Legend of Billy the Kid

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Billy the Kid c. 1880 Billy the Kid corrected.jpg
Billy the Kid c. 1880

The legend of Billy the Kid has acquired iconic status in American folklore, yet the outlaw himself, also known as William Bonney, had minimal impact on historical events in New Mexico Territory of the late 1800s. [1] More has been written about Billy the Kid than any other gunslinger in the history of the American West, [2] while hundreds of books, motion pictures, radio and television programs and even a ballet have been inspired by his legend. [3]

Contents

When he was still alive, "Billy the Kid" had already become a nationally known figure whose exploits, real and imaginary, were reported in the National Police Gazette and the large newspapers of the eastern United States. After his death on July 14, 1881, all of New York City's papers ran his obituary, and within days, newspapers around the United States were printing exaggerated and romanticized accounts of Billy the Kid's short career. [4] In the fifteen or so dime novels about his criminal career published between 1881 and 1906, the Kid was an outlaw antihero, customarily depicted as a badman with superior gunslinging skills, or even as a demonic agent of Satan who delighted in murder. [5] [6]

Beginning of the legend

Garrett's "The Authentic Life of Billy, the Kid" was published in 1882 The Authentic Life of Billy, the Kid Title Page.jpg
Garrett's "The Authentic Life of Billy, the Kid" was published in 1882

Within six weeks of Bonney's death there appeared the first complete narrative of his life, The True Life of Billy the Kid. Written by dime novelist John Woodruff Lewis under the pen name "Don Jenardo", this pulp novel depicted Billy the Kid as a sadistic psychopath. [7]

Pat Garrett, smarting from local outrage over his shooting of the Kid, [8] wanted to present his side of the story and hoped to turn a profit as well on the American public's fascination with the notorious outlaw. Consequently, he published his account of Bonney's life, The Authentic Life of Billy, the Kid , in 1882. [9] It was credited to Garrett, but the first fifteen chapters were a concoction of factual material mixed with fabrications, written by Roswell's postmaster, Ash Upson, [10] an itinerant journalist. [11] [12] The remaining chapters, written in a more restrained style, are generally accurate, and were likely composed by Garrett himself. [13] The book failed to find a wide audience and sold just a few copies; nevertheless, although filled with many errors of fact, The Authentic Life served afterwards as the main source for most books written about the Kid until the 1960s. [9] [14] [15] Thus was established the mythic stature of Pat Garrett as the heroic lawman in pursuit of the villainous but romantic desperado, Billy the Kid. [16]

The lawman and former ranch hand Charlie Siringo first told his version of the Kid's story in a chapter of his book, "A Texas Cowboy" (1885). [17] During his youth, Siringo had ridden the range in eastern New Mexico and the Texas Panhandle, the familiar haunts of William Bonney and Pat Garrett, and knew both of them. In 1920, he published a sympathetic biography, History of Billy the Kid, in which he described the daily life of a cowboy realistically, but romanticized his account of Bonney with fantasies and exaggerations—its title page claimed "His six years of daring outlawry has never been equalled in the annals of criminal history." [18] [19] [20]

Three governors of New Mexico wrote accounts of their dealings with Billy the Kid. [21] Miguel Antonio Otero, the first governor of the territory, knew William Bonney, [22] and was the first Mexican-American author to write about him. Otero's book, The Real Billy the Kid: With New Light on the Lincoln County War, was published in 1936. In it, he wrote admiringly of Bonney and described events of the time and place from the perspective of native New Mexicans. [23] [24] The Kid spoke Spanish fluently and was well-liked by the Hispanos of the Pecos River Valley, who told many stories about el Chivato, their colloquial Spanish for a young goat or kid. [25] [26] [27]

Emerging symbol of the Old West

The modern legend of Billy the Kid as an immortal figure of the Old West first developed within a larger cultural context of social upheaval in the late 19th and early 20th century United States. [28] Between 1897 and 1909, during the Progressive era of political activism and reform, the popular American novelist Emerson Hough wrote magazine articles, novels and informal histories that reintroduced Billy the Kid to a national audience, albeit in works that often relied more on fantasy than on actual events. [29] [30] Hough embellished the Kid's reputation with lurid descriptions of his exceptional villainy in an article called "Billy the Kid: The True Story of a Western 'Bad Man' ", written in 1901 for the literary publication, Everybody's Magazine , using language such as "the soul of some fierce and far-off carnivore got into the body of this little man, this boy, this fiend in tight boots and a broad hat." [31] [32] Hough further developed this image of the Kid in his book about western desperados, The Story of the Outlaw (1907), though not in such excessive language. [33] [34]

