La Gata, The Mexicali Stud and The Man Who Loved The Open Road

June 15, 2014
   Today I'm thinking of the man who taught me to love the open road:



Allen P. Bell in front of his Mobiloil gas station in Peach Springs, Arizona, 1947.

   Happy Father's Day dad. Miss the hell out of you.

   Still cleaning, chucking and salvaging artwork in the garage. Here's five unfinished boards I salvaged over the weekend with some potential:



Unfinished boards: L to R: The Mexicali Stud, Wyatt Pulls Steel, Joquin Murietta, Doc and Wyatt at The O.K. Corral and Mickey Free Enters Janos.

   Also found an unfinished La Gata. My KSLX morning radio compadre, Jeanne Sedello, posed for this.



Even though it's dinged up and kind of pooky (see water damage along bottom), I emailed Jeanner and asked if she wanted it anyway. Here is her reply:

Hell YEAH! I'll take it if you're offering!!! What do you mean you almost chucked it...that's priceless!!! But wait a minute...what kind of crap does it have on it....crap literally? I don't care...I'll take it....although I don't think I ever looked like that. Luv u brother and every time I hear an appropriate song for your services....I make a mental note. By the time you die...you'll have a full on concert:)

—Jeanne Sedello

   The last time we got together I jokingly asked Jeanne to do the playlist at my funeral and she took it seriously. The funny thing is, I wish I could be around to hear it. I know it will be great.

"How many performance artists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?"

"I don't know. I left early."
—Old Performance Artist Joke

Gary Peter Klahr Anyone?

June 13, 2014
   Friday the thirteenth. Editorial meeting all day, with working lunch. Planning True West editorail for 2015. Here are a few of my goals for the next year: "Lords of Apacheria" excerpt, Never-before-published photo essay on Pancho Villa and the Mexican Revolution, the real story behind "How The West Was Won," Mountain Men and their wily ways, The Wild Life of Texas Guinian.

Musty Morgue Mysteries
   Got to the bottom of art files and discovered termites, digging straight through carboard containers, clear through the art. Destroyed several dozen original art boards. Easily filled another garbage can with artwork.

 
A full garbage can of BBB discards (I did pull out the Wyatt and Virgil panel for a tweak).

Did discover a Doc Holliday that was worth saving:

 
"Doc Faces His Past"

   Found this old illustration of my grandfather busting across Iowa in the early 1900s:



 
"There Goes That Damn Bell Kid!", Grafix paper, pen and ink, 1980

   I have had mixed results doing caricature and miss more than I hit, however, this little pen and ink of a notorious Phoenix character, is dead on:



"A Phoenix Character: Gary Peter Klahr"



"If we keep doing what we're doing, we're going to keep getting what we're getting."
—Stephen Richards Covey

KC Heads Home and Honkytonk Sue's First Cover

June 12, 2014
   Speech last night went well. Sold out crowd, great food, good response. Cartwright's does such a good job. Only glitch was a faulty microphone cord that I had to crimp with my fingers so it would keep the connection. Irritating, and compromised my movement, but when you perform, as Emily Litella (Gilda Radner) put it, "it's always something."

   Whipped out a little painting today for a friend:

 
Daily Whipout, "KC Heads Home Ahead of The Storm"

   This is for KC Cassell, former headmaster at the Orme Ranch School who headed back to the east coast last year and is now at a school in Media, Pennsylvania. I promised him a painting and finally got around to it.

   Meanwhile, still cleaning in the garage and finding old artwork, like this little slice of Cave Creek life:

 
"Home of The Real News: Paul's Barbershop In Cave Creek, Arizona," 1987, pen and ink, from a photograph.

   Also found the black and white artwork for Honkytonk Sue's first cover:

 
Honkytonk Sue for first cover on the "New Times Weekly"

 
Honkytonk Sue's First Cover, March 8, 1978

A couple observations: how shockingly weak that masthead type face looks today! We were so proud of it at the time. I want to say Frank Mell designed it. Ouch! I also believe this is the very first annual Best of Phoenix, which means that they've been doing this very successful sales tool for 36 years! Also, if memory serves me correctly, the teaser at the bottom—"Best Western Magazine"—was actually True West (I just kept the cover and back cover). Perhaps I'm being too hopeful here, but it would have been something I would have promoted in staff meetings, because even way back then I was a fan of True West magazine.

