Warning: Dad Jokes Ahead!

 June 16, 2024

   Get ready for some groaners and some boners. It's my day and I intend to abuse it!

Father: I'm going to change my password to 'penis.'

Mother: I don't think it's long enough.

The Billy the Kid Bar, Mesilla, New Mexico

1951

  I would be willing to bet dollars to donuts one of those cowboys is yelling, "You sure know a lot for being so damn dumb!" 

  Three conspiracy theorists walk into a bar. You can't tell me that's just a coincidence?

   Sign at The Buffalo Chip Saloon: Now hiring people who show up.

Aunt Vivien's Crazy Predictions

"Some day my old man is going to wear his trousers so high he will have to unzip his pants to drive. Mark my words!"

—Crazy Aunt Vivien

Billy the Kid Gets Framed For Good

 June 15, 2024

   Some people think Billy got framed, and now they can say with some certainty that he, in fact, has been framed.

   And, how.

Amy Gauthier's labor of love is about to reopen

   Thanks to Amy Gauthier, the current owner—and savior—of the historic Ellis Store in Lincoln, New Mexico, two of my paintings, portraying the Kid at the back door of said store, have been framed with the floorboard wood that Billy actually walked on.

   While Amy and her crew were rehabbing the room in the Ellis store that the previous owners claimed was the room where the Kid stayed, they found termites and had to rip up a portion of the floor to salvage the room. Here is a photo of the Kid room showing the original wood before it was replaced.

   At my request, Amy shipped me a few of the better pieces of wood and here are the raw boards, next to three new paintings of the Kid.

Ellis Store Floorboards and BBB paintings

   And here are the two finished pieces, framed with the actual floorboards that Billy the Kid walked on.

Billy at The Rear Door of The Ellis Store

I & II

(both framed with the floorboards he walked on)

   Both pieces will be on proud display at the BBB Billy Art Show at the Ellis Store on Saturday, July 13.

   There will be a dozen other original paintings of the Kid from the BBB collection, including this one.

"Coffee With The Kid"

("His Face Went to Everyone's Heart")

 

"Advise persons not to engage in painting."

—Kid from Kingman

Goin' Through My Old Photos: Jim's Ful-Serve And Charlie Sheen at The Wagon Wheel

June 14, 2024

   I got assigned this article to write about Cave Creek when we first got here. I'm supposed to write about the politics, but what I am really interested in is the local bars and eateries. The first time I set eyes on this crazy place was in 1970.

Here's An Early Shot of My Hometown

Cave Creek Rodeo Parade, 1970, dirt road!

(Yes, that Jim's Ful-Serve, middle background)

 And, here's Jim's Ful-Serve in 1986.

Jim's Ful-Serve on Cave Creek Road

   And, here's Jim himself. . .

   Today it's a cafe called Big Earl's.

   And, speaking of old time Cave Creek cafes. . .

Charlie Sheen and Rip Torn pretend to have breakfast at the Wagon Wheel Cafe,

"Beyond The Law," 1993

   And, here is Harold himself, of Harold's Cave Creek Corral fame in his office, also, circa 1986.

Harold The Tiger Master

   And, one of my favorite hangouts was The Mineshaft, because it still had a little Wild West going on.

   I used to stop in often just to snap photo reference for Honkytonk Sue and The Doper Roper, and I was never disappointed, from the trucks outside to the good old boys having lunch inside.

"What the hell happened to the work ethic

in this country?"

   That's what they are sayin' and you know it. And here's a Mineshaft cowboy who ended up in one of my comic strips.

Ol' DR gets fresh

"The epidemic failure in history appreciation is that we keep repeating the same damn facts and dates. The real way to get young people into history is to tell better stories."

—Grantham P. Hooker, aka The Doper Roper

AC Out, DH (Damn Hot!) Inside!

 June 13, 2024

   Our AC went out yesterday afternoon and it started blowing hot air: 110 degrees outside, 96 inside. The air-conditioning repair dude and dudette didn't make it by until 5:30, but they got it fixed before dark (loose wire in thermostat) but, man, did the experience make us appreciate air conditioning!

   Not much makes a hat guy prouder or happier than seeing his offspring in a hat!

Frances Stylin' A Lid!

"Southern houses and buildings once had space and windows and deep porches. This was perhaps the most beautiful and comfortable ordinary architecture in the United States, but it is no longer built, because of air-conditioning."

—Joan Didion, "South And West" 1970

Wild Bill Sees The Light

 June 12, 2024

   Some things only become clear on the fourth or fifth pass and one of those truths is that fame has a dark side. Yes, it bring beauties by the score, but it also brings the crazies even more. Don't believe me, go ask James Butler Hickok.

