American culture.