   It's kind of staggering to see all of the effort that has gone into literally thousands of drawings I have done over the years. And what's even more staggering is how the vast majority of them really suck (Sue's lower torso, above, is so wrong). I have to agree with Josef:

"I think to get one good picture is a miracle."
—Josef Koudelka, Czech photographer

Mattie Earp's Final Stop

June 11, 2014
  I have a history speech over at Carwright's Restaurant at six tonight. First one of the new season. "Related to Outlaws" is the subject and is the theme of a cover story in the next True West, which is at the printer even as you read this.

  In addition to filing and culling my art morgue this morning, I also got back into my Daily Whipout routine. My goal was to do five before work, started at eight and got four in the can. Here they are:

 
"The Storyteller" (12"X 9") gouache, $500 for original


"Moonscraper" (5"X7") gouache, $250 for original



 
"Mickey Free Looks For Sign In The Sky" (9" X 12") gouache, $500 for original

(actually a reworking of an earlier painting I found in my failure pile)

 
"Mickey Free Rides Around the Glowing Crosses at Fronteras." (17.24" X6") gouache, $500 for original

   Went home for lunch and whipped out the final Whipout:

 
"Dust Storm Over Pinal" (12"X9") gouache, $500 for original

   Dig the dust but then what would you expect from the Duke of Dust? Yes, Pinal, Arizona was Mattie Earp's final stop and today nothing remains of the boom town except the a few headstones. True West magazine helped save the cemetery from vandals several years ago. The rider in the foreground is, in fact, on his way to see Mattie. His name is T.J. Flannery, a 30-year-old laborer.

"[Wyatt] Earp, she said, wrecked her life by deserting her and she didn't want to live."
—T.J. Flannery, testifying at Mattie's inquest

Free Calamity Jane

June 11, 2014
   Made a goal this morning to get out into the garage early, go through all my original art and put it into categories, The Razz, New Times, Honkytonk Sue, Billy the Kid and General Wild West. Then I decided to judge each piece of artwork, by putting them into three piles:

• Worth saving

• Sentimental

• Derivative

   I had Kathy come out and help me, since she is a little more objective than me. The first category is self-explanatory, the second category means a piece of art featuring a family member or friend that warrants saving. The last one—derivative—connotes artwork that I copied literally, without any original flare, or traced, or projected ( did this more than I'd like to admit). A good example of this is a Duo-tone of Calamity Jane done on Grafix paper in the 1980s (I believe it ran in "Low Blows," the compilation book of my New Times cartoons). I threw it right into the trash bin.

 
A large Grafix page of Clamaity Jane (17.5" X 25") in the garbage bin

   Here is a closer look:

 
Calamity Jane about to go to the dump

   And here's just some of the artwork I went through this morning. It's going to take another couple days. This is probably a fifth of the artwork stored in the garage.

 
Original BBB artwork on the Spanish driveway. Scenes in front are Honkytonk Sue boards for a story, "The Man Canyon" which never got off the ground.

   Filled the entire green garbage bin with "derivative" artwork, but then had seconds thoughts about Ms. Jane.

Here's the deal: I pulled the Calamity Jane out of the trash and brought it into work. If anyone wants it, they can have it for free. All they need to do is pay for shipping and handling ($25). Let me know why you deserve to have it.You can respond here, or email me at bozebell@twmag.com

"I'm glad she went to a good home."
—What I always say when someone cool owns a piece of my artwork

The Zaney Zone

June 10, 2014

   Back to cleaning out the garage and finding all sorts of stuff:



Random Rogues, Part III

   Found this image this morning:



Mickey Campa Standing On Bull, with caption, "I don't stand for no bull."



Mickey, of course, beat up so many guys in high school at Cerbat Park, at lunchtime, that we have all lost count. He was the MCUHS Pugilist.



   I have used many models over the years, usually people I know. This reference photo is for a New Times doubletruck I did on Phoenix hairdressers.



 
Gail Peterson, married at the time to Ed Mell

   And then there is the irrepressible "Minnesota Mike":


The late, great "Minnesota Mike" Melrose at El Encanto with a very pretty acquaintance.

   Back in the nineties a few of my history minded friends called ourselves The Renegades and we annually made treks to Old West sites. One year (1998?) we landed in Coffeyville, Kansas to witness first hand where the Daltons met their Waterloo:

 
Bob McCubbin at the mouth of Death Alley in Coffeyville, Kansas

   Over the Fourth of July weekend in 1980, I was invited to attend Comic Con in New York City as a guest of the promoter, Phil Seuling. His hipster daughter, Gwen Seuling—she had a skin head do, the first I had ever seen—took me to Danceteria, a niteclub where the Rolling Stones had just premiered their latest album), and where I saw TV videos of rock songs two years before the launch of MTV.