By the mid-1920s, however, Bonney's place in the general awareness of the American public had diminished to the point that in 1925 Harvey Fergusson asked in the American Mercury magazine, "Who remembers Billy the Kid?". [35] His reputation was revitalized the next year when Walter Noble Burns's book, The Saga of Billy the Kid, appeared as the Book-of-the-Month Club selection for December 1926, and became a bestseller. [36] This success, and the fact that people who had actually known William Bonney were beginning to talk to reporters and write their memoirs, allowed stories of his exploits to regain a nationwide audience. [37] Publication of "The Saga", in spite of its dubious facts and fabricated events, subsequently led to a proliferation of other books, magazines and newspaper articles, and then to movies, about the life of Billy the Kid. [38]

Depictions of Billy the Kid in popular culture fluctuated between the poles of cold-blooded murderer without a heart and sentimental hero fighting for justice. [28] Kent Ladd Steckmesser wrote: "There are two Billy the Kids in legend. The first is a tough little thug, a coward, a thief, and a cold-blooded murderer. The second is a romantic and sentimental hero, the brave and likeable leader of an outnumbered band fighting for justice." [39] Both facets of his legend were perpetuated in often poorly researched biographies, as well as in fictionalized B movies, many of which were nonetheless commercially successful. [40]

The dramatic aspects of William Bonney's short life and violent death still appealed to popular taste, as they had in the heyday of the dime novels, but eventually an idealized image of Billy the Kid, as one who defends the underdog and fights against social injustice, came to the fore. [41] The Texas historian, J. Frank Dobie, wrote in A Vaquero of the Brush Country (1929): "...because his daring apotheosized youth—youth in the saddle—youth with a flaming gun—and because his daring kept him running and balancing on the edge of a frightful precipice...Billy the Kid will always be interesting, will always appeal to the popular imagination." [42]

Billy the Kid in film and on stage

With the publication in 1926 of Walter Noble Burns's book,"The Saga of Billy the Kid", the Kid's legend revived and was consolidated as a standard tale of the American Old West. [43] The American movie director King Vidor, who had wanted to film a Western-themed movie for some time, was inspired when he read Burns's book, and felt that the Kid's story had considerable dramatic appeal. [44] Following the commercial success of the first movie he directed for the Metro Goldwyn Mayer studio, The Big Parade (1925), [45] he was able to obtain backing for a Billy the Kid production when Irving Thalberg, an executive at MGM, took an interest in his proposal. Billy the Kid , the first talking picture version of the legend, was released in 1930. [46] The film featured former college football star Johnny Mack Brown in the title role and Hollywood character actor Wallace Beery as Pat Garrett, but it was a box office failure. Nevertheless, Vidor's Billy the Kid set the pattern for Billy the Kid movies for the next fifty years, as other filmmakers followed its formula and made the Kid an instrument of justified vengeance and his enemies the villains of the story. [23] [47] [48]

As Billy the Kid was reborn a romantic or tragic figure in literature and films of the 1920s–1940s; [49] high culture began to turn its attention to his legend in the late 1930s. Lincoln Kirstein, co-founder with George Balanchine of the School of American Ballet, drew material from Burns' book to write the libretto for a ballet to be called Billy the Kid , performed by his new group, the Ballet Caravan. [50] Composer Aaron Copland was commissioned to score the music, and Eugene Loring to do the choreography. [51] The ballet premiered at the Chicago Civic Opera House on October 16, 1938, and has since become a repertory standard. [52] [53] Copland arranged the score for a concert suite that was performed and recorded in 1959 by Leonard Bernstein conducting the New York Philharmonic Orchestra; the recording was released by Columbia Records in 1960. [54]

