Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio Hio Silver.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Ridiculous History. Thank you so much for tuning in.
Speaker 1: My name is Ben, My name is Nolan Ben. I
Speaker 1: feel this was a missed opportunity to use the sound
Speaker 1: effects box. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well it's not
Speaker 1: Christmas if it's every day? Right? Aren't there clippity clops
Speaker 1: on that thing? I have to be I don't know.
Speaker 1: It's not a it's not a name brand that I mean,
Speaker 1: it's just a grid of buttons. I mean, there's a
Speaker 1: good twenty four buttons on there. I would think somewhere
Speaker 1: in there and as a pogo stick for crying out
Speaker 1: lout it ought to have a horse whinny and some
Speaker 1: clippity clops. Yeah yeah. But luckily, thanks to our our
Speaker 1: the third and better half of our show, super producer
Speaker 1: Casey Pegram, we have a multitude of soundclips. We are
Speaker 1: we are free from the soundclip box. But I like
Speaker 1: being able to, you know, do the DJ Morning Show
Speaker 1: Radio totally, so Nol. Were you ever a fan of
Speaker 1: the of like the old school Wild West heroes? Well,
Speaker 1: alas I was born in the wrong era. If only
Speaker 1: I had been a child in the nineteen twenties or so,
Speaker 1: I think I would have been all over it, But
Speaker 1: those things weren't as popular when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: I think there was shows like Lonesome Dove that I think,
Speaker 1: we're kind of more for the old folks, you know,
Speaker 1: I really wasn't. I was more into uh Ninja turtles
Speaker 1: and uh ThunderCats and things like that. There was really
Speaker 1: a place for that Wild West stuff when I was
Speaker 1: a kid. But then I kind of found that kind
Speaker 1: of manufactured nostalgia when I got a little older and
Speaker 1: and realized that stuff was pretty cool and there was
Speaker 1: absolutely an era for that stuff where I was just everywhere. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think when I was growing up, I was always
Speaker 1: more impressed by uh fictional stories of people with extraordinary
Speaker 1: supernatural powers or strange fantastical situations. But once upon a time,
Speaker 1: the United States, as well as eventually the globe, was
Speaker 1: obsessed with these stories of very human heroes in the
Speaker 1: again largely fictionalized Wild West. Uh. A lot of these
Speaker 1: people come from this sort of gumbo, this cultural stew
Speaker 1: of different influences in different stories. But today our story
Speaker 1: is a little bit of an argument. We are making
Speaker 1: a case for a real life inspiration behind the legendary
Speaker 1: Lone Ranger. And you remember the Lone Ranger You know
Speaker 1: about it, right, Yeah, just played by that guy Army
Speaker 1: Hammer in that movie where Johnny Depp did the racist
Speaker 1: Indian character with a dead crow or a raven perhaps. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So the Lone Ranger is a Texas Ranger. He's like
Speaker 1: Zoro in the Wild West kind of because he has
Speaker 1: a mask. Totally. And just to backtrack slightly, I wasn't
Speaker 1: saying that the character Johnny Depp portrayed was a racist Indian.
Speaker 1: I was just implying that it was probably a bit
Speaker 1: of cultural appropriation and a little problematic portrayal to have
Speaker 1: a white dude like Johnny Depp play Native American character.
Speaker 1: That's all I was getting in there. Alas, the film
Speaker 1: did not perform as well as its creators had hoped, indeed,
Speaker 1: and I think that was probably part of the reason.
Speaker 1: And also I think maybe it wasn't the best film
Speaker 1: in the world. But that character was a real character
Speaker 1: in The Lone Ranger, Tonto Uh, which was the Lone
Speaker 1: Ranger's trusty sidekick. Yeah. I the first time I learned
Speaker 1: about Tonto, I was reading one of my favorite comics
Speaker 1: growing up, The Far Side by Gary Larson, which may
Speaker 1: be returning. Uh. And there's a there's this fantastic panel
Speaker 1: some of us listening probably remember it. Uh where in
Speaker 1: The Lone Ranger, many years into his retirement, learns that
Speaker 1: chemo sabe means horses ass or something like that. And
Speaker 1: I never learned whether that was true, because you know
Speaker 1: how it is with comics when you're a kid, you
Speaker 1: just you take them at face value. Casey, real quick,
Speaker 1: did you ever see that new Lone Ranger of the
Speaker 1: newest adaptation? No? I those kind of big franchise movies
Speaker 1: I tend to skip and and this was one that,
Speaker 1: um did not really catch my attention. Yeah, I I
Speaker 1: feel you know, did you see it? You didn't see it.
Speaker 1: I didn't see it, nodn't didn't didn't catch my attention.
Speaker 1: I'm not a big fan of reboots, soft or otherwise. Uh.
