Wayne & Westerns

The John Wayne collector’s edition of American Cowboy magazine was released this past week. It’s a wonderful tribute to the legend. One of the articles I wrote about Wayne’s younger years appears in the periodical as well as a half page ad for the book The Young Duke. I’ve been a fan of John Wayne since I was 8 years old. My dad took my brothers and I to see True Grit and I was hooked on Wayne and westerns from that point on. The remake of the picture looks promising and I’m anxious to see it. The only problem I had with American Cowboy’s Wayne edition is that they spelled my name wrong. In the “contributing author” section my name is spelled Chris Enns. My name is spelled correctly in the ad in the body of the magazine however. It only bothers me that my name is misspelled because of what happened to my brother Rick. Shortly after he was arrested the prosecuting attorney ran a check on the name Rick Enns to see if there were any prior convictions. There were, but our name is not spelled that way. Under the name Rick Enss there were no prior convictions, but that didn’t serve the P-A’s purpose. She announced in court that my brother had prior convictions. She announced to the newspapers that my brother had prior convictions. She was told by the court not to do that, but she did it anyway. It worked out in her favor. You say something like that about a person who is arrested and everyone listens. You retract it, which she never did, no one cares. It’s important that your name be spelled correctly. It’s really all you’ve got. And it could mean the difference between going home or 20 years to life. True Grit being one of my favorite movies and my brother continuing to struggle, I’d like to leave this entry with a quote from that unforgettable movie that seems to fit the circumstances in my own life right now. Mattie delivered the line to Rooster Cogburn when she was referring to the man who killed her father. “I won’t rest until I see Tom Chenney barking in hell.” That’s how I feel about the people who cost me my brother.