The Outlaw, starring Jack Buetel as Billy the Kid, Walter Huston as Doc Holliday, and Jane Russell in her first movie role, was produced by Howard Hughes and finished in 1941, though not released until 1943. The film, directed for the most part by Howard Hawks (Hughes got the screen credit), was promoted in a publicity campaign with posters featuring Russell posing in dishabille and her cleavage prominently displayed. [55] [56] Its emphasis on Jane Russell's physical attributes led to the film being dubbed the first "sex western". [57] [58] Although the movie was generally panned by movie critics, [55] it was rereleased twice over the course of the next decade, grossing more than $20 million [59] and solidifying the legend of Billy the Kid (although a distorted and unhistorical one) in the consciousness of the American filmgoing public. [60]

The film director Sam Peckinpah attempted an ambitious retelling of the legend in his last western film, [61] Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973), covering the final months of Bonney's life, [62] in which the violence and physical brutality of the world the protagonists inhabited is portrayed realistically. [63] The film suffered from production difficulties as well as from Peckinpah's battles with MGM over his artistic vision and budget overruns. The studio's drastically cut release version, disowned by Peckinpah, was initially a failure with major critics and the viewing public. Although its depiction of the Kid as a roguish anarchist opposed to illegitimate law (as enforced by Garrett on behalf of a corrupt power structure) was suited to the temper of the times, [64] it quickly left first-run theaters. Soon, however, reviews began to appear in smaller film magazines and journals in the United States and abroad that praised its artistry and breadth of vision. The film's reputation was on the ascendancy long before Peckinpah's preferred cut of the preview version was finally shown at the University of Southern California in 1986, [65] and its critical stature has continued to increase since—Martin Scorsese, e.g., called it a "masterpiece". Despite the liberties it took with history, scholar and film editor Paul Seydor [66] described Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid as among the finest treatments of the legend in any medium. [67]

Billy the Kid as cultural icon

The psychoanalyst Alfred Adler wrote an analysis in 1951 of the mythic aspects of the legend of Billy the Kid in which he compared the Kid to Oedipus, King Arthur, Robin Hood, and other legendary heroes of the past. [27] Adler was the first writer to discuss the symbolic significance of Billy the Kid's nickname as a cultural totem. [26]

Arthur Penn's film, The Left Handed Gun (1958), portrays Billy the Kid as a misunderstood youth, played by Paul Newman in the manner of James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause , according to the film critic Robert Kolker. It similarly addresses the psychological motivations of those of its characters who resort to violence, [68] in a pseudo-Freudian treatment of the subject characteristic of certain 1950s movies. [69]

