October 22, 2024 • 15 mins
He is one of Preston's favorites, NYT's Best-Selling Authors, Tom Clavin. Tom has written, once again, about the wild west, this time chronicling some of the most iconic names and places. Join them for a trip back in time and visit "Bandit Heaven - The Hole-In-The-Wall Gans and The Final Chapter of The Wild West." Don't miss out Tom's previous works.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Third hour of the Morning Show with Presdin's Coy. Good
Morning Friends. It's Tuesday, October twenty second, two weeks from
election day. Jose, can you see over there in Studio
one A right in the broadcast. I'm here in Studio
one B, and it is Show five thousand, two hundred
and fifty nine, and I'm thrilled to have back with us.
(00:25):
He's one of my top two three favorite authors in
the world. His name is Tom Claven. The latest book
is Banned at Heaven and it is on sale today.
Sir Tom, how in the world are you?
Speaker 2 (00:37):
I'm fine, thank you, and thank you for having me back.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Of course, you keep writing these kind of books, man,
You're going to always find time on my program. I Tom,
I've got to find out. I have in my head
how this book happened. But you tell me if I'm
far from wrong here, I'm guessing. As you're writing some
of the other incredible Old West book books, Dodge City,
(01:01):
Wild Bill, Tombstone, the Last Outlaws, they're like these sticky
notes that are getting built up, and you at some
point look at them and go, you know, that's another book.
How close am I? Well?
Speaker 2 (01:13):
I think yeah, I think you're very close because it
seems like one thing led into another. There it was
like a progression of non intentional necessarily, but like it's
almost chronological with Wild Bill takes place. A lot of
it is during those Civil during and after the Civil War.
You have Dodge City and follow Me the Hell take
place in the eighteen seventies. Tombstone is something that like
(01:33):
early eighteen eighties, The Last Outlaws was about the Dalton
Gang where they met their ward a Lewin Cockinggilt Kansas
in eighteen ninety two. And then what Bandit Heaven is about.
It's as the subtitle says, the final chapter of the
Wild West is that there were still outlaw gangs and
outlaws like Watch Cassidy, Sundance, Kid, Kid Curry, some of
(01:55):
the others part of the Wild Bunch into in the
eighteen nineties into the twentieth century, into the early nineteen hundreds.
And so I wanted I felt like I'd done these
previous stories that took the readers on his journey that
began Babe with the Civil War, it took them to
the end of the century. Let's finish things up in
a way. It doesn't mean that it's not more stories
to tell about the American West actially, but let's let's
(02:17):
talk about what were the final gangs and how did
the Wild West sort of come to an end? What
was what? What? What put put these gangs out of existence?
And that's that's what basically what Banded Heaven is about.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
You describe bandit Heaven and I'm going to loosely describe
it as as three specific spots in an area. Tell
me how you came upon these spots, how you knew
about them and their significance one to each other.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
Well, you know, there's as part of my research, I
found out about what was called the Outlaw Trail. This
actually existed from the Canadian borders to the Mexican border
where outlaws could go on this trail pretty much unbolested
by lawmen. They went to the rough terrain and the
lawman didn't want to go near them. And they had
three main stops along the way. There was the Hole
in the Wall and Wyoming, which is literally a hole
(03:05):
in the wall that was hot you could loman couldn't
get in there. There was a place called Robbers Roos,
which is partly in Utah Party in Colorado, and it
was up on a plateau, so you could see part
as you were abandoned up there or abandoned gang you
could see somebody coming from miles away, so it was
very easy to protect the place. And then there was
also a place called Brown's Hole, which was a hole
was the name for a valley also at the time,
(03:26):
surrounded by hills and mountains with very difficult access. So
these places were like good hideouts for bandits. They would
rob a train, let's say, and head for Brown's Hole,
a head for robber's roos, and there there they would
be safe until it was time to go out robbing again.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
Were these locations locations that were happened upon after a
crime or prior to were these planned places to go,
you know both.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Initially they were sort of stumbled upon, not necessarily by
criminals but by others who was looking for just exploring,
for example, Jim Bridger, I think the Great Mountain Man
that was found one of them. And but once once
the work done around at these places were kind of
isolated and kind of easy, easy to protect, the criminals decided, well,
you know what, we're going to build a little They