Daily Whip Out:

"Wild Bill Finally Sees the Light"

Or: "Fame Ripped Him to Shreds" 

Also, see John Lennon.

"Hell is truth seen too late."

—Old Vaquero Saying

The Resurrection & Reopening of The Historic Ellis Store And The Return of Mickey Free's Big, Bad Jack

 June 11, 2024

   Here's the final poster for the Resurrection & Reopening of The Historic Ellis Store Art Show and party on July 13, 2024. 

   If you love the Kid as much as my Kid compadres, Thom Ross, Buckeye Blake and Paul Andrew Hutton, you should be there for the fun. Yes, it's going to be an art show but it is mainly going to be a celebration of Amy Gauthier's tireless efforts to save a historic site.

   Meanwhile, here's a cat we haven't heard from in a while:

Daily Scratchboard Whip Out Revisited:

"Mickey Free On His Big, Bad Jack"

   He rode a mammoth Jack and in that peculiar country south of Bacanora, Sonora, where they remember that one-eyed captivo and his crazy Jack, to this day.

Daily Whip Out Flashback: "Campfire Liars"

"Towards evening, when the sun  went down with the flare of a blast furnace, patrols of cavalry rode sharply across the skyline to the night outposts. And after dark, mysterious fires burned in the town."

—John Reed, "Insurgent Mexico" 1914

The Three Main Activities When Living With Uno

 June 10, 2024

So I am reading the morning paper and I look over and see this. I realized living with Uno is 90% following each other around, watching each other go to the bathroom and wondering what the other has in his mouth. This look clearly says, Can I have what you have in your mouth? Sorry, dude, it's toast!

No, really, if I'm really good, can I have

what you have in your mouth?

  Repeat on a daily basis.

Meanwhile on another subject near and dear to my heart:

Daily Whip Out: "Big Hats In Cowtown"

A variation on the Old Vaquero Saying: "If everybody's wearin' a big hat, ain't nobody wearin' a big hat."

  Here is a sneak peek at the Ellis Store Resurrection and Reopening next month.

And, here's another stab at weird cactus arms.

Daily Scratchboard Whip Out: "Poolside Cacti"

  Another hot one. Actually went in the pool for the first time, which is where I spied the cactus, above.

"Art is not a pastime but a priesthood."

—Jean Cochteau

Billy the Kid Keeps Knock-Knock-Knockin-On BBB's Studio Door

 June 9, 2024

   File this one under Billy the Kid Keeps Knock-Knock-Knockin' On My Studio Door. 

A Long Lost New Report On The Death of Billy the Kid Revisited

   Yes, sometimes I forget just how groovy some of our earlier efforts have been in True West magazine, and this fine piece, by Mark Lee Gardner, just totally rocks.

   Meanwhile, the Kid Kid's are reuniting in Lincoln, New Mexico on July 12 at the Resurrected Ellis Store Celebration. Stay tuned for the invite, but keep the date open because we are going to have some fun.

The Kid Kids:

Thom Ross, BBB and Buckeye Blake

at the Due West Art Gallery in Santa Fe

many moons ago.

"Billy at The Back Door of The Ellis Store"

(Is this a bonafied tintype of the Kid?)

   Dream on, sucker! But this tintype artwork will be on display at the Ellis Store, along with this one:

"Billy at Midnight On The Deadliest Street In America"

Mexican Mourners

   The local Fort Sumner women who loved the Kid turned out at the carpenter shop to grieve on the morning of July 15, 1881.

   That is, of course, Celsa, on the left. At least it will be when I transform this photo reference, shot in the Middle East, to Old Fort Sumner, New Mexico. Yes, I have been collecting grieving women for the assignment to illlustrate the entrance to the new Buckeye Blake Kid Shrine to be installed at the cemetery in Old Fort Sumner. If we do it right there will be something to offend everyone. See pocket protector, above.

"Relevance, on the whole, has a very short shelf life."

—Old Vaquero Saying

Spines to the left of me, spines to the right. Here I am . . .stuck on cacti with you!

 June 8, 2024

Still studying cacti. Went out in the sideyard of my studio and drew a couple from real life, until the board heated up and I had to come in. Hot? Oh, yes,

Daily Scratchboard Whip Out:

"Prickly Pear Spines In Twilight"

The Big Hat Conundrum

"If everybody's wearing a big hat, ain't nobody wearing a big hat."

—Old Vaquero Saying

I am sometimes asked, "Where did you get your sense of Yuma?" I mean, "humor."