Speaker 1: And again I wasn't super into the source material in
Speaker 1: the first place. But also that Johnny Depp portrayal really
Speaker 1: did kind of rubbed me the wrong way. And it's
Speaker 1: interesting because I actually just pulled up an article on
Speaker 1: Spithonian mag dot com with the headline, is the new
Speaker 1: Tonto any better than the old Tonto? Because, as we know,
Speaker 1: portrayals of Native American characters in the Golden Age of
Speaker 1: television or pretty problematic themselves, all the more reason this
Speaker 1: origin story we've got today is particularly interesting. Yes, in
Speaker 1: terms of appropriation, Yes, agreed. Let's also point out that
Speaker 1: during that Golden Age of television, many actors who were
Speaker 1: portraying Native Americans were not themselves Native Americans. So here's
Speaker 1: here's what we're gonna do in today's episode. We're going
Speaker 1: to build an argument that the Lone Ranger, as understood
Speaker 1: in fiction, film and comics, was inspired by a real
Speaker 1: person who does not get enough credit, a fellow named
Speaker 1: Bass Reeves. So cast your memory back, as Van Morrison
Speaker 1: would say, to eight, almost a hundred years before anybody
Speaker 1: had ever heard of the Long Lone Ranger. There's a
Speaker 1: guy named Bass Reeves, and he is born in Arkansas,
Speaker 1: in Crawford County. He is born into slavery. It is
Speaker 1: the household of a politician named William S. Reeves, right,
Speaker 1: like I believe a state congressman. Yeah, yeah, state legislator.
Speaker 1: This This guy Reeves later moves to Paris in eighteen France, Paris, Texas. Good,
Speaker 1: good distinction, good catch there So life in Um. This
Speaker 1: horrific institution of chattel slavery was always a terrible proposition
Speaker 1: and enormously difficult and unjust. Reeves worked first as a
Speaker 1: water boy and later he started working as a field hand.
Speaker 1: When William S. Reeves passed away, his son George Reeves
Speaker 1: made Bass his personal companion, kind of his man servant,
Speaker 1: sort of following him around, fixing things for him, doing chores.
Speaker 1: And then the Civil War occurred. During the Civil War, Reeves,
Speaker 1: George and Bass both went into battle. They fought for
Speaker 1: the Confederacy. As you can imagine, this is you know,
Speaker 1: not an ideal situation in general because it's war, but
Speaker 1: it's it's uh uniquely terrible because Bass Reeves is is
Speaker 1: essentially being forced to fight for the pro slavery side
Speaker 1: of the Civil War. Yeah, that's right. And it was
Speaker 1: during his time in the Civil War that he became
Speaker 1: embedded with a group of Native Americans. He was attempting
Speaker 1: to escape under cover of night. For this is a
Speaker 1: debate as as to what the reason was. One UM
Speaker 1: theory is that he got into a fistfight with his
Speaker 1: master over a card game dispute, and the other said
Speaker 1: that he heard that the slaves were going to be
Speaker 1: free and decided to pursue freedom himself. Either way, he
Speaker 1: ended up kind of bunking up with the Creek and
Speaker 1: Seminal Indian tribes in Oklahoma or modern day Oklahoma, and
Speaker 1: he really became one of them essentially. I mean, he
Speaker 1: learned all of their languages and their customs, and he
Speaker 1: became quite an adept marksman um through, you know, spending
Speaker 1: time with these these tribes. Yes, and at this time
Speaker 1: it was also becoming a very talented scout and tracker. Uh.
Speaker 1: Later he would say he knew the territories, meaning the
Speaker 1: Indian territories like the back of his hand, or the
Speaker 1: way a cook news her kitchen. We should we should
Speaker 1: note this we say learned their languages. He didn't learn
Speaker 1: just a few words. He actually spoke multiple languages. Bass
Speaker 1: Reeves was a polyglot. He had a prodigious memory, which
Speaker 1: comes into play later. He was assimilating into these tribes
Speaker 1: or befriending them during a very tumultuous time for these
Speaker 1: populations due to the Indian Removal Act of eighteen thirty.
Speaker 1: They had all been forced from their ancestral land, and
Speaker 1: the communities themselves were governed by an interlocking system of
Speaker 1: tribal courts. But these courts were only able to make
Speaker 1: any rulings. Their jurisdiction only allowed them to rule over
Speaker 1: members of those five major tribes. That meant that anyone
Speaker 1: else in the territories, whether they were people escaping slavery,
Speaker 1: whether they were criminals on the lamb, all of those
Speaker 1: people could not be prosecuted by the tribal courts. They
Speaker 1: could only be pursued by federal level agents. This was
Speaker 1: the real wild West, a lawless, ugly, dangerous place, and
Speaker 1: this is where bad Us became a well, I guess
Speaker 1: we'd call him a bad bass if we want to
Speaker 1: want to skirt around the family show requirements. He's a
Speaker 1: bad bass. Doesn't quite roll up the tongue, though, does
Speaker 1: it been. I like it. I'm I'm hard with double
Speaker 1: B sounds. That's it. That's always tricky for me to say.
Speaker 1: But I think your hearts in the right place. My
Speaker 1: friend and his heart uh was in the right place too.
Speaker 1: In terms of kind of becoming this sort of symbol
Speaker 1: almost of justice kind of right, yeah, yeah, eventually because
Speaker 1: he okay, so he was on the run, he himself
Speaker 1: would be considered an escaped slave until eighteen sixty five,
Speaker 1: after the Thirteenth Amendment was passed. Bass Reeves was no
Speaker 1: longer on the land. He was officially a freeman, or
Speaker 1: he was on paper because as we know, the despite
Speaker 1: the Thirteenth Amendments passage, despite the fact that people were manumitted, uh,
Speaker 1: in practice, they were still often enslaved, that's right. So
Speaker 1: he no longer had to um kind of hide in
Speaker 1: plain sight, in you know, among the Native American people,
Speaker 1: and he was able to kind of go out on
Speaker 1: his own and using some of those skills that he honed,
Speaker 1: you know, during his time with the Creek and Seminal
Speaker 1: tribes to kind of make some scratch for himself. He
Speaker 1: started to uh use his tracking abilities and in that
Speaker 1: marksmanship to help lawman tracked down very dangerous criminals who
Speaker 1: were also who were on the lamb, not just like
Speaker 1: for being a black man, but for actually perpetrating some
Speaker 1: pretty heinous crimes. And um, he was doing society a
Speaker 1: service by helping track a lot of these guys down.