(04:15):
actually built cabins in these places and corrals, has stolen livestock,
and they became you know, gang band in Heaven. That
was a collective name for these three places. They were
banded Heaven because they were a place that they can relax, enjoy,
you know, don't don't worry about the law, lowman, and
plan the next job.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Welcome to the Morning Show with Preston Scott. New York
Times best selling author Tom Clayven back with us. I've
got a ton of his books proudly displayed in my
office library at home, and this will be another addition
(04:53):
to it, The bandits. It's Banded Heaven, and we're discussing
the book. Without giving much away, I have to, but
I have to note we're on the fifty to fifth
anniversary of the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,
which was an it's an iconic film. What did they
get right? That intercepts and overlaps your book.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
What they got right was that but Cassidy and the
Sundance Kid were rather charming, roguish outlaws, and they you know,
if you notice in the movie, which still holds up
fifty five years later.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Yes it does.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
They don't. There's not much violence in it. There is
some and especially of course there's a very dramatic shootout
ending in to the movie. But but casting the Sundance
Kid were not violent men. They were criminals, not trying
to whitewash them, but they were not prone to violence,
and they got that right, and they were kind of
charming and that they had a very strong friendship. What
they sort of overlooked was that except for at a
(05:50):
place played by Cassin Ross's the movie, there wasn't really
many of the other characters who are part of the
Wild Bunch gang they call the Wall Gangs. And that's
a big part of what Bandon Had is about. There's
so many other interesting, colorful characters. Dirty Dave, Rudebag, Gunplay, Maxwell,
Ben Tall, Texan kill Patrick, George Flatt knows Curry. The
list goes on and on. Everybody had a nickname, and
(06:13):
you know one of my favorite characters. And people are
gonna say that they hear this right, But George Beak
knows Parrot who And as people will find out when
they band Has haven't ended up as a pair of shoes. No, yes,
I can tell the story.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
You do what you want without giving away what you
don't want to give away.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Okay, Well, he was a pretty bad outlaw who finally
got caught and he was scheduled to go to trial,
but he tried to break out of jail. Angry townspeople
strung him up and hung them and a couple of
local doctors that got permission to examine his brain to
see if there's any indication of why is somebody a criminal?
(06:54):
Why is someone not? And while he were at it,
they decided to take off some of his skin and
they send it to a hennery, which made it a
little pair of shoes, and the next time, the next
governor of Wyoming, he wore those pair of shoes to
his inauguration ball. No, it's true. Oh that's why I
prob I love nonfiction. It could be straight to the fiction.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
Well you know what that that that moves me right
to the question. And and forgive me, Tom, you've been
on the show with me maybe five or six times now,
maybe more, And I asked this question, but for the
sake of people that that didn't hear the previous times
you've answered it. How do you find this stuff? Well,
I mean, it's not like you're talking to living sources
(07:37):
that wandered around with butcher and and and sun dance.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
You know, that's a good question because I sort of
feel like I'm a prospector. You know. I put my
my my hat, my helmet on, my lamp is on right,
I got my pick my little pick axe there, and
I went to these these uh you know, a minor
and there's all these different tributaries and these sides nutting
roads with caves and tunnels and stuff like that. And
(08:03):
I just keep digging and you find this that information
is there. It's a question of can he dig it
out and just go from one thing to another. And
by the time I get ready to write a book,
I've got all this information. Not all of that can
make it into a book, but some of it is
very unusual, like this Joyce Beikos parrot story. And there's
other stories too. I mean a man named gun Play
Maxwell is a character in the book, and he got
(08:24):
his name because every time he got any trouble, he
went for his gun first. And yet he lived for
a pretty long life until he's probably is probably going
to do his gun faster than he could.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
You know, without getting into a commentary about the state
of modern journalism, there's an axiom and ideal that you
always find two or more sources. But in your line
of work, how do you find that second source or
do you just do the best you can with the
one you got?