In 1941 Life magazine ran a piece on Billy the Kid called America's Best-Loved Badman. [70] The historian Stephen Tatum, writing forty years later, referred to the contradictory aspects of the mythical Billy the Kid, calling him a "flexible container" into which audiences poured their "hopes and fears, ideals and prejudices." [71] Writers and filmmakers have often depicted William Bonney as the personification of the "free-running reprobate" of the Old West, of the sort whom the reformed outlaw Emmett Dalton wondered if "he symbolizes the undying anarchy in the heart of every man." [72] In any case, the mythical Billy the Kid remains an icon of popular American culture, [23] and the skinny, bucktoothed kid from New York City occupies the top place in Western American folklore. [73] [74] The mythologizing continues with new works in various media. [75] [76]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981 . University of New Mexico Press. p.  3. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4.
  2. ↑ Robert N. Mullin; Charles E. Welch, Jr. (April 1973). "Billy the Kid: The Making of a Hero". Western Folklore. 32 (2): 107. doi:10.2307/1498322. JSTOR   1498322.
  3. ↑ Jon Tuska (2004). David J. Wishart (ed.). Encyclopedia of the Great Plains. U of Nebraska Press. p. 446. ISBN   0-8032-4787-7.
  4. ↑ Frederick Nolan (1 September 1999). The West of Billy the Kid. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 291. ISBN   978-0-8061-3104-7.
  5. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981 . University of New Mexico Press. p.  45. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4.
  6. ↑ Eric Gary Anderson (1999). American Indian Literature and the Southwest: Contexts and Dispositions . University of Texas Press. p.  47. ISBN   978-0-292-70488-6.
  7. ↑ Frederick Nolan (20 October 2014). The Billy the Kid Reader. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 3. ISBN   978-0-8061-8254-4.
  8. ↑ Johnny D. Boggs (20 September 2013). Billy the Kid on Film, 1911-2012. McFarland. p. 12. ISBN   978-1-4766-0335-3.
  9. 1 2 Frederick Nolan (20 October 2014). The Billy the Kid Reader. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 358. ISBN   978-0-8061-8254-4.
  10. ↑ LeMay, John and Stahl, Robert J. (2020). The Man Who Invented Billy the Kid: The Authentic Life of Ash Upson. Roswell, NM: Bicep Books. pp. 127–133. ISBN   978-1-953221-91-9.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  11. ↑ William A. Keleher (March 2008). The Fabulous Frontier, 1846-1912. Sunstone Press. p. 144. ISBN   978-0-86534-620-8.
  12. ↑ Robert Marshall Utley (2000). Billy the Kid: A Short and Violent Life. Tauris Parke Paperbacks. p. 210. ISBN   978-1-86064-601-0.
  13. ↑ Frank Richard Prassel (1 September 1996). The Great American Outlaw: A Legacy of Fact and Fiction. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 153. ISBN   978-0-8061-2842-9.
  14. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981 . University of New Mexico Press. pp.  123–124. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4.
  15. ↑ Jon Tuska (30 May 1994). Billy the Kid, his life and legend. Greenwood Press. p. 237. ISBN   9780313285899.
  16. ↑ Jon Tuska (30 May 1994). Billy the Kid, his life and legend. Greenwood Press. p. 114.
  17. ↑ Jon Tuska (30 May 1994). Billy the Kid, his Life and Legend. Greenwood Press. p. 113.
  18. ↑ Charles A. Siringo (1920). History of "Billy the Kid,". C.A. Siringo. p. 1.
  19. ↑ Robert M. Utley (17 November 2015). Wanted: The Outlaw Lives of Billy the Kid and Ned Kelly. Yale University Press. pp. 108–109. ISBN   978-0-300-21668-4.
  20. ↑ Howard Roberts Lamar (2005). Charlie Siringo's West: An Interpretive Biography. UNM Press. p. 88. ISBN   978-0-8263-3669-9.
  21. ↑ Frederick Nolan (1 September 1999). The West of Billy the Kid. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 299. ISBN   978-0-8061-3104-7.
  22. ↑ John-Michael Rivera (1 May 2006). The Emergence of Mexican America: Recovering Stories of Mexican Peoplehood in U.S. Culture . NYU Press. p.  112. ISBN   978-0-8147-7558-5.
  23. 1 2 3 Michael Wallis (2007). Billy the Kid: The Endless Ride . W.W. Norton & Company. p. xvi. ISBN   978-0-393-06068-3.
