And now his last:
Love for Lonesome Dove
Many of us go about our lives in east coast Martrix fashion—heads down, tapping away at keyboards, biding our time until hopefully some ritual fun interludes. Rarer still comes the time of high adventure—a big trip somewhere exotic or an activity that lands way outside one’s comfort zone. I suppose that’s why so many of us gravitate to action and adventure movies as a temporary escape. They take us places we would never see and provide the only proven method of time travel. For my father, his preferred setting is the Old West. The bottoms of his soles have touched the dirt of so many western novel and movie locations, I cannot possibly begin to list them all. Perhaps this wanderlust of his germinated from the traits of his favorite author Louis L’Amour, who insisted on visiting and took detailed notes for each potential setting. This was long before the days of Google Earth, Wikipedia, and YouTube, so this was indeed important. Still is. Could you imagine Robert Ludlum never dining at a Zürich lakeside café? Point being, Dad never wasted a travel opportunity; it kept Father Time away similar perhaps to Baron Munchausen’s fable. And, being as learned as Dad is with the west of olde, it is a pleasant surprise when he heaps praise on a Hollywood western as “mostly accurate”. I tend to think he was particularly fond of Robert Duvall’s card cuttin’.
Last published in the Gainesville Times, February 14, 1989, Prof. Alex Taylor’s Crime Stories provides his take on what has become a much-loved and awarded classic.
Transcript and additional insight follow the column.
TRANSCRIPT:
Lonesome Dove more fact than fiction All of you who watched the immensely popular mini series, Lonesome Dove, were treated to fairly accurate historical drama. Written by Larry McMurtry in 1985, the book has become a hot item at local book stores. The entire story, like so many western novels, was fictionalized, although some of the incidents happened several years apart.
The story was about the first cattle drive from Texas to pioneer a vicious killer known as “Blue Duck,” who did exist, and a black man who accompanied the cattle on their way north.
In real life, the cattle drive began in Texas in early spring 1866, and was bossed by a man whose hands had rounded up 1,100 Texas longhorns for the drive because they wanted to prove that cattle could survive the harsh Montana winters.
Having worked as a trail hand on an old-fashioned cattle drive in Wyoming, I am still amazed at the stamina of men, cattle and horses on a drive of several thousand miles, as the one in this story.
All summer, the herd moved steadily north, arriving near Douglas, Colo., in the early fall. Here, they joined the Oregon Trail, which turned north near the N. Platte River, skirted the Big Horn Mountains just south of Crazy Woman Creek and the Powder River, then turned west between the Yellowstone and Big Horn River(s), finally following the Yellowstone north to the present town of Livingston, Mont, It was here the herd spent the winter of 1866-67, having arrived in a sheltered valley now called “Gallatin Valley” in early December.
When the herd came down the long hills into the valley, their numbers had been reduced to 600, almost half lost to Indians, rustlers and stampede.
Nelson Story’s grandson, Malcolm, survived to operate a 18,500-acre cattle ranch near Bozeman, Mont., and Malcolm’s son, Peter Story, still operates the ranch and is a state senator.
The black man in the story, apparently Nathan Love, a former slave from Tennessee, who went west shortly after the Civil War. Love took part in the cattle drive when he was only 15 years old. Unlike the story that enacted his death, Love lived to become a very popular rodeo star.
The notorious “Blue Duck” was as vicious in real life as he was in the series. As a companion of female bandit Belle Starr, he robbed and murdered throughout the West. History does not show the true identity of Blue Duck, nor why he chose this odd name I have a picture of the man, and apparently the director of the film has one of the same man. The real “Duck” and the actor who played the part are strikingly similar.
The entire series was very entertaining and will probably become a Western film classic, joining the ranks of others such as “Shane,” “The Searchers” and “She Wore a Yellow Ribbon”.
. . . And with that bit of historic nostalgia, I will take this opportunity to say good-bye for a while. I am taking some time off from this column to write my own novels (four in the works), and will be busy with mounds of materials in my research. You, folks have been great, and I certainly enjoyed all the coffee club chatter about history, crime and the old West. Many thanks to all the staff at The Times for their support and encouragement.
Now if my hunting friend and research advisor, Fred Shope, would retire and continue to help . . . !
Alex Taylor is a writer whose columns on history and criminology have appeared in The Times on Tuesdays.
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How good is Lonesome Dove?
See for yourself!
Never saw it? Lordy, Lordy! Look for it on popular streaming services.
On a sad note, Alex’s long-time hunting buddy and family friend Fred Shope passed away this past July, aged 90. He sold his automotive service business and indeed retired just a few years after the column published. Much huntin’, fishin’ and advisin’ ensued.
Okay, confession time. I lied—sort of.
Alex Taylor’s Crime Stories actually makes one more appearance in the Gainesville Times shortly before Christmas 1992. I thought it might make a fitting resolution to end his republication in similar fashion.
About Alex’s referenced books? Funny thing—life and its distractions. I can talk about this because of all the delays with Dust’s sequel WHICH I AM WORKING ON! Sorry, had to vent. News Flash—I’m near the end. R e g a r d l e s s, Dad’s books were never completed. No real excuses, just a function of life, time and priorities. I can attest that they were in fact being drafted. Crime, of course. If or when I get time, it’s my plan to coax the old man into completing at least one of them, or at least nailing a sketch. We’ll see.
Catch y’all next week!
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