Speaker 2 (08:52):
You know, a great second source. I mean you can
read things and other books, and that doesn't mean it
necessarily true. But to go back to the contemporary source,
is you know what was being reported of it. You know,
one of the benefits of to me in working on
Band in Heaven is it takes place in the eighteen
nineties and the early nineteen hundreds, and there were a
lot of newspapers all across the country, all throughout the West.
(09:12):
Newspapers were reporting at the time on the adventures of
some of these criminals Knowledges, Puts, Cassidy, but other people
I mentioned Kid Curry, Tom Horne of those. And so
you can find actual reporting being done at the time.
I mean, certainly when you find a story that is
covering the inauguration of that Wyoming governor referred to the
pair of shoes he was wearing used to be a
(09:33):
beak nosed parrot. And so the closer you can get
to something that had actually happened and the reporting on it,
the more reliable it.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
Is, and because we are an iHeartRadio station, we are
broadcasting proudly across the fruited plane and around the world,
which means today, all over the country, wherever you're listening
to us from you can get a copy of band
in Heaven, Tom Craven's latest book. He's the author of
(10:00):
a ton of books. We've talked about them all on
the program, whether it's Dodge City while Bill Tombstone, follow
Me to Hell, the story of mcnelly's Texas Rangers, or
The Last Outlaws. This book Banned Heaven though, Tom, you
were talking about this this era of time and that
it kind of marks a unique time. First, before we
(10:22):
talk about that, are there heroes in this book?
Speaker 2 (10:26):
You know, that's a good question because in my previous books,
they were very easily identifiable heroes as main characters, you know,
the White Arab of Bat Masterson, even Doc Hollidy Lea.
You mentioned McNelly, Landa McNelly. But in Banded Heaven, it's
your main characters are Bridge Cassidy's Sundance Kid and other
members of the Hole in the Wall gangs like Tall
(10:48):
the Tall Textan Kilpatrick and some of the other people
Tom Horne. So yes, there are heroes in the sense
that if you consider you know lawman as your heroes,
there's the the detective Charlie Sringo. Uh, there are the
other lawmen that that Joe la Force, who is what
it was the minor character in the film version of
(11:09):
which casting a sun dance kid. But a lot of
times what happened happens in band in Heaven has there's
a very thin line between the hero and anti hero,
between law man and bandit, and so something like Tom
Horne is a good example. Some people might recall us
a Steve a Queen movie made of Tom many years ago,
and he was he was a detective as an army scout,
(11:31):
but then he became a paid assassin and uh, working
for the large ranchers who wanted to get rid of
some of the people who who they thought was ranching
on their land. So it's it's it's an interesting question
because I think less so than some of my other books.
You'll find fewer heroes in this one. Charming characters, but
maybe fewer heroes.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Does band in Heaven still exist? Do these do these locations?
Are they still places people go to and see and stumble.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Upon, Yes you can. I mean Brown's Hall, for example,
has been a bit of place that people have lived
in for decades and decades as farmers and small ranchers.
It still exists. Robbers Roost not so much, very rough terrain,
not the place that people want to necessarily live at
it especially not abandoned. And the hole in the Wall
was basically a hole in the wall in Wyoming, so
(12:24):
it's again kind of remote areas, not something the place
that you'll find a subdivision.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
I'm just curious if, if you know wild West Officionado's
ever try to track these places down? What ended them?
What ended these places? Was it just the end of
the outlaw?