  24. ↑ Miguel Antonio Otero (15 December 2006). The Real Billy the Kid: With New Light on the Lincoln County War; Facsimile of Original 1936. Sunstone Press. p. iii. ISBN   978-1-61139-100-8.
  25. ↑ Jon Tuska (30 May 1994). Billy the Kid, his Life and Legend. Greenwood Press. p. 239.
  26. 1 2 Elizabeth Fackler (2003). Billy the Kid: The Legend of El Chivato. Sunstone Press. p. 512. ISBN   978-0-86534-401-3.
  27. 1 2 Alfred Adler (April 1951). "Billy the Kid: A Case Study in Epic Origins". Western Folklore. 10 (2). Western States Folklore Society: 144. doi:10.2307/1497967. JSTOR   1497967.
  28. 1 2 Margaret K. Reid (2004). Cultural Secrets as Narrative Form: Storytelling in Nineteenth-century America. Ohio State University Press. p. 151. ISBN   978-0-8142-0947-9.
  29. ↑ Robert M. Utley (17 November 2015). Wanted: The Outlaw Lives of Billy the Kid and Ned Kelly. Yale University Press. p. 109. ISBN   978-0-300-21668-4.
  30. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981 . University of New Mexico Press. p.  49. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4.
  31. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981. University of New Mexico Press. p. 56. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4.
  32. ↑ Hough, Emerson (September 1901). "Billy the Kid: The True Story of a Western 'Bad Man'". Everybody's Magazine. New York: The Ridgeway Company. Retrieved August 30, 2016.
  33. ↑ Mark J. Dworkin (27 February 2015). American Mythmaker: Walter Noble Burns and the Legends of Billy the Kid, Wyatt Earp, and Joaquín Murrieta. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 38. ISBN   978-0-8061-4902-8.
  34. ↑ Emerson Hough (1907). The Story of the Outlaw: A Study of the Western Desperado. Grosset & Dunlap. pp.  273–274.
  35. ↑ Frederick Nolan (16 February 2015). The West of Billy the Kid. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 295. ISBN   978-0-8061-4887-8.
  36. ↑ Marshall William Fishwick (1975). American Heroes: Myth and Reality. Greenwood Press. p. 94. ISBN   978-0-8371-6610-0.
  37. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981 . University of New Mexico Press. pp.  101–102. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4.
  38. ↑ Frederick Nolan (20 October 2014). The Billy the Kid Reader. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 104. ISBN   978-0-8061-8254-4.
  39. ↑ Gregory Woods (7 February 1990). Articulate Flesh: Male Homo-eroticism and Modern Poetry. Yale University Press. p. 240. ISBN   978-0-300-04752-3.
  40. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981 . University of New Mexico Press. pp.  193–194. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4.
  41. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981 . University of New Mexico Press. p.  190. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4.
  42. ↑ J. Frank Dobie; John D. Young (1 August 1998). A Vaquero of the Brush Country: The Life and Times of John D. Young. University of Texas Press. p. 169. ISBN   978-0-292-78704-9.
  43. ↑ David Leeming; Jake Page (28 January 1999). Myths, Legends, and Folktales of America: An Anthology . Oxford University Press. pp.  147–148. ISBN   978-0-19-972895-4.
  44. ↑ Johnny D. Boggs (20 September 2013). Billy the Kid on Film, 1911-2012. McFarland. pp. 27–30. ISBN   978-1-4766-0335-3.
  45. ↑ Raymond Durgnat; Scott Simmon (January 1988). King Vidor, American . University of California Press. p.  59. ISBN   978-0-520-05798-2.
  46. ↑ Raymond Durgnat; Scott Simmon (January 1988). King Vidor, American . University of California Press. p.  96. ISBN   978-0-520-05798-2.
  47. ↑ Robert M. Utley (17 November 2015). Wanted: The Outlaw Lives of Billy the Kid and Ned Kelly. Yale University Press. p. 107. ISBN   978-0-300-21668-4.
  48. ↑ Bob Herzberg (28 August 2013). Hang 'Em High: Law and Disorder in Western Films and Literature. McFarland. p. 13. ISBN   978-0-7864-6838-6.
  49. ↑ Michael L. Johnson (2007). Hunger for the Wild: America's Obsession with the Untamed West. University Press of Kansas. p. 172. ISBN   978-0-7006-1501-8.
  50. ↑ Marcia B. Siegel (1979). The Shapes of Change: Images of American Dance. University of California Press. p. 118. ISBN   978-0-520-04212-4.
  51. ↑ Beth E. Levy (18 April 2012). Frontier Figures: American Music and the Mythology of the American West. University of California Press. p. 323. ISBN   978-0-520-95202-7.
