Welcome to Cyclopaedia 9: Wild West. Cyclopaedia is a monthly article on the InnRoads Ministries website. The topic of the Wild West was voted upon by The Tavern Facebook group with a bit of encouragement from me. As a kid, I loved watching The Lone Ranger, The Cisco Kid, and The Rifleman. As I grew up, I found The Wild Wild West and Kung Fu which continued to enrapture me with these tales of heroism in the Old West. Then I found the books of Louis L’Amour and the spaghetti westerns of Clint Eastwood which cemented my love for the Wild West genre. To this day I love to listen to Riders in the Sky, watch western movies, catch the old shows on reruns, or listen while driving to western audiobooks or old radio shows. Even my gaming found outlets in the Wild West with Outlaws and Boot Hill. As I have matured, I realized that this mythic Wild West was not historically accurate nor did it favorably depict everyone in those books and movies. Yet, the Wild West is the mythology of America and speaks a lot to our heritage, both good and bad. While enjoying the Wild West, we can also learn about ourselves. So saddle up and holster your hogleg, its time to ride!
If you have questions about this article or topics you would like me to consider researching for future Cyclopaedia articles, please leave a comment below.
Overview
Wild West stories are set primarily in the later half of the 19th century in the American Old West. These Westerns often have an idealized, perhaps mythical view of the Old West and its denizens. Cowboys and gunslingers, big hats and spurs, cowboy boots and buckskins, revolvers and rifles. The stories also focus on Native Americans, outlaws, lawmen, bounty hunters, cavalry, ranchers, and settlers. Even the land of the Wild West has a harshness, often focusing on the arid, desolate landscape of deserts and mountains.
As the real American West was fading, the myths of the Wild West took firm hold in the imagination of Americans and foreigners. Dime novels, live shows like Buffalo Bill’s Wild West, and eventually early moving pictures exaggerated the historical facts creating sensational tales the Wild West.
The Western was the most popular genre in Hollywood and American fiction through the early 1960s. Occasionally it sees a resurgence in film, fiction and games.
Western Movie Subgenres
Though Westerns are about life and stories of the American West, they have spawned movies produced in other countries. These movies sometimes depict the American West using foreign locations, while other movies have the heroes and villains in other countries but acting as the legendary cowboy.
- Charro Westerns (Mexico)
- Curry Westerns (India)
- Meat Pie Westerns (Australia)
- Red Westerns (Eastern Europe)
- Spaghetti Westerns (Italy)
Some western films even borrowed from samurai films of Japan. The Magnificent Seven was based on The Seven Samurai by the master filmmaker Akira Kurosawa. A Fistful of Dollars was also based on a Japanese samurai film and would become one of the most famous Spaghetti Westerns of all time.
Following are sources of information pertaining to the Wild West to assist prospective game masters, game designers, writers, and storytellers in knowing where to start their research.
ARTICLES
Chinese Inclusion in the History of the American West
By Zhu, L.
Source: Journal of the West. 45, no. 1, (2006): 3-7
The Donner Party and the Rhetoric of Westward Expansion
By Stuckey, Mary E
Source: Rhetoric and Public Affairs, v14 n2 (20110701): 229-2
L.G. Moses’s Wild West Shows and the Images of American Indians, 1883-1933
By Trennert, R A
Source: American Indian Quarterly, 22, no. 4, (1998): 551
BOOKS
All The Pretty Horses
By McCarthy, Cormac
The Big Sky
By Guthrie, A.B.
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
By Brown, Dee
Butcher’s Crossing
By William, John
Centennial
By Michener, James A.
Cowboys, Mountain Men, and Grizzly Bears: Fifty of the Grittiest Moments In The History Of The Wild West
By Mayo, Matthew
Famous Gunfighters of the Western Frontier
By Masterson, W.B.
