Category Archives: FRONTIERADO

July 14, 2013 · 11:28 pm

FOUR COOL BUT FORGOTTEN GUNSLINGERS FOR FRONTIERADO

Bear River Tom Smith

Bear River Tom Smith

The Frontierado holiday is coming up on Friday, August 2nd and Balladeer’s Blog continues presenting holiday- themed articles. I know that in reality the gunfighters of the old west were thugs and worse but Frontierado is about the myth of the American west, not the grinding reality. 

As the glorious day approaches and we are all making our holiday preparations enjoy a sampling of this group of colorful characters who don’t get the attention – or movies – they deserve.

1. BEAR RIVER TOM – That’s our top-ranked figure in the photo to your left. One of the few actual gunmen to wear a fancy two-gun holster, Bear River Tom Smith’s myth begins with his birth in 1838 in New York City. He either did or did not serve in the Union Army in 1861 (accounts vary) but was definitely part of the NYC police force by 1862. In 1867 he headed west, working as a laborer laying track for the Union Pacific Railroad  in Nebraska.

By 1868 the crew he was with had reached Wyoming, where the Hell On Wheels town of Bear River sprang up around their work camp. Bear River was to wild, lawless railroad towns what Dodge City, Kansas was to wild, lawless cattletowns. Bear River Tom put his guns, fists and law enforcement experience to Continue reading →

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July 13, 2013 · 9:15 pm

TOP FOUR FRONTIERADO MOVIES: NUMBER THREE – POSSE (1993)

possePOSSE is a terrific western about a gang of African American gunfighters (plus the goofiest Baldwin brother) involved in an action-packed epic journey across the American west. The Frontierado holiday (which will be here Friday August 2nd) is the perfect time of year to hunker down with this film while drinking a Cactus Jack or a Deuces Wild or two. I’ll review the recipes for those mixed drinks in a few days, for now we’ll focus on the third-place movie on our countdown.

Posse stars Mario Van Peebles, who also directed, as Jesse Lee, the brooding, revenge-driven hero of the saga. He and all but one member of his gang, our titular posse, are soldiers fighting in Cuba during the Spanish-American War in 1898. A dangerous assault they carry out turns out to be a Continue reading →

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July 11, 2013 · 11:23 pm

TOP FOUR FRONTIERADO MOVIES: NUMBER FOUR – TOM SAWYER (1973)

Tom Sawyer

Tom Sawyer

The TOM SAWYER I’m referring to here is the 1973 musical version which is unforgiveably forgotten by many people. This musical has some incredibly catchy songs, memorable dialogue portions and terrific performances from all cast members, young and old.

Most importantly the film nicely distills the essential elements of Mark Twain’s popular story in a nearly seamless way. Anything you loved from the book when you read it is to be found here: Tom’s tall tales to Aunt Polly to explain why he’s late for supper or didn’t show up at school, Tom tricking other kids into paying him to whitewash a fence for him, Tom and Huckleberry Finn witnessing Injun Joe’s murder of Ol’ Doc, Tom chivalrously taking a thrashing for Becky Thatcher, Tom and Huck running away and being given up for dead and of course Tom attending his own funeral.

All that and a great musical number during an excellently mounted 1870’s Fourth of July Celebration. Injun Joe gets a much more merciful end in this movie than he did in the book, so that’s a plus, too. 

Johnny Whitaker, known to generations of Continue reading →

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July 10, 2013 · 6:14 pm

MORE NEGLECTED GUNSLINGERS FOR FRONTIERADO

FRONTIERADO IS COMING ON FRIDAY, AUGUST SECOND!

With the Frontierado holiday almost upon us what better time to examine three more figures who helped make the American west wild?

Lottie Deno

Lottie Deno

3. LOTTIE DENO – Equally comfortable  dealing faro, playing poker or shooting a pistol Charlotte “Lottie” Deno was one of the most famous female gamblers of the old west, along with Poker Alice. Lottie didn’t engage in nearly as many gunfights as Poker Alice did, but she didn’t have to, since she was very skilled at maneuvering lovesick men into doing some of her killing for her. Even her no-good husband Johnny Golden was bumped off by two of Lottie’s male conquests. 

Lottie, who said she learned card-playing from her father, was a former southern belle who came west after the Confederacy fell. She spent three years in San Antonio dealing faro and playing poker in, among other places, the iconic vaudeville saloon of Jack Harris, where Texas Ben Thompson and King Fisher were killed the same night in 1884. Fellow gambler Frank Thurmond began a romance with Lottie but when he Continue reading →

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July 6, 2013 · 2:01 pm

JUST TWENTY-SEVEN MORE SHOPPING DAYS TIL FRONTIERADO!

What is Frontierado?  Frontierado is a Continue reading →

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May 30, 2013 · 9:05 pm

WYNONNA EARP: THE NEGLECTED HEROINE WHO DESERVES A MOVIE

Wynonna EarpBalladeer’s Blog’s Frontierado holiday is rapidly approaching! For newbies I’ll point out that that holiday is the 1st Friday of every August. I’m kicking off this year’s countdown to Frontierado with a look at a comic book heroine who should not be overlooked in this mad barrage of superhero films of the 21st Century. The fact that she falls into Weird Western territory is what makes her perfect for the Frontierado season. 