 
Ms. Gwen Seuling in front of Madison Square Garden on July 4, 1980. I believe she went on to run the Comic Con show after her father's passing. One thing was for sure, she was way ahead of a whole lot of people.

   Closer to home, here is a prophetic scene:

 
The Insane Clown Posse Rides Again (in downtown Cave Creek, Arizona)

   Meanwhile, I uncovered a large batch of cartoons I did for the Phoenix New Times in the nineties (my second hitch, after I landed on KSLX radio).

 
The Zany Zone, appeared in Phoenix New Times, early nineties.

   The overhwelming reaction I have at re-reading these is, "What the hell was I thinking? These are not funny at all!" Was it being on the radio that stunted my zane brain? Was I trying too hard? Not sure, but it is unnerving, to say the least.

    I saw a comedian at the Mack Sennett Studios in LA on Sunday night.

    He had all these bells and whistles he created on his Mac computer and projected behind him in a quasi-Al Gore-"Inconvenient Truth"-kind-of-way and it was clever but the dude wasn't all that funny and the bits fell flat. I quipped to a friend, "He's got the props, but he ain't got the chops." That is, unfortunately, exactly how I feel reading these old strips.


"The significance of a man is not in what he attains but in what he longs to attain."
—Kahlil Gibran

The Early Bird Eats The Worm?

June 9, 2014
   Back home to the desert this morning. Paid an extra $12.50 for the Early Bird promotion on Southwest so I could perhaps speed up the getting-on-the-plane deal, only to find I was A-53, which was not bad (full flight loading first with As, then Bs and finally Cs). The only problem was, I paid the fee, but Kathy, who did not, was A-55. So, really what did I pay for? I guess you could say I was kind of an early bird, but that's a pretty thin early.

   Finished reading The Snow Leopard by Peter Matthieson on the plane ride home from Burbank. Amazing writer. Now I want to read his In The Spirit of Crazy Horse, which is quite controversial, but he is such a good writer I'm anxious to see what he has to say about the Peltier case.

   Got into the office and received this email from Brussels (all spelling and punctuation as is):

Bob,
   I just read the French edition of the life of Billy the Kid you wrote. Very well illustrated book .All excellent. I have a question: by which mean was it possible to have a so precise knowledge day by day, month by month sometimes hour by hour about people actions and behaviours in those years . Is it something that existed in the local news papers or extracted from personal memories ? I am anxious to know your way in that history.

Sincerily your’s
—Alex Pireau, Wezembeek-Oppem, Belgium

 
Billy Looms Over Lincoln, New Mexico

   Here is my reply:

Alex,
    Glad you enjoyed the French edition of Billy the Kid. The answer is that the first line of knowledge came from the many newspapers in the entire West (we just found a description of the Kid's killing by Garrett that  ran in a Colorado paper), then there were government investigations—The Angel Report—and others which were eventually found by researchers and added to the mix. Then came the personal memoirs of the Lincoln County War participants (John Tunstall kept a diary which noted researcher Fred Nolan tracked down in the early 1950s) and finally interviews with many of the old-timers in the 1920s and 30s. As the years have gone by all of these resources have given us a pretty good idea of daily life.

    Still, there are big gaps. We don't really know where the Kid was born and what his first years were really like.
—Bob Boze Bell

  Meanwhile, my old editor at the Arizona Republic, Ken Western, just sent me this news of me being included in a new Western fiction book:

   You appear in a couple of spots in Jeff Guinn's new Western "Glorious," most prominently on page 342: “Ike Clanton led two men through the crowd. One was tall and grizzled. The other sported a brushy mustache and wore a particularly wide-brimmed hat. “‘Why, it’s Boze Bell and Johnny Boggs,’ Mulkins said. ‘Why are they being brought up to the governor?’ Safford dramatically shook hands with the two prospectors, then gestured for Collin MacPherson (big bad guy) to join them.”…..(Governor talking at event) ”’Mr. Bell and Mr. Boggs have made a significant strike, and I hereby announce that they have sold their claim - to myself and Collin MacPherson.’”

So, you’re a rich man, BBB.

—Ken Western


 
Weston Allen a couple months ago. He's so much bigger now.

