Journal Notes

I’m off to Las Vegas tomorrow to speak to the attendees at the Single Action Shooters Society Convention at the Riviera Hotel. The topic of speech is 10 Loves Lessons Learned by Women of the Old West. I’m looking forward to being surrounded by people who love the Old West. I need the distraction at this time too. The holidays are wonderful, but I can’t help but think a little more about my brother and his situation. The injustice that was done to him and the sadness that continues on is overwhelming. I’ve been praying for years that things would change, but it seems to just get worse. The unanswered prayers and lack of hope have left me empty and more bitter than I ever thought possible. I feel like I’m drowning and the only thing keeping me afloat are the books I’m working on about the people who ventured over the plains to parts unknown. Wish I had a horse and thousands of miles to ride – I’d grab a hunk of mane, sink some spur, and hurry off into the sunset.

The more time I spend researching the lives of the women who dared to venture west in the mid 1850s, the more I realize that some of life’s best lessons came from those brave souls. For example, Tamsen Donner, wife of the leader of the fatal expedition over the Sierra Mountains learned that one should “never take no shortcuts and hurry along as fast as you can.” Sharpshooter and entertainer, Annie Oakley learned to “aim at a high mark and you will hit it. No, not the first time, not the second time and maybe not the third. But keep on aiming and keep on shooting for only practice will make you perfect. Finally you’ll hit the bull’s-eye of success.” Actress and professional beauty Lillie Langtry learned that, “Anyone who limits her vision to memories of yesterday is already dead.” I admire the aforementioned ladies and appreciate the lessons learned, but feel certain I wouldn’t have such lofty sentiments to offer after attempting to blaze a trail across uncharted territories. I don’t think I would have made it as far as the Rocky Mountains without crying. And I definitely wouldn’t have had any inspirational lessons to offer. I don’t care much for the great outdoors and I require modern plumbing. That’s hardly the quote the U.S. government could have used to persuade people to travel beyond Independence, Missouri. Just getting to a wagon train stop would have proved a challenge for me – I have a hard time trying to navigate my way around the web. Just when did all this computer stuff happen anyway? You know, one day I was playing Pong, the next thing I know Wes, the gas meter guy with the eye patch, has an uplink to satellite on his tool belt. But I digress… I think the best lesson offered by a frontier woman came from entertainer Klondike Kate Rockwell who said, “the quickest way to double your money is to fold it over and put it back in your pocket.”

The holiday season seems to have arrived with a fury. It snuck up on me while I was working on a massive church event. For the last several weeks I’ve been working on the Christmas in Bethlehem program at church. We transform the interior of the building to look like Bethlehem during the time Christ is born and then conduct tours through the city. It’s a worthy project, but an exhausting one. This will be my last year heading up CIB. After eight years of directing and writing the program I am going to turn the reigns over to someone else. I’m going to concentrate on writing and promoting the books I’ve penned and my brother. I want to make sure the last bit of time he has is as comfortable as possible. I also want to pursue a broader range of topics to write about. I hope to have a contract for my first fiction novel within the next 6 months and there is a distinct possibility that the various books I’ve written about women of the Old West will become a documentary series. I’m looking forward to change and making things right. The new year will include a great deal more research travel and learning more about Parkinsons and how to best care for my brother. I’ll be challenging the adoption of two of the three individuals that hurt my brother and the paternity of the third. Vengeance is on the way along with a library of new work.

Updating my site proved to have been impossible this past week with work and holiday company. Over the Thanksgiving holiday a few poems were brought to my attention. I suppose they might have been a bit more tolerable had they been about some Old West subject matter, but alas, that was not the case. I don’t care much for poetry. Much like the poet’s work I read this weekend, I find it forced and disingenuous. Poetry in its most virgin sense, has nothing but attention as its defense. It cannot escape its unnatural flow,
Crammed inside a box by some conflicted foe. Basically, what I’m saying is I don’t like it because it’s not natural. At the first attempt at making something ‘rhyme’, it loses its originality. Try as you will, it will never be pure. I have seen poetry that doesn’t rhyme and I guess that may be an exception to the rule. I consider an uninhibited flow of information from one’s mind natural. Since the brain doesn’t inherently rhyme or other actions that define poetry (loosely or strictly), then it isn’t natural in the sense I mean. It’s edited to fit poetry’s acceptable standards… ie, ‘made into poetry’. I think there should be some word that refers to simple thoughts. Philosophy? I’m not a fan – too much vague bull. Just thoughts not meant to be wisdom, or intellectual, or anything… just… well, poetic writing that is not constrained by any rules. I prefer gifted screenwriting to traditional poetry. Done well, screenwriting has the ability to say everything in just a few short words. Consider the dialogue from The Unforgiven. The scene involves Billy Munny’s conversation with The Kid shortly after they’ve taken a life. MUNNY It’s a hell of a thing, ain’t it, killin’ a man. You take everythin’ he’s got… an’ everythin’ he’s ever gonna have… THE KID (trying to pull him- self together) Well, I gu-guess they had it… comin’. MUNNY We all got it comin’, Kid. That’s poetry to me. A message conveyed in simple, but elegant terms. Another one of those simple, but elegant pieces came from The Outlaw Josey Wales. JOSEY Now remember, when things look bad and it looks like you’re not gonna make it, then you gotta get mean. I mean plumb, mad-dog mean. ‘Cause if you lose your head and you give up then you neither live nor win. That’s just the way it is. Words to live by indeed and just what I intend to do.