Speaker 1: But this was just the beginning of what would ultimately
Speaker 1: become a pretty insane ride that that that Reeves Bass
Speaker 1: would go on. Yeah, yeah, Bass, Reeves is becoming a
Speaker 1: bad bass. But he's not a lone ranger yet. He
Speaker 1: works in he works in Van Buren, ark and Saw
Speaker 1: and in that area, that region for about ten years
Speaker 1: and then something happens and it changes his life. Federal
Speaker 1: Judge Isaac C. Parker is appointed to oversee the Indian Territory.
Speaker 1: And during the during the chaos on the pandemonium of
Speaker 1: the Civil War, as we had said earlier, these territories,
Speaker 1: this territory became, uh, what is it? A hive of
Speaker 1: scum and villainy as we say in Star Wars. So
Speaker 1: Parker hires a guy named us Marshall James F. Fagan, And, uh,
Speaker 1: there's an excellent article about this on all That's interesting
Speaker 1: dot com. To lead a bit of a posse, Yeah,
Speaker 1: to lead a posse. This is back when you could
Speaker 1: just deputize people like we deputized Casey earlier. And he says,
Speaker 1: you know, Marshall Fagan, and need to round up two
Speaker 1: hundred good men to be deputies. We're going to bring
Speaker 1: the law to these parts. And so Fagan is looking
Speaker 1: for recruits. He hears about Reeves and Reeves answers the
Speaker 1: call because he's kind of perfect for this, because he
Speaker 1: knows this part of the country like the back of
Speaker 1: his hand, because he's lived in it, he's lived off
Speaker 1: the land. He knows every nook and cranny, and he
Speaker 1: is absolutely perfect to help track down some of these
Speaker 1: fugitives in and around these Indian territories. Uh So, yeah,
Speaker 1: Fagin hears about Reeves and Reeves says yes, I will
Speaker 1: come help you out. Um and he uh is soon
Speaker 1: after showing his smarts and his acumen and his ability
Speaker 1: to really be helpful, is hired as an official US
Speaker 1: Deputy Marshal. Two hundred deputies may sound like, uh like
Speaker 1: a little bit of overkill until you consider the size
Speaker 1: of the territory. It is uh ballpark. It is seventy
Speaker 1: five thousand square miles. So they needed all the help
Speaker 1: they could get. And while Bass was not the only
Speaker 1: African American hired for this or deputys Highs, he was
Speaker 1: one of the few, and he was by far out
Speaker 1: of all two hundred, he was one of the standouts.
Speaker 1: Let's paint a picture of the man. He's six ft
Speaker 1: two he's a he's a skinny guy. He rides an
Speaker 1: iconic white stallion, and he has a black hat to
Speaker 1: cult forty five peacemakers. He's known for his slick suits
Speaker 1: and his highly polished shoes, but he don't mistake him
Speaker 1: for a Western themed dandy folks. Over the time in
Speaker 1: his career, he sent a record breaking three thousand felons
Speaker 1: to justice, which means that he was in some he
Speaker 1: was in some hairy situations, but somehow he never actually
Speaker 1: got shot, which is amazing for anyone who's been in
Speaker 1: a firefight. And it's funny too because, I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: the character of the Lone Ranger really is almost like
Speaker 1: a Western James Bond. Know, he's got this kind of
Speaker 1: pinash to his character where he's all about kind of
Speaker 1: like he's a slick talker just as much as he
Speaker 1: is a sharp shooter, you know, and he can talk
Speaker 1: his way out of situations and uses his smart just
Speaker 1: as much as he's uses his gun slinging abilities. Um
Speaker 1: and Reeves was no different. He was, in fact, known
Speaker 1: as a master of disguise and would often dress up
Speaker 1: as like a farmer or you know, a cowboy. And
Speaker 1: when we said cowboy. We just mean like literally someone
Speaker 1: who was hurting, you know, stallions, and he had a
Speaker 1: calling card. He would always leave a silver dollar behind
Speaker 1: when he had when he had apprehended one of these felons. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a true story, even though it sounds like something
Speaker 1: devised by Hollywood. Uh. Well. Also want to note we
Speaker 1: talked about his prodigious memory. He had one disadvantage cognitively
Speaker 1: that a lot of people are not aware of, and
Speaker 1: that's that he was illiterate. He had never learned how
Speaker 1: to read or write. And because of this, before he
Speaker 1: went out in the field, he would have someone read
Speaker 1: him the warrants for the people he was chasing, and
Speaker 1: he would memorize them. He would also use this to
Speaker 1: distract outlaws, you know, he would have he would come
Speaker 1: up to them with a warrant or or some other
Speaker 1: innocuous letter, and then he would stop them in the
Speaker 1: middle of what was about to be a shootout and say, hey,
Speaker 1: can you read this for me because I can't read
Speaker 1: too well. And then they're like, what do you want
Speaker 1: me to read you out loud? But it was too late.
