When Billy the Kid Was A Girl

 May 19, 2025

   We are doing a cover story on Billy the Kid for the July-August issue and in our coverage we have a feature by James B. Mills on Billy the Kid before Walter Noble Burns "discovered" the Kid in 1926 with his groundbreaking book, "The Saga of Billy the Kid." Turns out there were many more Billy the Kid books and movies than we previously had known, including a 1911 movie starring a girl as the Kid:   

Billy the Kid as A Girl

   I know what you're thinking: Hey Bob, you totally made that up. Well, no, I didn't. Here's the actual photograph I took this image from.

Edith Storey in "When the Tables Turned"

also released in 1911

   Now, do you believe me? Here is some background on Edith:

   Edith Storey, the first thespian to play “Billy the Kid” on a silver screen, was born in New York City on March 18, 1892. Her film career began in 1908. She played the lead role in Billy the Kid three years later in 1911. “A very fine picture,” the Arkansas City Daily Traveller announced. “It was the story of a girl who from birth had passed as a boy. This picture was enjoyed by the audience.” The Western Comedy film was well-received by other critics and moviegoers across the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. “The girl leads the life of a cowboy until she is 16 years of age, and her sex is discovered through an encounter with a band of outlaws,” the Idaho Statesman declared on September 3, 1911. “This production has many laughable situations. It is both convincing and enjoyable and worth going miles to see.” Edith Storey starred in numerous other silent Western films, including The Immortal Alamo (1911) and As The Sun Went Down (1919), before she retired from acting at the age of 29 in 1921. Having starred in over 140 silent films throughout her career, Storey eventually received a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame. Edith worked as a village clerk in Long Island for decades prior to her death in Northport, New York, on October 9, 1967.

—James B. Mills

The More Things Change. . .

   The irony of all of this is that I received a script for a movie that will begin filming in the fall, "Billie The Kid" about a young girl and her father who get an old timey photograph taken at a Wild West town and get transported back to Lincoln, New Mexico where the girl is take for, ahem, Billie The Kid. The film, written and conceived by David Risotto begins filming this fall at Old Tucson and Mescal and is being financed by Honey Creek Studios out of Kentucky.

"The more things change, the more they remain the same."

—Old Vaquero Saying