Well, I grew up reading this newspaper, The Mohave County Miner.

This is from the 1890s.

Love the editor joke. Speaking of trying to make art and make people laugh. . .

"In sports there's a winner, there's a loser. What I love about art is, it's not like that. It's about self-perfection. I love trying to make the best film you can. Get everyone together and just do your absolute best. If you can actualize that, that's the magic!"

—Richard Linklater, "The Hit Man" which premieres today on Netflix

The Real Hero of Tombstone

 June 7, 2024

   If you weren't able to make it to yesterday's screening of "Tombstone" at the Scottsdale Museum of The West, here's what you missed.

The Man Who Really Saved 'Tombstone'

   Everyone who reads True West magazine knows about Kurt Russell shadow directing the popular classic "Tombstone," but was there another person in the background who actually saved the project? According to a high ranking producer on the film shoot there was. Here's what really happened.

   When the screenwriter—and first-time director— Kevin Jarre, was fired from the movie "Tombstone" several weeks into filming (nothing of what Kevin shot is in the released film), the filmmakers had a mess on their hands. Everyone agreed the original script was brilliant, but with time lost they needed an alternate version of the story, or, at least one that salvaged as much of the original dialogue. Unfortunately, millions of dollars were written off by tossing everything that had been shot and getting a new director (George Cosmotos) up to speed. In addition, the budget had to be reduced in order for the film to have a chance at recovering its investment. In short, the entire film project at this point was on the verge of failure.

   The Executive Producer Andy Vajna (pronounced Vie-nah) went to work with his partner Mario Kassar to reshape the film. Vajna was an experienced hand, having already produced "First Blood,"  "Rambo,"  and "Medicine Man." And Andy was one of the founders of the American Film Market (AFM). In fact, after a trailer for the Sylvestor Stallone picture "First Blood'' tested poorly, Andy recut it as a revenge story and the film was enthusiastically received and sold at the Cannes film festival. Andy set out to do the same thing for "Tombstone." Most of the ending with the Red Sash Gang being shot out of their saddles and hanged (none of this was in the original script) gives a satisfying finish to the story—and pays off the revenge angle—and led to a hefty box office. Jarre's original script has more of a "Godfather" tone, exploring, and exploiting the grays between the Earps and the Cowboys, but with Andy Vajna's input, and additions, the film transformed into a more popular entertainment than the original, brilliant script would have done.

   And, now you know who really saved "Tombstone." As brilliant as Andy's contribution was, I still believe a six-part miniseries of the original script would be a winner, but that's just me.

The real Tombstone at dusk

(photo by Rob Mariasch)

"In Hollywood, nobody knows anything."

—William Goldman

"I don't deserve this! To die like this! I was building a house!" 

—Little Bill Daggett, (Gene Hackman) in "Unforgiven"

Who Saved "Tombstone"?

 June 6, 2024

    When the screenwriter, Kevin Jarre, was fired from the movie Tombstone in the middle of filming, the filmmakers had a mess on their hands. According to one of the producers, a Hungarian dude saved the project by turning the butchered script and reshot and salvaged scenes into a revenge plot. Who was this genius?

   Find out today, when I introduce the legendary movie in the movie theater of Scottsdale's Museum of the West at 2 P.M.

Come early and get this collector's edition of TW

FREE!

  Sometimes history writes itself (before it repeats itself).

Daily Whip Out:

"Kitty 'Cantankerous' Collins"

Her admirers—and there were many—claimed she discovered parts of Badwater Basin in Death Valley but most historians scoff at her claims. She did, however, cut a fine figure in buckskins, which has long been a solid marker for what men would rather believe.

Actually, I made this up from whole cloth but my point is about half true, but you know what they say about that.

"Half a truth is often a great lie."

—Benamin Franklin

Drawing Cacti Til The Cows Come Home!

 June 5, 2024

   Sometimes I wake up and think to myself: today I am going to draw and create cacti until the cows come home.

   Today was one of those days.

Daily Scratchboard Whip Out:

"Welcome Baby Barrel Cactus!"

Daily Scratchboard Whip Out: "Cacti On The Brain #16"

​

Daily Whip Out: "Succulent Radius Burst"

Daily Whip Out: "Saguaro: Crazy Arms"

"The desert works diligently to deny the cactus life, but still it blooms."