Speaker 1: He had drawn the peacemaker and he's like, get down
Speaker 1: or I'll put you down. Uh. He Also, I love
Speaker 1: that you mentioned the disguise thing. It reminds me a
Speaker 1: little bit of the original A Team where I believe
Speaker 1: what what was the guy's name who was always smoking
Speaker 1: the cigars? I know his The actor was George Peppard,
Speaker 1: Mr t No, No, no no. There was another character
Speaker 1: in the A Team besides Mr Tea. There were four.
Speaker 1: There was the phase. There was Murdoch who Murdoch who
Speaker 1: was the crazy pilot, and then there was the main
Speaker 1: guy with the silver hair. Well he was like, okay,
Speaker 1: the main guy with silver hair and uh, Mr t
Speaker 1: Uh it's uh. The guy's name was Hannibal. He was
Speaker 1: he was the one who put the A Team together.
Speaker 1: Hannibal was a lot like Bugs Bunny in that he
Speaker 1: would go out of his way to use disguises. Those disguises,
Speaker 1: by the way, aged like milk and are are pretty
Speaker 1: problematic nowadays. But bass Reeves was doing a real life
Speaker 1: version of this. Like you said, Noel, he would not
Speaker 1: just dress up as a benign farmer. He would also
Speaker 1: pretend to be an outlaw on the run from himself.
Speaker 1: How cool is that? Uh? And he he would he
Speaker 1: would create backstories for his characters like this guy was
Speaker 1: an amazing actor in a different world, in a universe
Speaker 1: to the left of hours, he is walking the planks
Speaker 1: in London doing um doing Shakespeare. So one one time,
Speaker 1: and there's a true story. He walked thirty miles dressed
Speaker 1: as a homeless itinerant beggar on the lamb, on the
Speaker 1: run from the law. And he did this so that
Speaker 1: the people he was coming for would not you know
Speaker 1: here that the legendary Bass Reeves was just a few
Speaker 1: miles away. He would just be another another faceless person
Speaker 1: in the morass of poverty. And when he got to
Speaker 1: the home of his target, he was after these two brothers.
Speaker 1: The mother invites him in because he's like, I'm having
Speaker 1: such a tough time. I've got nothing, I'm on my
Speaker 1: last legs. The laws after me. May I, you know,
Speaker 1: get shelter. And he manipulates this lady into saying, well, well,
Speaker 1: come on, you know what's the Christian thing to do.
Speaker 1: You can stay the night here. You don't have to
Speaker 1: sleep rough tonight. So he says, okay, I'll do that,
Speaker 1: and then while he is pretending to be asleep, he
Speaker 1: waits for the brothers to go to sleep, and then
Speaker 1: he arrests them in their sleep and he walks them
Speaker 1: the thirty miles back to camp. Yeah, but he kind
Speaker 1: of spared the mother the embarrassment of having to witness that.
Speaker 1: You know. Yeah, she was probably asleep, That's what I mean.
Speaker 1: She woke up at some point, at some point. But
Speaker 1: I don't know if there's part of me that things
Speaker 1: that that was sort of a thoughtful calculus on his part, kindness.
Speaker 1: Maybe well, maybe she just woke up and saw a
Speaker 1: silver dollar on the empty beds. I mean, they were
Speaker 1: probably rotten kids anyway. You know, she was probably happy
Speaker 1: to be rid of them. They had it coming, clearly.
Speaker 1: I don't know. A mother's love is a pretty you're
Speaker 1: right about pretty strong thing, A good point, Ben, I
Speaker 1: always forget about a mother's love. But she was probably
Speaker 1: glad they were alive. That's fair, unless they were going
Speaker 1: to be sentenced to Hank. He could have killed them
Speaker 1: in their sleep. He could have. He could have, and
Speaker 1: it was it was classy that he didn't. So we
Speaker 1: see already the makings of this legend, the bones of
Speaker 1: this modern American mythology, because when I day earlier in
Speaker 1: the show, he became the symbol of justice. That's a
Speaker 1: big part of it because he he wasn't known as
Speaker 1: some sort of like cash crazy murderer for higher you know,
Speaker 1: he was absolutely someone who was bringing people in. He
Speaker 1: was an agent of the law. Yeah, he was not
Speaker 1: a sadist, nor was he a bloodthirsty monster. He was
Speaker 1: actually if he were in D and D he would
Speaker 1: be a paladin. He had a code. He also, because
Speaker 1: he never got shot, he got nicknames like the Indomitable
Speaker 1: Marshal or the Invincible Marshal. And even while he was alive,
Speaker 1: people were starting to uh to build this myth around him.
