True West Mag v Wild West Mag.

[Danny Bear Claw]

I let my subscription to True West magazine lapse.  I think Bob Bose Bell spreads too much fertilizer around.  It's hard enough to get the facts straight on old west history.  I think what did it for me was the picture a few months back of a man posing with a black powder revolver held with both hands.  His support hand was wrapped around the front end of the cylinder.  True West mag indicated this proved that in the old west men did indeed shoot two handed.  Although I realize this was a posed picture from the days of the old west, I dare say any man who would fire a cap-n-ball revolver holding it in such a manner would certainly not repeat the mistake a second time.
Wild West magazine, on the other hand, seems to stick more to the facts.  If the facts are unclear or unknown they at least say so.
So, which magazine do you prefer?  I still like Guns Of The Old West the best.  At least they keep us up to date on all the modern cowboy guns available today.

[dangerranger]

I think I like the list as you do.
Guns of the Old West
Wild West
and True West
in that order.
I still read True West even with the ' artistic license'.  Bell brings up storys, and yarns that others wouldnt touch. its up to me the reader to decide how much truth is in it. I like old dime novels, and his style is closer to theirs. DR

[GunClick Rick]

All of a sudden,there i was!!! Surrounded by the retched red man,i stood my ground and started firing,bullets zinging and arrows flying through the air!!!!! I was hit several times,,

[Harley Starr]

I think I like the list as you do.
Guns of the Old West
Wild West
and True West
in that order.
I still read True West even with the ' artistic license'.  Bell brings up storys, and yarns that others wouldnt touch. its up to me the reader to decide how much truth is in it. I like old dime novels, and his style is closer to theirs. DR

My sentiments exactly.

[dangerranger]

All of a sudden,there i was!!! Surrounded by the retched red man,i stood my ground and started firing,bullets zinging and arrows flying through the air!!!!! I was hit several times,,

GCR, I think you have found your true calling! DR

[Wolfgang]

"All of a sudden,there i was!!! Surrounded by the retched red man,i stood my ground and started firing,bullets zinging and arrows flying through the air!!!!! I was hit several times,,"

the "retched red man" . . ?  now that is teminology right out of the old west fur sure.

. . . and seeing as how this is a first hand factual account of exactley how it happened . . .

I presume that it all occured last weekend in downtown Visalier . . . right in front of the "end of the trail" statue ?

Submit yur story to "True West" . . . I thunkun thut they crave a cover story for the december issue 

ps.  Sign the story in genuine blood that dripped from the arrow wounds 

[Wolfgang]

I let my subscription to True West magazine lapse.  I think Bob Bose Bell spreads too much fertilizer around.  It's hard enough to get the facts straight on old west history.  I think what did it for me was the picture a few months back of a man posing with a black powder revolver held with both hands.  His support hand was wrapped around the front end of the cylinder.  True West mag indicated this proved that in the old west men did indeed shoot two handed.  Although I realize this was a posed picture from the days of the old west, I dare say any man who would fire a cap-n-ball revolver holding it in such a manner would certainly not repeat the mistake a second time.
Wild West magazine, on the other hand, seems to stick more to the facts.  If the facts are unclear or unknown they at least say so.
So, which magazine do you prefer?  I still like Guns Of The Old West the best.  At least they keep us up to date on all the modern cowboy guns available today.

If you thing that the magazine is a bit silly . . . . . .

. . . how about whut occurs on the "True West Forum" on the internet ?   

[Johnny McCrae]

I think I like the list as you do.
Guns of the Old West
Wild West
and True West
in that order.
I still read True West even with the ' artistic license'.  Bell brings up storys, and yarns that others wouldnt touch. its up to me the reader to decide how much truth is in it. I like old dime novels, and his style is closer to theirs. DR

My sentiments also.

[Ten Wolves Fiveshooter]

      I like them all, and sort the fiction out as I go, a little fiction is good for the soul as long as you keep it in its place, it keeps things interesting for me.

[GunClick Rick]

Doncha wanna know what happened???

[dangerranger]

My grandfather use to tell some real wild west tales of Visalia, most didnt involve the rechid red man, but quite a few drunkin cowboys! My favorite Dr as a kid was a cowboy from Visalia. he was drafted into WW1 as a mule Dr and by WW2 he had gotten his people license, as he put it! it was almost worth getting hurt just to here his storys! DR

[MJN77]

This is the caption from True West
"Lee County Sheriff James S. Scarborough poses with his six-shooter; plagued with outlaws, Lee County citizens voted the shootist in for two terms at the close of the 19th century. Scarborough also served as sheriff of Kelberg County in South Texas from 1914-23. His pistol shooting stance, while seemingly unorthodox, makes us question how early it was that shooters gravitated to this two-handed grip. Scarborough is incorrectly demonstrating the Weaver stance though; his hand should hold the other on the pistol's grip, not on the barrel as shown here."

– All photos Courtesy Turner Publishing / Historic Photos of Texas Lawmen by Mike Cox –

It does say it is incorrect.
To me, True West is more interesting than Wild West. Plus I like BBB's artwork. But in all honesty, I think both magazines have too many adds and not enough articles. As far as history, I do my own research. Internet, library etc. Just MY opinion.