WYNONNA EARP – December of 1996 saw the comic book debut of Wynonna Earp, a descendant of Frontier Marshal Wyatt Earp. Wynonna worked in present-day law enforcement in the American southwest. What separates her from her more well known ancestor is the fact that Wynonna was a United States Marshal, Black Badge Division.

The Black Badge Division was a top-secret branch of Federal Marshals established by President Theodore Roosevelt to deal with paranormal menaces. That’s right, Wynonna Earp was as sexy as Barb Wire or Xena and fought werewolves, mummies, zombies, gremlins and all other manner of supernatural foes just like Kolchak or the X-Files crew. In her earlier adventures Marshal Earp was drawn as a drop-dead sex-bomb who often gouged out the eyes of her opponents with her impossibly high heels while in her final few escapades she was drawn as a more sensibly-dressed heroine.

Wynonna Earp was the Continue reading →

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September 25, 2012 · 12:01 am

THE TOP “DEITIES” IN WILD WEST MYTHOLOGY

 The exaggerated stories that surround the figures of the American West appeal to me as a classic example of the human tendency toward embellishment. In my non-believer’s heart I genuinely feel this tendency lies at the core of nearly all the superstitious nonsense in each of the world’s “holy” books and in all of ancient mythology.

After all, these figures of the Wild West were in action less than 200 years ago, yet look at all the superhuman deeds  that are ascribed to them and the outrageous drama that we’re told their lives were filled with. These real-life characters who were often just thugs and criminals have been  posthumously transformed into icons whose sagas now bear little resemblance to their actual lives.

I feel that serves as a blueprint for how all mythic belief systems operate. When you magnify the distortions of just 200 years by 10 times or more you can see what tiny little kernels of truth may actually lie buried in the accounts of gods and demigods who are said to have roamed the world ages ago.

All of which Continue reading →

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August 8, 2012 · 11:18 pm

THE ORIGINAL DJANGO AND TWO BLAXPLOITATION WESTERNS: A PRIMER FOR DJANGO UNCHAINED

 The upcoming release of Quentin Tarantino’s reboot of the seminal Spaghetti Western saga Django wreaked some minor havoc with my recent Frontierado holiday posts. I had been working on a draft for a review of the original Django and its central figure contrasted with other EuroWestern heroes like Charles Bronson’s Harmonica, Gianni Garko’s Sartana, Terence Hill’s Trinity, Tony Anthony’s Stranger and of course Clint Eastwood’s Man With No Name.

I also had a draft in progress for a review of two blaxploitation westerns from the 1970s which featured a former slave turned gunslinger taking on former Confederates in the Wild West.

A few days before I was to publish those reviews the airwaves and the web started crawling with what seemed like ’round the clock trailers for Django Unchained, Tarantino’s reboot of the story, this time with the title figure an African American who goes from slavery to a career as a bounty hunter gunning down southern rednecks in the Wild West.

Instantly my two reviews, right down to AN ACTUAL JOKE I WROTE THAT, ASTONISHINGLY ENOUGH, SHOWS UP IN THE TRAILER FOR DJANGO UNCHAINED, seemed like Continue reading →

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August 3, 2012 · 12:01 am

HAPPY FRONTIERADO! CELEBRATE WITH A LOST ADVENTURE OF BUCKSHOT BRYANT

Computer image reconstruction of what Buckshot Bryant’s mysterious visitors may have looked like … if filmed by a urinal cake

At last the day is here! All through the year we waited and now the celebrating begins in earnest! Frontierado, the greatest holiday this side of Life Day for Wookies, has galloped into town and bellied up to the bar for a drink and a hot meal.

Special greetings from me, the Blackwater Kid, to Amarillo Rose, Dusty Murtaugh, Doc Albany and her husband Casino Bill Kost, Cyclone Rachel, Buckshot Bryant, Lady London, Cactus Cathy, Kid Equus and Doc Robyn, plus the M.I.A Six-Gun Sara!

There are even more people celebrating Frontierado with us this year than last year, but various obligations have prevented me from writing official Sagas for all of them.

This holiday is being observed in the USA, New Zealand, the UK and Australia just like last year, but this year we add Canada, Germany and Japan to the list of nations that have Continue reading →

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August 2, 2012 · 1:08 am

THREE MORE NEGLECTED WILD WEST FIGURES

FRONTIERADO IS THIS FRIDAY, AUGUST THIRD!

With the Frontierado holiday almost upon us what better time to examine 3 more figures who helped make the American west wild?

3. LOTTIE DENO – Equally comfortable  dealing faro, playing poker or shooting a pistol Charlotte “Lottie” Deno was one of the most famous female gamblers of the old west, along with Poker Alice. Lottie didn’t engage in nearly as many gunfights as Poker Alice did, but she didn’t have to, since she was very skilled at maneuvering lovesick men into doing some of her killing for her. Even her no-good husband Johnny Golden was bumped off by two of Lottie’s male conquests. 

Lottie, who said she learned card-playing from her father, was a former southern belle who came west after the Confederacy fell. She spent three years in San Antonio dealing faro and playing poker in, among other places, the iconic vaudeville saloon of Jack Harris, where Texas Ben Thompson and King Fisher were killed the same night in 1884. Fellow gambler Frank Thurmond began a romance with Lottie but when he Continue reading →

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