Not much work got done this past week. My parents are here visiting and my attention has been elsewhere. With the exception of making corrections to the revised version of the Libbie Custer book and making all the final arrangements for the Christmas in Bethlehem project, I’ve accomplished little. Hope to spend some time today researching the next few books I’ll be writing. Two new westerns ride into theatres this month, True Grit and Cowboys and Aliens. Both look like quality pictures, but how can you go wrong with a western? Would that I could keep my mind strictly on the Old West, but my brother’s situation continues to grieve my heart. I’m sad all the time it seems. I have to believe there is a purpose for all this pain. I have to believe that things will get better someday. I have to believe that or there is no use being here at all. Hopefully, I’ll be back soon with more information about the Single Action Shooters Convention in Vegas next month and interesting tidbits about women outlaws from the heartland of the country.

I’ve been doing a lot of research this past week in preparation for updating the book Hearts West: True Stories of Mail Order Brides. I’ve come across some truly moving correspondence between couples who believed they would never see their loved ones again. Whether a cholera outbreak had overtaken the wagon train carrying a future spouse to their beloved, or lack of water threatened their passage over the Salt Lake desert, the last words they wrote to their betrothed was about love. In all the years I’ve been doing research I’ve never come across anyone who left a letter of hate. I don’t believe anyone has that thought in mind as the end draws near. Love is the prevailing sentiment. I’d like to hope that for myself, but believe that would be folly. My parents spent what might be the last time with my brother today. My mother reports that his tremors are out of control and that he struggles to keep his head from shaking violently. Parkinson’s is the runaway train on course to collide with an early, painful grave. Rick will go, but not before he suffers more. In these final times I don’t have love on my mind. It’s hate. It’s bitterness and angst and a desire to track down the bad guys and make them pay. I feel like the Charles Bronson character in Once Upon a Time in the West. I will only rest once I see the bad guy fall from grace, lose everything, and be fully exposed to the world. And then, as they cry out for mercy, and dare to ask how this could happen to them, I will be there to remind them and watch the murderers downfall. I want to see their faces filled with the recognition that they have been found out. No thoughts of love from them or for them will be issued – only signs of relief that evil has passed. Rick didn’t deserve this. My mom didn’t deserve this heartache. I can’t live without somehow making it right. And as Bronson promised Fonda, making it right will only come at the point of dying.

My parents are traveling to the prison/medical facility where my brother is located. Time is of the essence. They might be able to make this trip again. My mother was hospitalized in route. She really should still be in the hospital, but was released early because of the great need to get to Rick. The anger I feel over this situation washes over me again and again. In between the tidal waves of pain and bitterness that toss me about, I might come up for air and allow myself to hope for the reconciliation Paul talks about in 2 Corinthians. For a brief moment I feel it, but it slips away quickly with the next crash of tears and hurt. I’m pulled under with rage and an overwhelming drive to continue working toward proving his innocence and expose the real evil in this sad, unending tale. I’ve been waiting for a long time, but it’s just about over now. Cockroaches scatter in the light. The cockroaches who accused my brother are going to scatter in the light of truth. The only way I can work the fury out while waiting for the light to come is to write. I’ve got more than enough work to keep me busy, just not enough to help me forget all that’s happened and is yet to happen.