Speaker 1: They said that he had superhuman strength, that he had
Speaker 1: this you know, photographic or deetic memory, and he had
Speaker 1: plenty of close calls. Now we don't know how many
Speaker 1: of these are true, but you will hear stories about
Speaker 1: a bullet knocking his hat off, or maybe he's he's
Speaker 1: writing after someone. They shoot at him, but instead of
Speaker 1: hitting him, they hit the reins on his horse. And
Speaker 1: we have an actual example of what came to be
Speaker 1: known as his letter trick. Right, it comes from Art Burton,
Speaker 1: I think, yeah. Art Burton in the very creatively titled
Speaker 1: Black Gun, Silver Star, The Life and legend of frontier
Speaker 1: Marshal bass Reeves UM and at one point he was
Speaker 1: on the hunt for two Texans who had been accused
Speaker 1: of murder, and uh, they actually put one over on
Speaker 1: old Marshall Reeves and they got the they got the
Speaker 1: drop on him, and he um in the form of
Speaker 1: this story. He saw them on the road and they
Speaker 1: asked if, just very candidly, are you bass Reeves? And
Speaker 1: he said that he wasn't, and they said, would he
Speaker 1: take us for some kind of Sampleton's right, And they
Speaker 1: pulled their pistols on him and they, you know, basically
Speaker 1: a gunpoint forced him to ride along with them until
Speaker 1: they could find someone that could corroborate their you know,
Speaker 1: their their story that he was in fact the notorious
Speaker 1: uh lawman bass Reefs. So you could do you could
Speaker 1: do stunts like this before the age of social media. Now,
Speaker 1: let's not forget too. That's that's totally true, but let's
Speaker 1: not forget to Can you imagine this guy must have
Speaker 1: taken some abuse from some of these hay seeds, you know,
Speaker 1: of course, yeah, I mean I can't even imagine, you know,
Speaker 1: just the amount of horrible name calling and and disrespect
Speaker 1: that he would have gotten probably at the hands of
Speaker 1: his own colleagues, you know, I mean he probably would
Speaker 1: have been quite resented and at the time for a time. Yes,
Speaker 1: I mean, I just you know, it's it's it's very
Speaker 1: uh profound. I think that he pushed forward and was
Speaker 1: like so committed to this life, into this job that
Speaker 1: he clearly that was not an issue for him. He
Speaker 1: is all about commitment because he also committed to his characters.
Speaker 1: I love this story. This is one of my favorite
Speaker 1: Bass Reefs stories. So, so, these guys have the brilliant
Speaker 1: idea that they're gonna pull firearms on this dude, and
Speaker 1: they literally say, well, you're gonna ride with us until
Speaker 1: we see someone who can tell is who you are
Speaker 1: in or who you am. That's right, so exactly right there,
Speaker 1: They're riding along with him at gunpoint for a long
Speaker 1: long time until they can find someone that can that
Speaker 1: can that can confirm or deny that this is in
Speaker 1: fact the notorious I'm repeating myself, Lam and bass Reeves.
Speaker 1: And after, you know, riding along for some time, they
Speaker 1: just they got kind of tired of the whole, the
Speaker 1: whole thing, and they ordered him down off his horse.
Speaker 1: So that they could end his life. They were going
Speaker 1: to execute him summarily on the side of the road,
Speaker 1: and you know, being the class acts that they were,
Speaker 1: they offered him the uh, the wonderful movie moment of
Speaker 1: final famous last words, right, you know, I have the
Speaker 1: last words uh. And again to the point about racism.
Speaker 1: They may have called him boy or something like that.
Speaker 1: Here's what he did. This is brilliant. He said, well,
Speaker 1: I have a letter from my wife and I can't read.
Speaker 1: I would, I would dearly love for you find, gentlemen,
Speaker 1: to to read it to me. You know, I want
Speaker 1: to hear from her before I passed from this mortal plane.
Speaker 1: They had gotten off their horses too, of course, so
Speaker 1: he tells him he's reaching for this letter and he
Speaker 1: passes it to them with shaking hands on the verge
Speaker 1: of tears. It was a great act. These guys were convinced.
Speaker 1: So you know, this classic misdirection, the way a stage
Speaker 1: magician works. They put their eyes on the letter, and
Speaker 1: stupidly enough they take their eyes off the very dangerous
Speaker 1: bad bass reeves and that's when he draws his gun.
Speaker 1: And here's my question in the plot, and didn't didn't
Speaker 1: pat him down? Right, Why did he still have his
Speaker 1: guns where they just calm for that they could shoot
Speaker 1: him before he could reach the peacemakers, I guess, But
Speaker 1: it's like they're riding along with him for all that time.
Speaker 1: It was the first thing you do when you take
Speaker 1: someone hostage, as you pat him down and remove any
Speaker 1: weapons they have on their person. Maybe he maybe he
Speaker 1: had a hidden a secret piece peacemaker, secret peacemaker. Yeah, maybe,
Speaker 1: I don't know it is. It is a little idiotic
Speaker 1: and speaks to these uh, these gentlemen's intelligence level that
Speaker 1: they wouldn't have found those um and and done something
Speaker 1: about it. But you know, and then that's all she wrote. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he drew his gun on the Tweedle d holding that letter,
Speaker 1: And when he drew his gun, the other character who
Speaker 1: all call Tweedled dumb, dropped his own gun in surprise,
Speaker 1: so reeves bottom both in they survived. This trick worked
Speaker 1: so well that he would rinse and repeat using it
Speaker 1: a number of times over the course of his career.
