James Arness started it all.

[Texas Man]

I was sadden to hear of James Arness pasting and thinking about it drives a point home with Me. It reminds Me that some day We all will face that day and in My case there are fewer days left than back when I first started watching Gun Smoke on T.V. I will always remember the first opening part showing the 45 as it was cocked and fired and I was inspired as a young man by the myth of gunfighers and outlaws and I was at the age back then when a few of the old Rangers and Other laymen were still packing single actions. The early western would later have a large part in my life on my interest in guns and later collecting them.

 

The passing of James Arness is more than a heros death, As was the death of John Wayne and other actors of the time we had respected and loved. To many of Us it was Our chance to live a life that we had been born some years to late in be a part of and in each of our own way We lived a bit of it from Gun Smoke and a few other shows of the time. As a result of shows like Gun Smoke and other westerns, Companys like Ruger and Colt came out with single action again and Hal Forget of Navy Arms bought Us the return of percussion guns once again and in a far way the people who followed in time were the fore fathers of todays SASS Movement in a way. The list is a long list of men who beleaved in the Old West Interest and the Two Men who stood at the very front were John Wayne and James Arness and both were True American Heros in My Opinion.

 

I was born in 1941 in South Texas and WAS LUCKY enough to get to know a FEW of the REAL OLDIMERS who were still alive at the time. As a young boy, I had a Grandfather that took Me with Him to the Town Square where the old timers would sit under mesquite trees and talk about their lives and thing they had experenced as young men. I have listen to men who fought in the Civil War and Indian Wars, Men who personally knew Wes Harden and other men on both sides of the law. I had the chance to meet some of the older Texas Rangers and in later years I would trade guns with some of them and spen some time with them as well and got to shoot with many during the 1950s and 60s. They shared advise with me that saved My skin more than a few times in the years to come and it was with some Ranger Friends that I was with when I witnessed My first real life gunfight. [it was over in a flash]

 

I have written a few times here about a few men I met when I was younger some many years ago and by the early 1950s just of the old timers had already pasted on. One was a Old Man who was a flag bearer in the Civil War, Another was an old Indian Fighter who used to let me feel the flint arrowhead that had still carried in his leg embedded in the bone. I knew a number of such men and they told me in PERSON stories about when they were younger. I shall never forget the day when a bet was made and Old Man Kirt pulled out an engraved 1851 Colt and fron inside the saloon sitting at the same table I and My Grandfather were fired out the open door and blew the head off a chicken as black powder smoke filled the room. I also listen as Texas ranger told me about shootouts they had been invovled in and what it was like to watch men die.

 

I remember the time when cowboys drove cattle past my house to the rail head and the time a lynch mob one night came down the street in fron of my house as I peeked out the window and hearing a shot when the Sheriff fired over their head telling them they could not take the man they wanted, Only for them to come back latert that same night and get him from jail and take him a few blocks up the street from my house where they hung him and the next morning My Parents drove past where he was hanging and they had told us kids to get down and of course I had to peek and I saw my first man hanging from a Misquite tree and to this day I remember it as if it was yesterday.

 

I quess the death of James Arness reminds a lot of us who are older that the time is closer with each day and for Me, I can say without regreat that I have had a FULL LIFE and many of the things I lived are gone forever. The days of walking for miles alone the brush and bamboo alone the banks of the Rio Grande River looking for crossing trails and the night in a Mexican Cantina dancing with the dark haired ladies till dawn and trailing thur bush and catus in over 100 degree heat for hours and the sound of flying bullets around Me and the excitement of a fight at night when all you can see it the flash of a muzzle and the sound of a bullet hitting near you and the screams of men running and cussing and yelling things about Your Mother and the best sound of all is when You hear the impact of your shot as it finds its target. Today You can still find all the excitement You want down this way but for Me I feel I have already done My part My luck has always been with Me.

 

I am sure All of Us have felt a since of time and how fast it goes. From years of carrying a gun everday day of my adult life, The times we live in today here in South Texas has not changed all that much and I now spend My time trading and collecting gun more than I do looking for excitment like I did years ago. Ler the Younger Men have their turn.

Texas Man

[Gunner Gatlin, SASS 10274L]

Thank you for sharing this incredible story pard!

 

Indeed, may the good Lord give James Arness' soul peace...

 

GG ~