The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1935-01-25

heightened by the almOSt-certain
knowledge that discovery meant stern whats
this =. Reading dime novel!!!i. :" from
disappearing parent or teacher.
Those of later generation who get their
vcarious thrills from watching movie melo-
dramas or listening to radio murder mysteries,
are likely to be scornful of the Observation-Disclosures
heroes whose desperate deeds and hairbreadth
escapes so enthralled Dad. "Aw, bunk? they
say Il betcha there never was any such fella
as Daredeath Dick, the King of the Cowboys,
or Captain Cool Blade, the Man-Shark of the
Mississippi"
Maybe not! But ask Dad about some of the
other dime novel heroes. =.
Didn't he snuggle copy of Buffalo Bill, The
Border King up to bed with him one night and
there, by the dim light of the old coal-oil lamp,
read how with one leap the Border King sprang
up behind his disguised pard back to back, and
opened fire with his trusty revolvers on the yelp
ing redskins? And, few months later didn't
he go down to the county seat town and with
his own eyes see that same Border King" enter
the arena of Buffalo Bills Wild West show, ush-
cred in by a blaring band and the excited yells
of several hundred young Americans like him.
self? That tall, lOng-haired, buckskin-clad fig
ure, sitting on his white horse with regal grace
wasn't he a stOry-book hero come to life? Yes,
sir!
Despite the fact that many Bloody Pete and
in the fertile imagination of old Erastus F. Bid
dies scrbblers some of the characters immor-
talized in that prolific publishers "Dime Novels"
"Half-Dime Library" pocket Novels" or Boys
Library" real persons, even though they
never had one-tenth of the adventures ascribed
to them. Chief among them, of course, was this
same Border King"
William Frederick Cody, youthful guide for
army officers In Kansas in 1S66-67 and hunter
who cd upa for off 10 Kansas
Pacific railroad, may have been dubbed Buffalo
Bl' by the grateful X. p. workers. or he may
have won that sobriquet In Notwithstanding
match with Billy Comstock. But it remained for
two dime novelsts, Edward Zane Carroll Judson,
who wrote under the name Of "Ned Buntlne,"
and Col Prentiss Ingraham to make it world
famous. a. m5fJ
Other dime novel heroes who had counterparts
in real life were "Wild Bill" California Joe,'
"Texas Jack" "Pawnee Bill" Capt. Jack" "Ari-
IONA joe "Buckskin SAM" Rowing Joe," "Fan-
cy Frank" "Deadwood Dick, Diamond Dick"
Calamity Jane" 1.-The Evil Spirit of the Plains"
and "Old Grizzly"
James Butler Hickok, native of Illinois, a
soldier and scout in the Union army in Missouri
during the Civil war, Overland stage driver mar
shall of roaring Kansas cow towns, gambler and
gunman par excellence, was already famous as
"Wild Bill" before ever Buntline multiplied his
adventures tenfold in the little yellow-back books.
Even after his assassination in Deadwood, S. D.,
in 1885, he was still good "copy" for the dime
novelsts as he has been for the more serious
historians, several of whom have tried to sort
out the fiction from fact and write authentic
biographies of him in recent years. v
However, "Texas Jack" name Of Bunt-
lines manufacture for John B. Omohundro,
native Of Virginia who emigrated to Texas be-
fore the Civil war became mustang breaker
and rancher, soldier in the Confederate army
and afterwards hunter, scout and Indian-fghter
until his death in Leadyille. Colo, in 1880. as,
The case of California Joe" is similar to
that of wild Bill" in that he was famed under
that name before ever the dime novelists took
him up. Although one of Ingraham's novels char
acterized him as "The Mysterious Plainsman, An
Unknown Man, whose real identity, like that of
the Man of the Iron Mask is still unsolved"
there was no real mystery about his identity.
He was Moses e. Miner, a Kentuckan. who first
crossed the Plains in the Golden Days of 40. was
a miner in Montana and the Pacific Northwest
and for a brief time chief of scouts for Gen.
George A. Custer during the campaign of 1867
6S against the tribes of the Southern Plains. He
also served as a scout and guide for army officers
in Wyoming and Montana in the 7Os, was a pros
pector in the Black Hills gold rush and met the
same fate as his friend, Hickok. Like wild
Bill' he was shot down from behind by an as
sassin in 1876 just before setting out from the
old Red Cloud agency in Nebraska to guide the
expedition of Gen. Ranald S. Mackenzie against
the Sioux and Cheyennes
''Pawnee Bill' was Maj Gordon Lille, native
of Illinois, who went to Oklahoma in the early
days as Boomer" was friend of the Pawnee
Indians, who adopted him into their tribe, was
associated for time with Cody in the Wild
West show business and later had similar
show of his own He is still living in Oklahoma
as the prosperous owner of a ranch. famous for
its herd of buffalo.