Speaker 1: But here's the thing. Remember I mentioned earlier that he
Speaker 1: was a real life paladin. For anybody familiar with dungeons
Speaker 1: and dragons, he was real life lawful good. You know
Speaker 1: about the alignment thing, right, you know what we're talking about,
Speaker 1: like lawful good chaotic good of course, so he's lawful
Speaker 1: good and lawful good. Characters are sticklers for the rules,
Speaker 1: even when the rules um they'll they'll do what the
Speaker 1: law says, even when the law maybe gives them an
Speaker 1: ethical conflict. His son, Benny Reeves, was charged with murdering
Speaker 1: his wife, who was bass Reeves daughter in law. This
Speaker 1: happened in nineteen o two when the charges were announced
Speaker 1: the way it's depicted and by the way, a fantastic
Speaker 1: drunk history segment. I love that show. We should get
Speaker 1: on that show. I don't want to be the person
Speaker 1: telling the story. I want to be in the reenactment.
Speaker 1: Do they actually get to drinker? Is it is just
Speaker 1: I think sometimes they're being performative, But I think the
Speaker 1: people are telling these stories are actually drinking. The actors are,
Speaker 1: so that makes sense. So so anyway, these charges are
Speaker 1: read out, you know, Benny Reeves charged with the murder
Speaker 1: of his wife. Bass Reeves is sitting in the back
Speaker 1: of the room and no other deputy wants to take
Speaker 1: the case because they all at this point they all
Speaker 1: respect bass Reeves and so what does the man do.
Speaker 1: He takes on the case himself and he arrests his
Speaker 1: own son. Benny Reeves goes on to serve more than
Speaker 1: two decades at Leavenworth. I mean, remember earlier when we're
Speaker 1: talking about a mother's love, doesn't that apply to a
Speaker 1: father's love? To Ben, that really must have been hard
Speaker 1: for him to do. I guess the law was like
Speaker 1: his mom and dad exactly. He loved the law more
Speaker 1: than he loved his own son. Poetic, tragic, but again
Speaker 1: a stickler for justice. And you've got to give the
Speaker 1: man credit for that. Um. He was a man of
Speaker 1: integrity through and through um. And he just exemplified that
Speaker 1: thirst for justice that you know they tried to to
Speaker 1: hit on in The Lone Ranger. And Bass Reeves, after
Speaker 1: his long career, passes away on January twelve nine. He
Speaker 1: has survived to the ripe old age of seventy one,
Speaker 1: and he passes away in Oklahoma. However, his story doesn't
Speaker 1: stop their recall. At the top of the episode, we said,
Speaker 1: this is gonna be this is gonna be a matter
Speaker 1: of us building a case, right. Uh So we referenced
Speaker 1: earlier the excellent book Black Gun Silver Star by R. T.
Speaker 1: Burton that came out in two thousand six, so it
Speaker 1: didn't have a lot of the the muckraking journalism that
Speaker 1: was common in the eighteen hundreds in early nineteen hundreds,
Speaker 1: and Burton points out that despite the fact he was
Speaker 1: a bad Bass Reeves was fired in nineteen o seven
Speaker 1: not because he did a good job, but because Oklahoma
Speaker 1: became a state and Bass was African American, so he
Speaker 1: was not allowed under the new state laws to continue
Speaker 1: in his position as Deputy marshal, and Steady joined the
Speaker 1: police department after all that service, you know, just to
Speaker 1: kind of get cast off. Uh. And it's weird that
Speaker 1: was it a federal thing. It was a state law.
Speaker 1: It was the racial discrimination encoded in state law. And
Speaker 1: it's a horrible, horrible story, at least that part of it.
Speaker 1: And it tells us a lot about the banality of evil.
Speaker 1: But as we said, his story doesn't end there. This
Speaker 1: is where the Lone Ranger comes in. People who remember
Speaker 1: the original television show, comics stuff like that will recall
Speaker 1: that the Lone Ranger was was portrayed as a white character. However,
Speaker 1: we have along with our research associate Gabe a pretty
Speaker 1: solid argument that the Lone Ranger was inspired by bass Reeves,
Speaker 1: was heavily inspired by bass Reeves, and that the Lone Rangers,
Speaker 1: we understand it in popular fiction of the time, was
Speaker 1: just another case of whitewashing, kind of like how uh
Speaker 1: there was that moment a few months or years back
Speaker 1: when Scarlett Johanson was going to get cast as like
Speaker 1: every character of color. She definitely got cast as the
Speaker 1: ghost in the shell lead, and that was problematic in
Speaker 1: and of itself. But I think there was a role
Speaker 1: that she ultimately turned down. Um No, I know what
Speaker 1: it was. She was going to be a trans character
Speaker 1: and that created a big, big, big uproar because you know,
Speaker 1: there are plenty of fantastic trans actors out there that
Speaker 1: deserve those roles, and Scarlett Johanson doesn't need to get
Speaker 1: every part. But that's the thing that kind of attitude
Speaker 1: in Hollywood. Uh. While maybe not inherently malicious, it's it's
Speaker 1: got a history. So Burton is our in road to
Speaker 1: build the case for bass Reeves being the real Lone Ranger. First,
Speaker 1: he says, look, they have the same kind of horses,
Speaker 1: gray or white. They're known for using disguises they have
Speaker 1: a lot of interaction with people in the American Indian population,
Speaker 1: you know, specifically trackers a k a. Tonto U, and
Speaker 1: they have distinctive calling cards. The Lone Ranger left silver bullets,
Speaker 1: but the real life one, Bass Reeves, as we said,
Speaker 1: left folks, is silver dollar, which is so baller, what
Speaker 1: a power move. It adds up to, right, if he
Speaker 1: left a silver I was thinking about the math if