[Crow Choker]

This subject is one I couldn't pass on without giving my two-cents. As far as True West is concerned, it may have some good reading, needed to pass the time of day, but I have always put it on the same level as the National Enquirer. I believe they've got writers sitting in some rented office space taking small bits of history and/or fact and sitting there making up stories to sell their magazine. Sort of reminds me of the old dime novels of the 19th century. Won't waste my dollars on it. Wild West seems to have a little more credibility, but who knows, no one around today lived when the events took place. Wild West to their credit  appears to do more investigation in their articles which are written more in a history book type format. My wife took a subscription out last year, not yet determined if a renewal will take place. Now to Guns of the Old West. I bought issues off the magazine rack at WallyWorld for a year before I took a two year subscription. Liked it except for one major issue and two minor ones. I spent greenbacks on it to read about guns, NOT to read the Late Jack Lewis's accounts of old B western actors that he always had to let the reader know that he, Jack Lewis, knew. When ya have a magazine with approx 80-90 pages and some 15-20 of them are used for two or three of Mr. Lewis's article's and full page pictures per issue, well that's a little to much. I twice called the office of G of the OW and talked with the managing editor, Mr. Linas Cernauskas about my displeasure with the overabundance of Jack Lewis's articles. Also wrote them when my subscription was near ending. Unfortunatly Mr Lewis passed away, he was probably a nice guy, but I didn't give a hoot about the articles. I didn't 're-up' with G of the OW and neither did two friends for the same reason. One of them JO, had a letter to the editor published approx two years ago about 'old actors Jack Lewis rubbed elbows and drank whiskey with'. Several letters in the after months written by fans indicated they liked the old stories, mostly because every Saturday as kids they watched those old westerns. Well I did to, but when I became a man, I started to like to do things men do, such as shootin real guns and purchasing books and magazines about guns. There's plenty of movie magazines out in the market, let them cover the oldies. As JO indicated and I previously stated, we bought the magazine to read about guns, not old B western actors. Time will tell if the 'movers an shakers' at G of the OW eliminate the articles. I told Mr Cernauskas to publish a special edition yearly for that subject and leave the gun magazine for guns. I haven't bought any since my subscription ran out last October. One of the minor items I stated is that some of the writers will take a production gun such as Cimarrons '72 OpenTop, send it to two-three custom gunsmiths, then write a review about it. Why they won't just write about the gun that most of us buy and/or can afford. I don't care how it shoots after they get it back, I want to know how it performs out of the box. The other minor item is they seem to repeat gun reviews of the same gun to often. Seems to me I read two reviews of Taylors 'SmokeWagon' in less than a year. OK, I know I got wordy here and it can be said to call G of the OW, been there, done that. I know I don't have to buy it, did just that. Other than all this, You all have a safe and good Labor Day week-end.  Yers, Crow Choker (Hiya there Jubel Starbuck, I'm on my soapbox again)

[MJN77]

As for Guns of the Old West, what kinda turns me off is three pages of an article about how cool the author thinks this particular gun is, and four or five lines about how the gun shoots. Also all the articles seem to be written by the same two or three writers. Oh, and Dennis Adler wearing all his different outfits trying to look "bada$$" I don't buy any of these mags but maybe two or three times a year.

[Modoc]

A funny side note,  Brandon Iron (Todd Lofgren) from GOTOW is one of our local shooters.  We were at the local gun show and I had a loading strip from Ted Blocker on my belt as part of the CAS display and after inspecting it; he said that it was head and shoulders above any of the other examples that he had gotten for his article about them.

What makes it neat is when you have had a chance to handle and shoot some of the guns that make it into articles that are published nation wide.

[Wolfgang]

I enjoy "True West" . . . most of the advertizing is pretty silly . . . but it suports the magazine financial and make publication possible.  So I read the 20% of it that is of interest to me. 

[Crow Choker]

Ref. Guns of the Old West, except for Jack Lewis's articles, I miss the magazine. Always enjoyed Mike Beliveau's, Dennis Adlers, and Todd Lofgren's articles and information. Adler 'costuming it up' didn't bother me, look at what you see if you attend any CAS/SASS/NCOWS shoot. My main beef as I alluded to was the 2-3 write-ups per issue of old movie actors. If I was into movies/tv shows from the 1930-1960 or so years and subscribed to some movie magazine, I won't expect or want articles about guns to take up space. Nothing against Jack Lewis as a person, he was active for years in gun magazines, digests, etc. Write-ups about guns used in some of the latest western movies/made for tv movies, and 'good, realistic ' tv westerns are interesting and educational. If those of you who liked Jack Lewis's articles, then tell GOTOW, I sure they will find someone to keep it up, but I and others I know will not buy it. I've got all of Adlers books, so I can glean his information. Wish Mike Beliveau would write some. The minor things I had to say about GOTOW, well I could have lived with them. This is not an attempt to 'hijck' the thread, Wild West vs. True West. GOTOW was mentioned in the starter thread by D. Bear Claw.

[Green River Powell aka RonC]

This thread was very useful to a greenhorn like me. I'm going to pick up a couple of issues of Guns of the Old West and Wild West to check them out. I love the history and have several books on the "wild west".

Ron

[dangerranger]

Ron , I still like True West, but just rember it reads like True Detective, True Crime, True storys, Etc... theres an element of truth and a "true story" in it. if you like dime novels its a good read. DR

[Deja vous]

Dime western novels.. i want to see those return.. The short story heaven for me.. lol..  I don't have a lot of time to read.  So the short stories are cool, and someday I will be in one the little part indian kid that can shoot and ride really crappy and ends up dead in the novel.. lol..