—Old Vaquero Saying

Stand by For Autographed Copies of The 66 Kids

 June 4, 2024

   We had to put the following disclaimer on today's website offer:

   Now for a limited time, when you order your copy of "The 66 Kids" it will be autographed by both BBB and Marshall Trimble. We say limited time because, do you know how hard it is to get both of these Yakkers in the same room and then get them to stop talking and telling stories long enough to sign a box of books? The answer is, Marshall's wife Vanessa and David Sholefield (the muscle at Scottsdale's Museum of the West) managed to strong-arm these two northern Arizona talkers to shut up long enough to sign one entire box of books (20) and when they are gone, well, we'll repeat the task, but we can't promise the same results.

BBB and Marsh almost stop talking!

   We barely got them to shut up long enough to take this picture. Actually, full disclosure, Marshall is starting a story even as the shutter clicked. See his mouth?

   Short answer, order your autographed copy now. Do not delay!

Yes, I want a signed copy of The 66 Kids!

"My high school was so small we had driver's ed and sex ed in the same car."

—Marshall Trimble, above, in the middle of telling this windy

Showdown at The Scottsdale Museum Corral

 June 3, 2024

   As the story goes, the writer William Goldman, first read about minor outlaws Robert LeRoy Parker and his cohort Harry Alonzo Longabaugh in the late fifties (possibly in True West magazine). 

 

  Goldman claims he spent about eight years pondering a story, saying, "There is that famous line Scott Fitzgerald wrote, who was one of my heroes, 'There are no second acts in American lives.'" So, when Goldman discovered that when the so-called super-posse comes after the outlaws and they took off for South America, Goldman had an epiphany: "They had a second act. . .It's a great story!"

   There was only one problem. Nobody in Hollywood would buy it. Only one studio would even consider it and that was if the two characters did NOT go to South America. When Goldman defended it by saying that was what really happened, the studio head supposedly sneered, "I don't give a shit. All I know is John Wayne don't run away."

   Of course, Goldman persevered and later claimed he only changed a couple pages of his script for "Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid" and the next thing you know the film had been green-lighted with George Roy Hill directing with Steve McQueen and Paul Newman starring in it, and with Jacqueline Bisset as Etta Place. No, wait, actually Steve and Jacqueline were considered but dropped out for various reasons, until we get the dream pairing of Paul Newman and Robert Redford as the outlaws and Katherine Ross as Etta Place.

   Of course, it seems obvious to me, the real reason it got greenlighted is because of the many clever lines of dialogue. Here are a few of my favorites:

"What happened to the old bank? It was beautiful."

"People kept robbing it."

"That's a small price to pay for beauty."

"I got vision; the rest of the world is wearing bifocals."

"I'm not crazy; I'm just colorful."

   And, there's plenty more where that came from.

Meanwhile, Back at The Ranch

   This is such a cool photo.

Tea Time at The Cholila Ranch

The real life and very handsome South America ex-patriot bandidos: Harry Longabaugh (The Sundance Kid), Etta Place and Butch Cassidy at their ranch in southern Argentina.

   Yesterday, we partnered with the fine folks at the Scottsdale Museum of the West to show "Butch & Sundance" as the first of 25 classic Westerns in their theater, unspooling two classic Westerns—Sundays and Thursdays—each week and with introductions by myself and, occasionally, this guy.

Me and Marsh at the Scottsdale Museum

of The West, yesterday.

"Not that it matters, but most of what follows is true."

—William Goldman's classic opening card to the film

The History of Nothing

 June 2, 2024

   Okay, so you saw what I wrote up yesterday about Virgil Earp being deputized while standing on a corner in Prescott, Arizona. 

Daily Whip Out:

"Virgil Earp Standing On A Corner In Prescott, Arizona"

   So, to be safe, I ran that copy by Brad Courtney, who is the unmoved mover when it comes to Prescott history. Here is part of his reply:

   "After the two bad guys bolted shooting their guns while fleeing on horseback down Montezuma, Constable Murray knew he needed some help, so he went looking for US Marshall Wiley Standefer (Crawley Dake's predecessor). Well, Standefer had just opened the Palace Saloon a month before (September 1877) on Gurley Street. This is the 1877 Palace that has been incorrectly linked to today's Palace (whose roots actually trace back to 1874--it is actually getting a new historical plaque that I wrote as well to replace the old one with incorrect information). I had always wondered why Virgil and the other three lawmen who would form the posse with Murray the constable and William McCall didn't hear all the commotion. They were inside! Fortuitously, not only was Standefer inside his Palace saloon, but he was yakking it up with Yavapai County sheriff Ed Bowers and Virgil. That is where and when Virgil was deputized. But apparently Virgil had walked into town from Thumb Butte, or Allie dropped him off while she went shopping. He had no horse, so he would have to keep up on foot. McCall and Standefer pursued by buggy. Bowers and Murray each had a horse. As you know, the buggy boys drove right by Wilson and Tullos (on the corner of Carleton and Granite where the Mile High Middle School is now). The bad guys were shot up there. As to the constable election, Virgil beat out Murray as far as vote-getting, But Prescott kept two constables at the time, so Murray got to keep his spot."