Speaker 1: he had. If he left a silver dollar as a
Speaker 1: calling card for every felon he took in, h three thousand,
Speaker 1: right he took in and he killed fourteen, Then does
Speaker 1: that mean that he eventually left three thousand, fourteen dollars
Speaker 1: just laying around. That seems like a pretty pricey calling card,
Speaker 1: doesn't it. It does. It's like it's like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: the faberge Eg murderer strikes again. Exactly. No. That's a
Speaker 1: good point, uh. And another good point that's in the
Speaker 1: CNN dot com article is the idea of where this
Speaker 1: black mask came from, which is maybe an almost an
Speaker 1: insult to injury kind of form of appropriation, right. I
Speaker 1: mean they make this argument that it's almost symbolic, uh,
Speaker 1: that the black mask that um the Lone Ranger war
Speaker 1: could be compared to the fact that Reeves, by being
Speaker 1: a black man, was almost he was not seen as
Speaker 1: a full human therefore maybe would not have been seen
Speaker 1: as a threat in some way. That was his greatest
Speaker 1: ability in this. That figured into his ability to disguise
Speaker 1: himself and not present a threat in a world that
Speaker 1: marginalized men that looked like him. Yeah. Absolutely, And there's
Speaker 1: also a geographical link right the idea of Detroit, because
Speaker 1: a lot of the criminals that Reeves captured were later
Speaker 1: sent to lock up in Detroit, and the creators of
Speaker 1: the Lone Ranger, George Trendall and Franz Striker, came up
Speaker 1: with the idea of the Lone Ranger in Detroit. So
Speaker 1: it's not a hard uh, it's not a hard order
Speaker 1: of operations, Like, it's not hard evidence, but there's very
Speaker 1: strong circumstantial evidence. We can plausibly imagine Trendle and Striker
Speaker 1: being aware of this piece of Detroit history and then
Speaker 1: knowing the story of Bass Reeves. It's strange because they
Speaker 1: may not have even known Bass Reeves himself. Maybe maybe
Speaker 1: there was just a bunch of conversation amidst these felons
Speaker 1: about this particular individual, this as you said, iconic individual
Speaker 1: who captured them, and Burton says, you know, I can't
Speaker 1: prove the Bass Reeves inspired The Lone Ranger, but he
Speaker 1: is by far the closest person in real life with
Speaker 1: the characteristics. But the thing is that Bass Reeves story
Speaker 1: and the things that he actually accomplished as a real
Speaker 1: life human person are beyond the scope of anything that
Speaker 1: that our hero The Lone Ranger could have ever possibly
Speaker 1: done on a television show. I mean, think about what,
Speaker 1: like what I mentioned earlier when we were just talking
Speaker 1: about how difficult it must have been for him to
Speaker 1: exist in this society, not only that to command respect
Speaker 1: and to be effective. I mean, he really was this
Speaker 1: kind of triple threat of a man. I mean and
Speaker 1: really really really um admirable qualities. Uh, and that a
Speaker 1: commitment to justice and that heartbreaking moment where he had
Speaker 1: to arrest his own son. Um, that's the kind of
Speaker 1: stuff you you just can't write, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's fascinating, what a life this guy? Lad? Yeah? Yeah.
Speaker 1: And you know something you may be wondering, Uh, why
Speaker 1: haven't I been insisting the whole time that this should
Speaker 1: be a film. That's because it already this character has
Speaker 1: already occurred in numerous things. There's a short film on
Speaker 1: YouTube about him. Uh. He was also featured in short
Speaker 1: film in called They Die by Dawn. And uh he
Speaker 1: was briefly in the HBO adaptation of Watchman, right. Uh,
Speaker 1: he m yeah, that character in the in the old
Speaker 1: black white kind of silent film reels Inspire's Hood ad Justice. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And there's a new lions Gate film called Hell on
Speaker 1: the Border coming out that follows the story of Bass Reeves.
Speaker 1: Of course, it's a little bit fictionalized, but it sounds
Speaker 1: it sounds pretty good. It stars David Gussie along with
Speaker 1: Frank Grillo, the guy who's Crossbones in the Marvel movies,
Speaker 1: playing a villain again in Surprise and uh Ron Perlman,
Speaker 1: Who's Who's a Who's a grizzled you know, hard of
Speaker 1: gold helper sidekick. But Bass Reeves himself, what do you
Speaker 1: have liked the movie? We don't know. We do know
Speaker 1: that he was nothing if not consistent. Once someone asked
Speaker 1: him why he spent so much effort enforcing what they
Speaker 1: called the white Man's laws. Bass replied, maybe the law
Speaker 1: ain't perfect, but it's the only one we got. Without it,
Speaker 1: we got nothing. And in addition to UM a handful
Speaker 1: of books, we've got Burton's book and another one that
Speaker 1: we mentioned earlier, and the portrayals uh in a lot
Speaker 1: of this popular culture stuff that's kind of coming around,
Speaker 1: some of this lost legacy of Bass stieves is really
Speaker 1: starting to kind of be righted. And one of the
Speaker 1: most official examples of that was reeves induction into the
Speaker 1: Texas Trail of Fame back in UM. He has had
Speaker 1: bronze statues erected uh and a bridge in Oklahoma named
Speaker 1: after him. So finally getting a little little credit where
Speaker 1: credit is due. Yes, fine, maybe he would argue that
Speaker 1: the wheels of justice grind slow, but exceedingly fine. I
Speaker 1: believe that, along with our author, Mr Burton, we have
Speaker 1: made a pretty convincing case, if not water tight, that
Speaker 1: Bass Reeves was indeed the inspiration for the Lone Ranger.