Speaker 2 (12:42):
It was the end of the outlaw, because you know,
what happened was that the rest of the country was
getting into the nineteen hundreds, and these cowboys and outlaws
had not really made that transition. They were still doing
the old fashioned things of stealing cattle and try to
rob trains and try and rob banks. But the technology
got better. I mean, if you had a bank that
was robbed in one town, you could make a phone
(13:03):
call to the sheriff for the next and get a
posse going. There was you know, for those about to
drive cars. I mean Andison was inventing the electric light bulb,
and the telephone was being line was being strung, so
one by one or two and threes, these outlaws became
either imprisoned or were killed. When Butch, Cassie and the
(13:24):
Sundance Kid were killed in nineteen oh eight, that was
really you can really see that line of departure. That's
where the Wild West ended officially, because they were not
saying there wasn't an outlaw anywhere after that. But the
outlaw Aids was pretty much done with. But the Sundance
died all of a sudden.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
The entrance of the automotive, you know, era changed the
way outlaws and gangsters operated. Tom, What is it about
the wild West that attracts people? I mean, is it
something that you can just sort of, I don't know,
express or is it something that maybe an email is
shared with you? What's the end during charm of this?
Speaker 2 (14:03):
I think because we have really interesting characters who actually existed.
I mean, you can write a good novel it's a
lot of adventure about the American Western create a very
interesting fictional character. I mean, look at what Laren McMurtry
did with Lonesome Dove. We have two very intriguing characters.
Even those characters are based on real people. So I
(14:24):
think when my line of work non fiction, I think
writing about people who actually existed and finding out if
you can anything new about them or are the most
interesting adventures. You know, how many people knew that when
Wired up in Bad Messs and was still young men
in their twenties, they were the principal lawmen together in
Dodge City. So I think there's this constant fascination with
(14:45):
people who actually existed, that did have lives that were
as interesting as they was sometimes portrayed on the screen.
They actually existed, They actually had these interactions without laws
and some of the outlaws, you know, some of these
bandits and bad guys we're to be charming. You know.
People still talk about Jesse James and when he robbed trades,
he would handle his own press releases to the passages.
(15:07):
So I think there's a constant fascination.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
Well, Tom, thanks to you and the dogging you do
and researching you do, I think we all feel like
we know these characters and these people better. Thank you
so much for your work, and thanks for sharing time.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
Well, thank you. So it's a pleasure being on your show.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
Thank you, Tom. Tom Craven with us this morning. And
the book is Bandit, Heaven, The Hole in the Wall,
Gangs and the final chapter of the wild West. The
book is on sale today
Third hour of the Morning Show with Presdin's Coy. Good
Morning Friends. It's Tuesday, October twenty second, two weeks from
election day. Jose, can you see over there in Studio
one A right in the broadcast. I'm here in Studio
one B, and it is Show five thousand, two hundred
and fifty nine, and I'm thrilled to have back with us.
(00:25):
He's one of my top two three favorite authors in
the world. His name is Tom Claven. The latest book
is Banned at Heaven and it is on sale today.
Sir Tom, how in the world are you?
Speaker 2 (00:37):
I'm fine, thank you, and thank you for having me back.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Of course, you keep writing these kind of books, man,
You're going to always find time on my program. I Tom,
I've got to find out. I have in my head
how this book happened. But you tell me if I'm
far from wrong here, I'm guessing. As you're writing some
of the other incredible Old West book books, Dodge City,
(01:01):
Wild Bill, Tombstone, the Last Outlaws, they're like these sticky
notes that are getting built up, and you at some
point look at them and go, you know, that's another book.
How close am I? Well?
Speaker 2 (01:13):
I think yeah, I think you're very close because it
seems like one thing led into another. There it was
like a progression of non intentional necessarily, but like it's
almost chronological with Wild Bill takes place. A lot of
it is during those Civil during and after the Civil War.
You have Dodge City and follow Me the Hell take
place in the eighteen seventies. Tombstone is something that like
(01:33):
early eighteen eighties, The Last Outlaws was about the Dalton
Gang where they met their ward a Lewin Cockinggilt Kansas
in eighteen ninety two. And then what Bandit Heaven is about.
It's as the subtitle says, the final chapter of the
Wild West is that there were still outlaw gangs and
outlaws like Watch Cassidy, Sundance, Kid, Kid Curry, some of
(01:55):
the others part of the Wild Bunch into in the
eighteen nineties into the twentieth century, into the early nineteen hundreds.