—Brad Courtney

   Well, crap, that is significantly different from the story I told, or, I should say, the version I believed was totally accurate. Which just goes to show, how damned slippery the truth is, period. There are so many tiny tangibles and so many obtuse tentacles emanating from any event that it's nigh impossible to ever get any past event totally accurate. Yes, it's depressing, especially when I've spent so much of my life trying to find the "truth." Which brings us to:

The History of Nothing

   It's true, I know a thing, or two, about Nothing.

Nothing Doing

BBB shooting a photo with a camera! And that is Carson Mell and Tommy Bell posed against a rock, across the road from Nothing, Arizona.

(Photo by Ed Mell)

Truth Be Told

   The truth doesn't cooperate and the slightest variation sends us off in the wrong direction (the movie "The Left-Handed Gun" is based on the only known photo—a tintype!—of Billy the Kid that shows his gun on his left hip.) Oh, so everything in that photo is reversed? Ay Yi Yi.

   Repeat.

"The past changes a little every time we retell it."

—Hilary Mantel

Standing On A Corner In Prescott, Arizona

 June 1, 2024

   Dan The Man, Stuart Rosebrook and I are wrapping up the big Doc In Prescott feature for the next issue of True West. Here's a layout you might get a kick out of.

   As you may know, Virgil Earp made his bones, while standing on the corner of Gurley and Montezuma Streets (where the St. Michaels Hotel is today) in Prescott when the local constable rode by in a buggy going south on Whiskey Row and spied the civilian—Virgil—holding a Winchester and deputized him on the spot. Virgil ran after the buggy, on foot, all the way to Granite Creek where he personally dispatched a couple of inebriated Texas bad boys and his bravery got him elected constable (replacing the guy who deputized him!) and then he rode the coattails of this event all the way to being named city marshal in Tombstone a short time later. Anyway, here is a sneak peek at one of the layouts we're working on in the next issue which ties those two happenstances together. And, by the way, yes, we know that arrow, on right,  is pointing to the wrong place.

"Standing On A Corner In Prescott, Arizona, such a fine sight to see. It's Virgil Earp, my lord, with a saddle gun, slowing down to take a look at me."

—Jackson Browne, if he grew up in Yavapai County

Two More Breakthroughs In Doc & Kate's Journeys

 May 31, 2024

   If you read my mea culpa yesterday about the solid evidence that Doc Holliday most likely traveled from Prescott to Las Vegas, New Mexico in an open two-seater buckboard, well, you may be interested in how history turns on the slightest bit of reporting. Look what Stuart Rosebrook found this morning:

Santa Fe New Mexican, Feb. 27, 1880

   Doc Holliday went from Prescott to Las Vegas in the March of 1880 and returning by April. Add to that, the newspaper reports that the railroad had been completed from Las Vegas, New Mexico to Albuquerque by March of 1880 and that opens up the very real possibility that on his return trip Doc rode the train all the way to Albuquerque and then rode in a Concord stagecoach back to Prescott.     

   Based on this latest revelation, I think it's safe to say Doc might have gone over in a glorified cart but he probably came back in a gilded coach.

   Plus, you can imagine the return passengers on both coaches gushing about how modern the West was becoming!  

Daily Whip Out:

"So, are you saying that everything you told us yesterday was only half true?"

   Yes. That is totally true. See quote, below.

A Bonus Photo of Gillette

 For me, the Holy Grail of research and history writing is finding a photograph of the place in question so we can see with our own eyes what it might have been like. For starters, let me say I have been looking at old Arizona photos for over a half century and I have never seen a photograph of the mining camp, Gillette, in Arizona Territory. 

   To recap: late in life Kate told three different interviewers about traveling from Prescott to the new mining camp of Gillette, where she claimed the mining superintendent allowed Doc and her to stay in his residence for the night. What might that have that looked like? Well, thanks to Brad Courtney, we now have a photograph of the place in question.

Gillette, in the late 1870s

Photo taken by D. F. Mitchell 

   In an added bit of irony, the man who took this photo of Gillette is the same photographer who took the photo of J.H. Holliday in Prescott!

Only one of two verified photos of Doc Holliday as an adult.

"Just when you think you've figured everything out, it moves."

—Old Vaquero Saying