I locked myself inside my home office three days ago to begin the rewrites on the Elizabeth Custer book and have just now finished. I love writing. What I can’t stand is the paperwork. Actually, I love having written. Working out all the bugs in the bibliography is the most difficult part of the job. There were many primary sources used to research this title and all have to be numbered and correspond with the right section and, well, it’s a nightmare. The new video promoting the book is on the website now under the “media” category. It’s both educational and heartbreaking. Sounds a little like my first marriage. There’s no time now to reflect on the Custer book or an ex-husband. I’ve got to get to work on the next manuscript. I’ll simply conclude my thoughts about the latter by saying that I went into the marriage knowing as much about the man as Mia Farrow did in Rosemary’s Baby. I was young and didn’t realize he thought monogamy was a type of wood. But enough of that, let’s get back to the Old West. On this day in 1861, 17 year-old Cole Younger, riding with Quantrill’s Raiders, skirmished with federal troops near Independence, Missouri and killed his first man. The shot was measured at 71 yards. On September 21, 1876, a posse caught up with Cole and he was shot seven times. The shots didn’t kill him. He was jailed, later paroled, and went on the lecture circuit preaching the evils of crime. Before his death in March 1916, he had locked himself in his home office to write his memoirs.

I’m on the trail today of some of the most notorious female outlaws in the Midwest. I’ve found a few among the ladies of easy virtue. The Rose of Cimarron, Belle Starr, Cattle Annie and Little Britches – all had their reasons for becoming unshackled outlaws, the common one being they lost their hearts to some romantic reprobate, and therefore could lay the blame, as their sisters had done for centuries, upon the unregenerate male sex. Nothing has changed. From the 1850s to 2010, men are still being blamed for women’s bad actions. Writing about male outlaws is much more interesting because they don’t make excuses. They’re bad, they know it, and they accept it. Many of the Old West outlaw gangs, and for that matter Old West law enforcement teams, were brothers – the Youngers, the Daltons, the Earps, the Mastersons, the Tighlmans. They looked out for one another. I’ve not found any female gangs or police squads from that era that consisted of just sisters. Family wasn’t enough for women of old to give up everything and seek vengeance for a wrong to their sibling. At least I haven’t come across an example yet to support that. On this day in 1896, the Dunn brothers faced the challenge of fighting for one another. Bill Dunn and his four brothers Bee, Dal, Calvin, and George most often operated as bounty hunters. But the Dunn brothers were better known as the proprietors of a road ranch outside Ingalls, Oklahoma, where passing travelers were waylaid after being put up for the night. On May 2, 1895, two desperados known as Charley Pierce and Bitter Creek Newcomb arrived at the Dunn ranch to spend the night. As they stabled their horses, Bill and one of his brothers ambushed them outside the barn to collect the $5,000 bounty on Newcomb in Guthrie. A year later, on August 25, 1896, the outlaw leader Bill Doolin was killed much the same way. Dunn was part of the posse surrounding Doolin’s farm in Lawson, Oklahoma, and waited for the fugitive to appear at the door. When he showed himself, his surrender was demanded. Doolin refused and was shotgunned to death. Later that year, the people of the county grew angry over Dunn’s tactics. On November 5, Dun answered his critics by blaming Deputy Sheriff Frank Canton for the brutal way in which Newcomb and Pierce were killed. In the streets of Pawnee, Canton confronted Dunn. Dunn drew first, but Deputy Canton fired a .45-caliber slug into Dunn’s forehead, killing him instantly. Bill’s brothers swore revenge for his death. One of them announced, “I’ll get even if I have to crawl back from the grave.” Bill Dunn was in the wrong, but I can’t help but admire his brother’s loyalty.

Lawman Bat Masterson always thought his brother was too kind to be a deputy. He was right. Deputy Marshall Ed Masterson preferred to try and work things out peacefully and give offenders the benefit of the doubt. His conciliatory nature led to his demise. This week in 1877, the Dodge City Deputy Marshall tried to put an end to a quarrel between Ed Shaw and Texas Dick Moore, co-owners of the Lone Star Dance Hall. All of them got shot up in the melee. Including an innocent bystander, but happily all recovered fully. It’s sad to note the Ed was eventually shot and killed while on duty in Dodge. The bullet struck at such a close range it set his jacket and vest on fire. He called out to his brother, Bat, who came to his brother’s side as fast as he could. Bat was brokenhearted and made sure the people responsible for his brother’s death paid. I admire that attitude and how brothers and sisters stuck together during that time period. The Earps, the Mastersons, the Tilghmans, family came first. No one who killed one of their siblings was allowed to get away with it. Perhaps the visitor to my sight from Bolivar, Missouri in the 7 o’clock hour yesterday were hoping such an attitude did not exist today. I assure you it does. The devotion even extended into the 11 o’clock hour when the visitor from Bolivar had a visitor from Norborne check out the site. And so I will say it again…my brother isn’t what you claim. Even after he’s gone I’m going to keep fighting for him. Watch for The Plea coming to bookstores. And make plans to see Conviction coming to a theatre near you.