And so I wanted I felt like I'd done these
previous stories that took the readers on his journey that
began Babe with the Civil War, it took them to
the end of the century. Let's finish things up in
a way. It doesn't mean that it's not more stories
to tell about the American West actially, but let's let's
(02:17):
talk about what were the final gangs and how did
the Wild West sort of come to an end? What
was what? What? What put put these gangs out of existence?
And that's that's what basically what Banded Heaven is about.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
You describe bandit Heaven and I'm going to loosely describe
it as as three specific spots in an area. Tell
me how you came upon these spots, how you knew
about them and their significance one to each other.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
Well, you know, there's as part of my research, I
found out about what was called the Outlaw Trail. This
actually existed from the Canadian borders to the Mexican border
where outlaws could go on this trail pretty much unbolested
by lawmen. They went to the rough terrain and the
lawman didn't want to go near them. And they had
three main stops along the way. There was the Hole
in the Wall and Wyoming, which is literally a hole
(03:05):
in the wall that was hot you could loman couldn't
get in there. There was a place called Robbers Roos,
which is partly in Utah Party in Colorado, and it
was up on a plateau, so you could see part
as you were abandoned up there or abandoned gang you
could see somebody coming from miles away, so it was
very easy to protect the place. And then there was
also a place called Brown's Hole, which was a hole
was the name for a valley also at the time,
(03:26):
surrounded by hills and mountains with very difficult access. So
these places were like good hideouts for bandits. They would
rob a train, let's say, and head for Brown's Hole,
a head for robber's roos, and there there they would
be safe until it was time to go out robbing again.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
Were these locations locations that were happened upon after a
crime or prior to were these planned places to go,
you know both.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Initially they were sort of stumbled upon, not necessarily by
criminals but by others who was looking for just exploring,
for example, Jim Bridger, I think the Great Mountain Man
that was found one of them. And but once once
the work done around at these places were kind of
isolated and kind of easy, easy to protect, the criminals decided, well,
you know what, we're going to build a little They
(04:15):
actually built cabins in these places and corrals, has stolen livestock,
and they became you know, gang band in Heaven. That
was a collective name for these three places. They were
banded Heaven because they were a place that they can relax, enjoy,
you know, don't don't worry about the law, lowman, and
plan the next job.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Welcome to the Morning Show with Preston Scott. New York
Times best selling author Tom Clayven back with us. I've
got a ton of his books proudly displayed in my
office library at home, and this will be another addition
(04:53):
to it, The bandits. It's Banded Heaven, and we're discussing
the book. Without giving much away, I have to, but
I have to note we're on the fifty to fifth
anniversary of the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,
which was an it's an iconic film. What did they
get right? That intercepts and overlaps your book.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
What they got right was that but Cassidy and the
Sundance Kid were rather charming, roguish outlaws, and they you know,
if you notice in the movie, which still holds up
fifty five years later.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Yes it does.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
They don't. There's not much violence in it. There is
some and especially of course there's a very dramatic shootout
ending in to the movie. But but casting the Sundance
Kid were not violent men. They were criminals, not trying
to whitewash them, but they were not prone to violence,
and they got that right, and they were kind of
charming and that they had a very strong friendship. What
they sort of overlooked was that except for at a
(05:50):
place played by Cassin Ross's the movie, there wasn't really
many of the other characters who are part of the
Wild Bunch gang they call the Wall Gangs. And that's
a big part of what Bandon Had is about. There's
so many other interesting, colorful characters. Dirty Dave, Rudebag, Gunplay, Maxwell,
Ben Tall, Texan kill Patrick, George Flatt knows Curry. The
list goes on and on. Everybody had a nickname, and
(06:13):
you know one of my favorite characters. And people are
gonna say that they hear this right, But George Beak
knows Parrot who And as people will find out when
they band Has haven't ended up as a pair of shoes. No, yes,
I can tell the story.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
You do what you want without giving away what you
don't want to give away.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Okay, Well, he was a pretty bad outlaw who finally
got caught and he was scheduled to go to trial,
but he tried to break out of jail. Angry townspeople
strung him up and hung them and a couple of
local doctors that got permission to examine his brain to
see if there's any indication of why is somebody a criminal?
