When I was a child, every second show on the Television was a Western, Hardly surprising then that while growing up, all us young laddies ran about on pretend horses, blasting everything we saw with our toy six guns (If you could afford one ..If not a stick with a bend at one end did fine).
In later years when cash was not so tight, the plastic six shooter would be accompanied by a black Cowboy hat ... Normally with a red dangling fringe. The point being every schoolboy wanted to be a Gunfighter.
The TV tales of our school days heroes was displayed in such a simple fashion. The good guy rode a white horse and wore a white hat ...The Baddie was dressed in black, Shooting and killing people was easy, No holes .. no Blood .. You just fell down.
Luckily if you were the good guy, you would only be wounded, or if you had to die .. At least you got time to say your parting speech before you died a hero, a baddie was killed instantly, One bullet was all that was required.
Perhaps TV has a lot to answer for.
Now some 45 years further along lifes path, we get to know the real truth of our boyhood heroes, and its not nice.
Truth be known, very few of the Gunslingers EVER faced up to another man, Six guns by their side, hands hovering over the butt, waiting for the clock to strike the Hour, Then the fastest on the Draw lives.
The true story of many of those men of legends is quite different. Most were cold blooded killers who didn't hesitate to shoot men in the back. Some didn't even kill all that many but all passed into folklore. The Gunslingers of the American west.
In compiling this issue of the CRYPT I believe I have found a surprising answer as to why some Cowboys became a legend, and some did not.
Firstly in the early West, Newspapers were few and far between, remember a lot of Cowboys couldn't read. So tales and stories were passed around the Campfires.
Obviously as each story got re-told a bit got added, then a bit more and more again, after several tellings the story had blown out of all perspective. However .. Certain Cowboys had a particular thing about them, that ensured that (a) the stories stuck in peoples minds (b) Because of these particular things they were easily recognisable. Lets take a look at a few.
Billy the Kid - a Child in the eyes of the Western people.
Jesse James - Leader of a Gang but mostly Brothers.
Clay Allison - Had a Club foot.
Wyatt Earp - Strange guns and a Lawman turned gunslinger
All these traits meant that these man were recognisable and their notoriety grew with each story.
In truth they were not all as bad as painted. Billy the kid didn't kill all that many people (Compared to others of that time). He never really robbed anyone (The rustling of a few head of cattle was accepted practice with all but the cattle owners) But became one of the biggest legends of the west.