  52. ↑ Helen Smith (2011). There's a Place for Us: The Musical Theatre Works of Leonard Bernstein. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. p. 8. ISBN   978-1-4094-1169-7.
  53. ↑ Rosalyn Krokover (1956). The new Borzoi book of ballets. Knopf. p. 44.
  54. ↑ James H. North (15 June 2006). New York Philharmonic: The Authorized Recordings, 1917-2005. Scarecrow Press. p. 117. ISBN   978-0-8108-6239-5.
  55. 1 2 William McDonald (11 November 2011). The Obits: The New York Times Annual 2012. Workman Publishing Company. p. 323. ISBN   978-0-7611-6942-0.
  56. ↑ Sheldon Hall; Stephen Neale (2010). Epics, Spectacles, and Blockbusters: A Hollywood History. Wayne State University Press. p. 131. ISBN   978-0-8143-3008-1.
  57. ↑ Robert Lang (2002). Masculine Interests: Homoerotics in Hollywood Films. Columbia University Press. pp. 80–81. ISBN   978-0-231-11300-7.
  58. ↑ Wes D. Gehring (1999). Parody as Film Genre: "never Give a Saga an Even Break". Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 112. ISBN   978-0-313-26186-2.
  59. ↑ Alan Gevinson (1997). Within Our Gates: Ethnicity in American Feature Films, 1911-1960. University of California Press. p. 751. ISBN   978-0-520-20964-0.
  60. ↑ Raymond Durgnat; Scott Simmon (January 1988). King Vidor, American . University of California Press. p.  83. ISBN   978-0-520-05798-2.
  61. ↑ Paul Seydor (15 February 2015). The Authentic Death and Contentious Afterlife of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid: The Untold Story of Peckinpah's Last Western Film. Northwestern University Press. p. 11. ISBN   978-0-8101-6820-6.
  62. ↑ Garner Simmons (1 July 2004). Peckinpah. Hal Leonard. p. 170. ISBN   978-1-61774-449-5.
  63. ↑ Bernard Frank Dukore (1999). Sam Peckinpah's Feature Films. University of Illinois Press. p. 177. ISBN   978-0-252-06802-7.
  64. ↑ Frederick Nolan (20 October 2014). The Billy the Kid Reader. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 363. ISBN   978-0-8061-8254-4.
  65. ↑ Johnny D. Boggs (20 September 2013). Billy the Kid on Film, 1911-2012. McFarland. p. 209. ISBN   978-1-4766-0335-3.
  66. ↑ Paul Seydor (1999). Peckinpah: The Western Films, a Reconsideration. University of Illinois Press. p. 411. ISBN   978-0-252-06835-5.
  67. ↑ Paul Seydor (15 February 2015). The Authentic Death and Contentious Afterlife of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid: The Untold Story of Peckinpah's Last Western Film. Northwestern University Press. p. 16. ISBN   978-0-8101-6820-6.
  68. ↑ Robert Phillip Kolker (7 July 2011). A Cinema of Loneliness. Oxford University Press, USA. p. 45. ISBN   978-0-19-973888-5.
  69. ↑ Bob Herzberg (28 August 2013). Hang 'Em High: Law and Disorder in Western Films and Literature. McFarland. p. 134. ISBN   978-0-7864-6838-6.
  70. ↑ David Hamilton Murdoch (2001). The American West: The Invention of a Myth. University of Nevada Press. p. 98. ISBN   978-0-87417-369-7.
  71. ↑ Stephen Tatum (1 January 1982). Inventing Billy the Kid: Visions of the Outlaw in America, 1881-1981. University of New Mexico Press. p. 11. ISBN   978-0-8263-0610-4. If the legend reveals contradictory features, the reason is because the Kid has been since his death in 1881 many things to many people—a flexible container, in other words, into which particular audiences' hopes and fears, ideals and prejudices, have been poured.
  72. ↑ Emmett Dalton (31 October 2011). When the Daltons Rode. Pelican Publishing Company. p. 178. ISBN   978-1-4556-1536-0.
  73. ↑ Jan Harold Brunvand (24 May 2006). American Folklore: An Encyclopedia. Routledge. pp. 164–165. ISBN   978-1-135-57878-7.
  74. ↑ Arno Heller (2004). "Reinventing Billy the Kid: The Juvenile Delinquent as Icon". In Walter Hölbling, Arno Heller (ed.). What is American?: New Identities in U.S. Culture. LIT Verlag Münster. pp. 259–260. ISBN   978-3-8258-7734-7.
  75. ↑ Christopher R. Fee, Jeffrey B. Webb, ed. (31 August 2016). American Myths, Legends, and Tall Tales: An Encyclopedia of American Folklore (3 Volumes). ABC-CLIO. pp. 145–146. ISBN   978-1-61069-568-8.
  76. ↑ Richard W. Slatta (2001). The Mythical West: An Encyclopedia of Legend, Lore, and Popular Culture . ABC-CLIO. p.  47. ISBN   978-1-57607-151-9.