(06:54):
Why is someone not? And while he were at it,
they decided to take off some of his skin and
they send it to a hennery, which made it a
little pair of shoes, and the next time, the next
governor of Wyoming, he wore those pair of shoes to
his inauguration ball. No, it's true. Oh that's why I
prob I love nonfiction. It could be straight to the fiction.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
Well you know what that that that moves me right
to the question. And and forgive me, Tom, you've been
on the show with me maybe five or six times now,
maybe more, And I asked this question, but for the
sake of people that that didn't hear the previous times
you've answered it. How do you find this stuff? Well,
I mean, it's not like you're talking to living sources
(07:37):
that wandered around with butcher and and and sun dance.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
You know, that's a good question because I sort of
feel like I'm a prospector. You know. I put my
my my hat, my helmet on, my lamp is on right,
I got my pick my little pick axe there, and
I went to these these uh you know, a minor
and there's all these different tributaries and these sides nutting
roads with caves and tunnels and stuff like that. And
(08:03):
I just keep digging and you find this that information
is there. It's a question of can he dig it
out and just go from one thing to another. And
by the time I get ready to write a book,
I've got all this information. Not all of that can
make it into a book, but some of it is
very unusual, like this Joyce Beikos parrot story. And there's
other stories too. I mean a man named gun Play
Maxwell is a character in the book, and he got
(08:24):
his name because every time he got any trouble, he
went for his gun first. And yet he lived for
a pretty long life until he's probably is probably going
to do his gun faster than he could.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
You know, without getting into a commentary about the state
of modern journalism, there's an axiom and ideal that you
always find two or more sources. But in your line
of work, how do you find that second source or
do you just do the best you can with the
one you got?
Speaker 2 (08:52):
You know, a great second source. I mean you can
read things and other books, and that doesn't mean it
necessarily true. But to go back to the contemporary source,
is you know what was being reported of it. You know,
one of the benefits of to me in working on
Band in Heaven is it takes place in the eighteen
nineties and the early nineteen hundreds, and there were a
lot of newspapers all across the country, all throughout the West.
(09:12):
Newspapers were reporting at the time on the adventures of
some of these criminals Knowledges, Puts, Cassidy, but other people
I mentioned Kid Curry, Tom Horne of those. And so
you can find actual reporting being done at the time.
I mean, certainly when you find a story that is
covering the inauguration of that Wyoming governor referred to the
pair of shoes he was wearing used to be a
(09:33):
beak nosed parrot. And so the closer you can get
to something that had actually happened and the reporting on it,
the more reliable it.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
Is, and because we are an iHeartRadio station, we are
broadcasting proudly across the fruited plane and around the world,
which means today, all over the country, wherever you're listening
to us from you can get a copy of band
in Heaven, Tom Craven's latest book. He's the author of
(10:00):
a ton of books. We've talked about them all on
the program, whether it's Dodge City while Bill Tombstone, follow
Me to Hell, the story of mcnelly's Texas Rangers, or
The Last Outlaws. This book Banned Heaven though, Tom, you
were talking about this this era of time and that
it kind of marks a unique time. First, before we
(10:22):
talk about that, are there heroes in this book?
Speaker 2 (10:26):
You know, that's a good question because in my previous books,
they were very easily identifiable heroes as main characters, you know,
the White Arab of Bat Masterson, even Doc Hollidy Lea.