"I'm rich in the cosmic bank."
—BBB

Hanging With Weston

June 8, 2014
   Had fun with Sir Weston this morning. He is standing, with support, and, after ripping up his rug (his parents bought him a detachable foam rug with letters and numbers that come apart like Legos) he pulled himself up at his bedroom window door and turned to "goo goo" me about going outside:



Weston with his blankie standing at the back door

  After breakfast, grandma and Deena went to Target and grandma Goose bought Weston a new toy.  Weston's parents drove us out to the Rose Bowl area and we visited the Kid Space Museum. Most of the play exhibits were a tad too old for him, but the parents and grandparents had fun. Afterwards we drove downtown Pasadena and had lunch at Verde Cafe. Sat outside on the sidewalk. A very pretty day. Food was good, had the boiled grapefruit, tortilla soup and a virgin mojito.



On the sidewalk in front of the Verde Cafe in downtown Pasadena.



Deena and Kathy, two peas in a pod.

After we got home, Weston's dad Mike put together the new toy, a Sand Castle Play Table. Mike put water in it and the boy played with it for a good hour:


Weston playing in the water. He was mighty intrigued by the water leak underneath (it's made to hold sand and not necessarily water) and seemed to be contemplating going under to fix it, which led to this quip by his father:


"I've got the right tools. Heart shaped shovel. Check. . ."
—Mike imitating Weston getting ready to under the new toy to fix the water leak

Birthday Surprise

June 7, 2014
   Surprised Kathy with a birthday trip today. Didn't tell her where we were going but told her to pack a sweater. She thought we were driving up north to Flag, but we actually headed south to Sky Harbor. Also gave her roses and champagne to start the trip:



BBB and Kathy Sue on her 64th birthday getting set to leave the house.

Flew to Burbank and were picked up by Deena and Weston and then went to lunch at Four Cafe in Eagle Rock.


Unknown dude, Deena, Weston and Kathy Sue wait in line at The Four Cafe

"Goodnight nobody, Goodnight mush, And goodnight to the old lady whispering 'hush'."
—Margaret Wise Brown, Goodnight Moon

Random Rogues, Part II

June 6, 2014
   I spent three hours in the garage this morning trying to get a handle on the mess and the treasures piled there. Got too hot at about nine and had to quit. Still can't get to the back but I'm working on it.

Random Rogues From The BBB Archives:

 
This is Arizona's Official Historian, Marshall Trimble, who writes "Ask The Marshall" for True West magazine. Photo taken in Oklahoma (Pawnee?) in 1988 on an outlaw tour led by Bob McCubbin. Marshall loved the sign and asked me to take a photo of him in front of it.


 
Kingman Cowboy Bud Linn, who is married to my Aunt Jean. Photo circa 1976. Great guy, they moved to Fort Sumner, New Mexico where they both still farm and have fun.



 
Chuck Wagon and the Wheels in front of the same packing plant wall Honkytonk Sue posed in front of, in Tucson, circa 1980. Excellent Country Rock band from the Old Pueblo. Still playing, I believe.

 
Richard Ignarski sitting on Bill Doolin's grave, circa 1998. Taken on the same outlaw tour that the Trimble photo came from. Richard is opening a gunfighter museum in Tombstone.



 
Tate Wilford at Festival of the West, circa 2003. Great look and mustache. Classic.

"One man's trash is another man's trashy treasure."
—Old Vaquero Saying

A Gallery of Rogues From The BBB Archives

June 5, 2014
   Sixth day cleaning in garage. I ran across these characters from my archives.

 
The Apache Kid in Cave Creek Cave (Flint Carney), 1988

 
El Chivato In The Casas Grandes, Mexico Jail (Thomas Charles Bell), 1996

 
Steve Benson, Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist, circa 1991

 
Doug Clark, Phoenix concert promoter (he created Compton Terrace), circa 1978

 
Paul Andrew Hutton, Santa Fe, New Mexico, 1993

"Whatever you love, you are."
—Old Vaquero Saying

To Save Or Chuck?

June 4, 2014
   Still cleaning out the garage and finding some things that I can't believe I ever saved, and other stuff that are keepers and then there are things that are right on the line: to save or chuck?

Save Or Chuck? Help me decide
 
The original poster for my first art show on October 22, 1992: Save or chuck?



 
Ghandi In Arizona, ran in New Times, the actual paste-up boards with glued on corrections: save or chuck?



 
Kathy Sue as Honkytonk Sue at a meat packing plant wall in Tucson, 1980: save or chuck?





 
Bob Boze Bell Screaming, reference shot for Playboy, 1988: save or chuck?


 
Cowboy Caleb Pike, Victoria BC, August 25, 1985: save or chuck?

"I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past."
—Thomas Jefferson