Famous Sheriffs and Western Outlaws
By Raine, William MacLeod
Guns of the Wild West
By Wexler, Bruce
Hondo
By L’Amour, Louis
How the West Was Won
By L’Amour, Louis
Legends of the Fall
By Harrison, Jim
Little Big Man
By Berger, Thomas
Lonesome Dove
By McMurtry, Larry
The Longhorns
By Dobie, Frank
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
By Johnson, Dorothy
The Ox-Bow Incident
By Clark, Walter VAn Tilburg
Riders of the Purple Sage
By Grey, Zane
Shane
By Schaeffer, Jack
The Shootist
By Swarthout, Glendon
The Sisters Brothers
By deWitt, Patrick
Smoky the Cowhorse
By James, Will
Tough Towns: True Tales from the Gritty Streets of the Old West
By Smith, Robert Barr
True Grit
By Portis, Charles
The Virginian: A Horseman of the Plains
By Wister, Owen
Wicked Women: Notorious, Mischievous, and Wayward Ladies from the Old West
By Enss, Chris
GAMES
Aces & Eights – RPG
Aces High – RPG
Bang – Tabletop Game
Boomtown – Tabletop Game
Boot Hill – RPG
Bountytown – Tabletop Game
Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood – Computer Game
Carson City – Tabletop Game
Colt Express – Tabletop Game
Cowboys – Tabletop Game
Dark Horse – Tabletop Game
Deadlands: The Weird West – RPG
Deadlands: Doomtown – Tabletop Game
Deadwood – Tabletop Game
Doomtown: Reloaded – Tabletop Game
Dicetown – Tabletop Game
Far West – RPG
Flick’em Up – Tabletop Game
Gold West – Tabletop Game
Grimslingers – Tabletop Game
Gun – Computer Game
Gunslinger – Tabletop Game
Gun.Smoke – Computer Game
High Noon Saloon – Tabletop Game
Homesteaders – Tabletop Game
Longhorn – Tabletop Game
Lost Valley – Tabletop Game
Mad Dog McCree – Computer Game
The Oregon Trail – Computer Game
Outlaw – Computer Game
Outlaws – Computer Game
Pony Express – Tabletop Game
Red Dead Redemption – Computer Game
Red Dead Revolver – Computer Game
Red Steel 2 – Computer Game
Revolver – Tabletop Game
Shadows of Brimstone – Tabletop Game
Six-Guns & Sorcery – RPG
Spellslinger – RPG
Spurs – Tabletop Game
Sunset Riders – Computer Game
Way Out West – Tabletop Game
Werewolf: The Wild West – RPG
Western Hero – RPG
Wild Arms – Computer Game
Wild Fun West – Tabletop Game
Wyatt Earp – Tabletop Game
CINEMA
Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. – TV Show
The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin – TV Show
Back to the Future Part III
The Big Valley – TV Show
Blazing Saddles
Bonanza – TV Show
Brave Starr – Cartoon
Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show – Live Shows
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
The Cisco Kid – TV Show
Cowboys & Aliens
Dances with Wolves
Daniel Boone – TV Show
Deadwood – TV Show
Django
Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman – TV Show
A Fistful of Dollars
Firefly – TV Show
F Troop – TV Show
For A Few Dollars More
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Gunsmoke – TV Show
Have Gun – Will Travel – TV Show
Hidalgo
High Noon
The High Chaparral – TV Show
How the West was Won – TV Show
Jonah Hex
Kung Fu – TV Show
Legends of the Fall
Lone Ranger – TV Show
Lonesome Dove – Movie/TV Show
The Magnificent Seven – TV Show
The Man from Snowy River
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
The Mask of Zorro/The Legend of Zorro
Maverick – Movie/TV Show
McCabe and Mrs. Miller
McLintock!
One Upon a Time in the West
Open Range
The Outlaw Josey Wales
The Ox-Bow Incident
The Quick and the Dead
Quigley Down Under
Rango
Rawhide – TV Show
The Rifleman – TV Show
Rio Bravo
The Roy Rogers Show – TV Show
The Searchers
Shane
Shanghai Noon/Shanghai Knights
The Shootist
Silverado
Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron
Support Your Local Gunfighter/Sheriff
They Call Me Trinity
Tombstone
Trigun – Anime
The Virginian – TV Show
True Grit
Unforgiven
Wagon Train – TV Show
Wanted: Dead or Alive – TV Show
Westworld
The Wild Bunch
Wild Wild West – Movie/TV Show
Wyatt Earp
The Young Riders – TV Show
Young Guns
Zorro – TV Show
LOCATIONS
Buffalo Bill Museum and Grave
http://www.buffalobill.org/
National Annie Oakley Center
http://www.garstmuseum.org/
National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum
http://nationalcowboymuseum.org/
National Museum of the American Indian
http://nmai.si.edu/
PEOPLE
Gene Autry
Billy the Kid
Christopher Houston ‘Kit’ Carson
Butch Cassidy
Buffalo Bill Cody
Samuel Colt
John Henry ‘Doc’ Holliday
Wyatt Earp
Clint Eastwood
Geronimo
Zane Grey
Wild Bill Hickok
Jesse James
Louis L’Amour
Sergio Leone
Clayton Moore
Ennio Morricone
Annie Oakley
Riders in the Sky
Roy Rogers
Will Rogers
Belle Starr
The Sundance Kid
John Wayne
I hope you find these resources informative and inspiring for your adventures, storytelling, or game design.
Stay Creative!
T.R. Knight
( If you would like to save this list of resources as a convenient PDF for later reference, you can find that HERE )
WHO IS T.R. KNIGHT?
He is a freelance editor, proofreader, and writer in the game industry. He is also a Husband and Caregiver to his wife Angie, Father of Twins Emily and Rachel, Gardner and Hobby Chef, and Director of Academic Technology and User Services at Taylor University. You can learn more about T.R. at his blog http://www.thomasrknight.com.