You mentioned McNelly, Landa McNelly. But in Banded Heaven, it's
your main characters are Bridge Cassidy's Sundance Kid and other
members of the Hole in the Wall gangs like Tall
(10:48):
the Tall Textan Kilpatrick and some of the other people
Tom Horne. So yes, there are heroes in the sense
that if you consider you know lawman as your heroes,
there's the the detective Charlie Sringo. Uh, there are the
other lawmen that that Joe la Force, who is what
it was the minor character in the film version of
(11:09):
which casting a sun dance kid. But a lot of
times what happened happens in band in Heaven has there's
a very thin line between the hero and anti hero,
between law man and bandit, and so something like Tom
Horne is a good example. Some people might recall us
a Steve a Queen movie made of Tom many years ago,
and he was he was a detective as an army scout,
(11:31):
but then he became a paid assassin and uh, working
for the large ranchers who wanted to get rid of
some of the people who who they thought was ranching
on their land. So it's it's it's an interesting question
because I think less so than some of my other books.
You'll find fewer heroes in this one. Charming characters, but
maybe fewer heroes.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Does band in Heaven still exist? Do these do these locations?
Are they still places people go to and see and stumble.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Upon, Yes you can. I mean Brown's Hall, for example,
has been a bit of place that people have lived
in for decades and decades as farmers and small ranchers.
It still exists. Robbers Roost not so much, very rough terrain,
not the place that people want to necessarily live at
it especially not abandoned. And the hole in the Wall
was basically a hole in the wall in Wyoming, so
(12:24):
it's again kind of remote areas, not something the place
that you'll find a subdivision.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
I'm just curious if, if you know wild West Officionado's
ever try to track these places down? What ended them?
What ended these places? Was it just the end of
the outlaw?
Speaker 2 (12:42):
It was the end of the outlaw, because you know,
what happened was that the rest of the country was
getting into the nineteen hundreds, and these cowboys and outlaws
had not really made that transition. They were still doing
the old fashioned things of stealing cattle and try to
rob trains and try and rob banks. But the technology
got better. I mean, if you had a bank that
was robbed in one town, you could make a phone
(13:03):
call to the sheriff for the next and get a
posse going. There was you know, for those about to
drive cars. I mean Andison was inventing the electric light bulb,
and the telephone was being line was being strung, so
one by one or two and threes, these outlaws became
either imprisoned or were killed. When Butch, Cassie and the
(13:24):
Sundance Kid were killed in nineteen oh eight, that was
really you can really see that line of departure. That's
where the Wild West ended officially, because they were not
saying there wasn't an outlaw anywhere after that. But the
outlaw Aids was pretty much done with. But the Sundance
died all of a sudden.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
The entrance of the automotive, you know, era changed the
way outlaws and gangsters operated. Tom, What is it about
the wild West that attracts people? I mean, is it
something that you can just sort of, I don't know,
express or is it something that maybe an email is
shared with you? What's the end during charm of this?
Speaker 2 (14:03):
I think because we have really interesting characters who actually existed.
I mean, you can write a good novel it's a
lot of adventure about the American Western create a very
interesting fictional character. I mean, look at what Laren McMurtry
did with Lonesome Dove. We have two very intriguing characters.
Even those characters are based on real people. So I
(14:24):
think when my line of work non fiction, I think
writing about people who actually existed and finding out if
you can anything new about them or are the most
interesting adventures. You know, how many people knew that when
Wired up in Bad Messs and was still young men
in their twenties, they were the principal lawmen together in
Dodge City. So I think there's this constant fascination with
(14:45):
people who actually existed, that did have lives that were
as interesting as they was sometimes portrayed on the screen.
They actually existed, They actually had these interactions without laws
and some of the outlaws, you know, some of these
bandits and bad guys we're to be charming. You know.
People still talk about Jesse James and when he robbed trades,
he would handle his own press releases to the passages.
(15:07):
So I think there's a constant fascination.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
Well, Tom, thanks to you and the dogging you do
and researching you do, I think we all feel like
we know these characters and these people better. Thank you
so much for your work, and thanks for sharing time.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
Well, thank you. So it's a pleasure being on your show.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
Thank you, Tom. Tom Craven with us this morning. And
the book is Bandit, Heaven, The Hole in the Wall,
Gangs and the final chapter of the wild West. The
book is on sale today
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