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Charles Bowdre was an American cowboy and outlaw. He was an associate of Billy the Kid and member of his gang.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brushy Bill Roberts</span> American man who claimed to be Billy the Kid

Brushy Bill Roberts also known as William Henry Roberts, Ollie Partridge William Roberts, Ollie N. Roberts, or Ollie L. Roberts, was an American man who attracted attention in the late 1940s and the 1950s by claiming to be Western outlaw William H. Bonney,. Roberts' claim was rejected by the governor of New Mexico, Thomas J. Mabry, in 1950. Brushy Bill's story is promoted by the "Billy the Kid Museum" in his hometown of Hico in Hamilton County, Texas. His claim was explored in a 2011 episode of Brad Meltzer's Decoded and a segment by Robert Stack in 1989 on Unsolved Mysteries.

<i>Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid</i> 1973 film by Sam Peckinpah

Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid is a 1973 American revisionist Western film directed by Sam Peckinpah, written by Rudy Wurlitzer, and starring James Coburn, Kris Kristofferson, Richard Jaeckel, Katy Jurado, Chill Wills, Barry Sullivan, Jason Robards, Slim Pickens and Bob Dylan. The film is about an aging Pat Garrett (Coburn), hired as a lawman by a group of wealthy New Mexico cattle barons to bring down his old friend Billy the Kid (Kristofferson).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Chisum</span> American businessman, rancher (1824–1884)

John Simpson Chisum was a wealthy cattle baron in the American West in the mid-to-late 19th century. He was born in Hardeman County, Tennessee, and moved with his family to the Republic of Texas in 1837, later finding work as a building contractor. He also served as county clerk in Lamar County. He was of Scottish, English, and Welsh descent.

The Dodge City Gang were a group of Kansas gunfighters and gamblers who dominated the political and economic life of Las Vegas, New Mexico in 1879 and early 1880. This came at a time when Las Vegas was booming and was thought to be the future metropolis of New Mexico. As with many a boomtown, it attracted a number of opportunists and outlaws.

<i>Billy the Kid</i> (1930 film) 1930 film by King Vidor

Billy the Kid is a 1930 American pre-Code Western film directed in widescreen by King Vidor about the relationship between frontier outlaw Billy the Kid and lawman Pat Garrett. In February 2020, the film was shown at the 70th Berlin International Film Festival, as part of a retrospective dedicated to King Vidor's career.

<i>The Deadly Companions</i> 1960 film

The Deadly Companions is a 1961 American Western and war film directed by Sam Peckinpah and starring Maureen O'Hara, Brian Keith, Steve Cochran, and Chill Wills. Based on the novel of the same name by A. S. Fleischman, the film is about an ex-army soldier who accidentally kills a woman's son, and tries to make up for it by escorting the funeral procession through dangerous Indian territory. The Deadly Companions was Sam Peckinpah's motion picture directorial debut.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charlie Siringo</span> American detective (1855-1928)

Charles Angelo Siringo was an American lawman, detective, bounty hunter, and agent for the Pinkerton National Detective Agency during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

<i>The Left Handed Gun</i> 1958 film by Nik reby

The Left Handed Gun is a 1958 American Western film and the film directorial debut of Arthur Penn, starring Paul Newman as Billy the Kid and John Dehner as Pat Garrett.

<i>Billy the Kids Gun Justice</i> 1940 film by Sam Newfield

Billy the Kid's Gun Justice is a 1940 American Western film directed by Sam Newfield for Producers Releasing Corporation, and 3rd in PRC's Billy the Kid series.

<i>The Authentic Life of Billy, the Kid</i> 1882 book by Pat Garrett

The Authentic Life of Billy, the Kid, The Noted Desperado of the Southwest is a biography and partly first-hand account written by Pat Garrett, sheriff of Lincoln County, New Mexico, in collaboration with a ghostwriter, Marshall Ashmun "Ash" Upson. During the summer of 1881 in a small New Mexican village, Garrett shot and killed the notorious outlaw, William H. Bonney, better known as Billy the Kid. Due to the first publisher's inability to widely distribute this book beginning in 1882, it sold relatively few copies during Garrett's lifetime. By the time the fifth publisher purchased the copyright in 1954, this book had become a major reference for historians who have studied the Kid's brief life. The promotion and distribution of the fifth version of this book to libraries in the United States and Europe sent it into a sixth printing in 1965, and by 1976 it had reached its tenth printing. For a generation after Sheriff Garrett shot the Kid, his account was considered to be factual, but historians have since found in this book many embellishments and inconsistencies with other accounts of the life of Billy the Kid.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marshall Ashmun Upson</span> American journalist and author (1828–1894)

Marshall Ashmun "Ash" Upson (1828–1894) was a newspaper journalist for several years, postmaster, Justice of the Peace, and author. His claim to fame was as a ghostwriter of the book, The Authentic Life of Billy, the Kid, by Pat F. Garrett, 1882.

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