Speaker 1: We would love to hear your thoughts. As always, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for tuning in. Please let us know
Speaker 1: other historical figures that you believe have yet to get
Speaker 1: their do. We would love to dive into their stories
Speaker 1: in the meantime. As always, uh oh wait, we should
Speaker 1: tell people where to find us. Yeah, you can find
Speaker 1: us in the usual spots as a show entity, as
Speaker 1: a triumvirate me Ben super producer Casey Pagram on the
Speaker 1: social channel is your social platform of choice. We've got
Speaker 1: the Facebook, We've got the Instagram, or we're ridiculous history
Speaker 1: um Our favorite one where we can actually spend a
Speaker 1: little time and hang out with are your if your
Speaker 1: you and your fellow listeners is the Ridiculous History Facebook
Speaker 1: page called the Ridiculous Historians. All you gotta do is
Speaker 1: name one to all three of us, make some reference
Speaker 1: to something in the show, or just make us laugh.
Speaker 1: Uh and and you are in. Like Flynn, my friends,
Speaker 1: we also all exist as independent human beings. After all.
Speaker 1: You can find me exclusively on Instagram where I am
Speaker 1: at how Now Noel Brown. You can find me on
Speaker 1: my various misadventures on Instagram named an abstive creativity at
Speaker 1: Ben Boland spelled like bow Lean, but without the G.
Speaker 1: You can also find me on Twitter where I'm at
Speaker 1: Ben Bowland h s W, a reference that the old
Speaker 1: heads me well appreciate. Ben. I gotta tell you you've
Speaker 1: got some good musings On Twitter, I appreciate that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know you're lurking on Twitter. I'm a lurker. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not a tweeter, and you don't you really like
Speaker 1: stuff which read I don't like it. I don't retweet it.
Speaker 1: I don't do any of it. I just lark and
Speaker 1: I remember interesting. I know what inspired you, what inspired
Speaker 1: me to lurk? Just not particular interest, because you know,
Speaker 1: it's just not my it's not my scene. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm a visual learner. I'm a visual communicator, I think.
Speaker 1: But there's a lot of stuff on Twitter that is
Speaker 1: very interesting, a lot of people that use it to
Speaker 1: great effect. And know what I'm saying is you are
Speaker 1: one of those people that is very kind. But you know,
Speaker 1: I see your tweets though I see them reposted as
Speaker 1: Instagram stories like at other times. Oh you're talking about me,
Speaker 1: you personally? Oh yeah, yeah, because I want to reach
Speaker 1: the audiences. I mean, I don't know I understanding at all, No,
Speaker 1: not at all, But you're reaching me as well in
Speaker 1: that way, and I think it's it's a smart to
Speaker 1: do that. Oh well, I thank you, but also thank
Speaker 1: you to super producer Casey Pegram. Thanks to of course
Speaker 1: Gabe where would we be. You know, we gotta get
Speaker 1: Gabe on the show. At some point, we gotta get
Speaker 1: Gabe on the show. He doesn't live here in Atlanta, though, Yeah,
Speaker 1: we'll have to get him to call in or maybe
Speaker 1: we'll fly out to him. I see, where does he
Speaker 1: even live? He's a man of mystery. He really really
Speaker 1: is a man of mystery. But our our pals Mango
Speaker 1: and Will got him all line, part time genius one time,
Speaker 1: so it's doable. They probably know where he lives. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but they won't tell me. It's kind of weird that
Speaker 1: we don't what you think they use a little weird.
Speaker 1: It's just sort of this disembodied like voice in our
Speaker 1: inbox that comes through with really great history ideas. Would
Speaker 1: it be hilarious if you lived here? What if he's
Speaker 1: a bot? What if he is a bot? What if
Speaker 1: we get that? What if one of us gets that
Speaker 1: the most advanced Russian bot ever created? And we I
Speaker 1: asked him for something? He goes, I'm sorry, Ben, I
Speaker 1: can't let you do that. Can't let you do this?
Speaker 1: Is that the line space something? It's very close, It's
Speaker 1: very close, but no, absolute thank you too to Gabe
Speaker 1: because we would be nowhere with that, or we'd be
Speaker 1: at least half half as far along for sure. Thanks
Speaker 1: to Jonathan Strickland for goodness gracious for picking up the
Speaker 1: reins in a big way in a non quister role
Speaker 1: when I was away on adventures. Um. I haven't listened
Speaker 1: to the episodes yet, but I'm sure they're gangbusters, and
Speaker 1: I'm really grateful that that he was able to come
Speaker 1: in and keep the history machine at churning. We had
Speaker 1: a great time. You were missed. Uh learned a lot
Speaker 1: about poop Heist, which is gonna be hilarious if you
Speaker 1: run into it. Uh So, we also want to thank
Speaker 1: Alex Williams who composed our track, and we want to
Speaker 1: thank of course Bass Reeves. See you next time. Books.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.