Ranger Jim's Ramblings for June

This month, I thought I'd do a quick post about perios, the time frame, not the punctuation mark.

Right now, I'm working on a  new Texas Ranger Jim Blawcyzk novel titled TEXAS JEOPARDY. I know, some of you are saying "How can there be a new Jim Blawcyzk novel? Jim was gunned down from ambush in TO AVENGE A RANGER. Well, this is a sixth generation Jim Blawcyzk tale, featuring Jim's great-great-great-grandson and namesake. It's set in the present day, and there's the rub.

When you are writing a Western, or most genres, set in the past, unless you go too far afield you can pretty much make up your own characters, towns, and locations. However, when writing in the present, you need to be much more careful about getting those same things accurate. You can't just plop down a fictional town anywhere you want. Ditto for the methods used in law enforcement, not to mention you'd better make dang cure any suspects are read their rights. Places, locations, equipment, and vehicles need  be correctly depicted. Anything out of place and you can be certain the readers will notice, and let you know.

So, am I enjoying writing a present day novel? Absolutely. Am I finding it harder than an old-fashioned traditional Western. Again, absolutely. But I wouldn't not do it again.

Next month, off to Texas, then the WWA convention in Kansas City. Until then, see you down the trail

"Ranger" Jim

Blog #4  One-room Schoolhouses

One-room Schoolhouses Buildings

By Julie Hanks, Ph.D.  aka Jesse J Elliot

         The one-room schoolhouses not only reflect the importance 19^th Century Americans placed on education, but they also reflected the regions, the people, and the available resources at these school sites. While the established Eastern United States were already building brick schools, the one-room schoolhouses of the West tended to represent the materials most accessible in those areas.  Most often the arid areas of the Southwest used adobe, the prairies often used sod, and the schools with access to trees or the railroad used lumber.  

         Thanks to the many organizations and researchers interested in recording our past, many of these schools have been restored or at least photographed for posterity. In some areas the old schoolhouses have been restored and now serve as museums, community centers, and even tourist centers or shops.

        

        Encinoso, New Mexico, now a ghost town in Lincoln County has an old adobe schoolhouse that

has miraculously survived the weather and time. The school has not been restored but remains as it

was. Generally the land reclaims adobe structures, but this surviving building not only illustrates an

adobe school, but in its current state, it is also a history lesson on how to build an adobe structure

(still used in isolated and poor areas as homes or shops).

         Unlike Encinoso, the Virginia City, Montana, school is still in use--but not as a school. Restored and modified, the old one-room schoolhouse now serves as an Artisans shop in this trendy town. It’s a beautiful log cabin that once served its children well.

            

       Another schoolhouse, totally different from Virginia City’s, is the Sula School House, in Montana, recently restored by the local Sula Historical Society and the Trapper Creek Job Corps. The building was sanded, painted and restored. Volunteers came from the community to help.

". . .all the wood we're using came from the East Fork. . .which I'm pretty sure the schoolhouse was originally built with wood from here. People may not be able to tell the difference, but it's important to me (Bill Reed, the man spearheading the project)."  None of the volunteers minded the work--as long as it was completed by opening of duck season. http://ravallirepublic.com/news/local/article_e1aaee62-7796-11e0-aec9-001cc4c002e0.html 

            Unfortunately no restoration is available for sod schoolhouses. Few if any sod schoolhouses remain. Here are two photos of sod schoolhouses in Nebraska.  One is particularly interesting in that the teacher is a man—by the end of the 19^th Century, women dominated the western schools. The photo is taken 1890 in Thomas County, Nebraska. The other sod schoolhouse is taken in western Nebraska. Note the construction of the second building. No ninety-degree walls there.

            Other building materials were rock such as limestone and sandstone, bricks, and untreated logs. The author of one of my main resource describes his excitement when he comes upon a limestone school built in 1896 in Chase County, Kansas.  Not only was the school beautifully constructed in limestone, but so were "the two privies, flanking the school" (Rocheleau, 2003,

p. 56 & 57).

          

           I could go on and on, but I’ll leave it to the reader to follow up on other one-room schoolhouses. There are many reference sites, and each contains its own treasure trove of information.  However, the sites I used most frequently for this month’s blog are listed below.   

Erickson, D. (2011) “schoolhouse being restored by historical society” in Ravalli

 Republic, May 5, 2011.

One Room Schoolhouse Center. Online, ongoing site:

 http://oneroomschoolhousecenter.weebly.com

Rocheleau, P. (2003). The One-Room Schoolhouse: A Tribute to a Beloved National Icon.

              St. Martins Press: New York.

Sod One-room Schoolhouses (photos).  https://www.google.com/search?q=Sod+one-

room+schoolhouse&client=safari&rls=en&tbm=isch&imgil=JZCKCmPh56Yq3M%253A%253B3xyruyAOoC71hM%253Bhttps%25253A%25252F%25252Fnapersettlement.oncell.com%25252Fen%25252F136-architectural-tour-origins-of-the-one-room-schoolhouse-73871.html&source=iu&pf=m&fir=JZCKCmPh56Yq3M%253A%252C3xyruyAOoC71hM%252C_&usg=__-08ZD6SkhRy-v7iwXqV5AfYDROY%3D&ved=0ahUKEwjy3b6Azc_TAhUT8GMKHYARBmsQyjcIMg&ei=maMHWbKtCZPgjwOAo5jYBg&biw=1215&bih=642#imgrc=VNXn47tEawFicM:

See you next month with a one-room schoolhouse curriculum.

           

         

THE HEALING STONES OF ST FILLAN

THE DOCTOR'S BAG

the blog about the medicine and surgery of yesteryear

Keith Souter aka Clay More

This month I am not going to talk about the medicine of the Old West. Instead, I am going to mention the 'old medicine' of the West of Scotland.

Recently I paid a visit to an elderly relative in Carnoustie, which is in the east coast,  before heading across country to spend a couple of days hiking in Glencoe. On the way across I made a detour to stop off at the beautiful little village of Killin. It is situated astride the River Dochart with the Falls of Dochart running through the village. 

The Falls of Dochart

The Healing stones of St Fillan

My purpose was to visit the Breadalbane Folklore Centre which is housed in the old mill on the bank of the river. The original mill was apparently built by St Fillan. Inside the mill are the famous Healing Stones of St Fillan.

           

St Fillan was a monk from a noble Irish family, a follower of St Columba, who came to Killin in the seventh century to try to convert the Picts from their ancient pagan ways. His name means wolf cub, or little wolf.There are many legends that have grown up around him and they have drifted into the folklore of Scotland. He was said to have been born with a stone in his mouth. His father threw him into a lake, but angels looked after him until he was found and cared for by Bishop Ibar. He brought him up as his son in the  Christian faith. 

So much for legend. It is known that he taught in the vicinity, operated a meal mill and worked as a healer.

           

In his healing work he used stones that had been gathered from the river bed. There were eight of them and he bequeathed them to the community, to be used after his death. They are kept in a corner of the mill beside a working water wheel. They are quite fascinating artifacts to see.

           

The healing stones of St Fillan

There are eight of them of varying size. Each of them represents a different part of the body. The largest is called the head stone and is about the size of a coconut. It appears to have indentations that correspond to the eyes, the ears and a smiling mouth. It is used for all sorts of head problems; anything from problems with eyesight, toothache, headaches and deafness. Then there is a stone with a belly button to treat problems of the chest and the abdomen; anything from bowel problems to kidney stones. A similar sized one without a belly button is used for problems of the back. And then there are four stones for the limbs and one for the ‘extra’ problems. People with a problem hold the appropriate stone then rub it on their affected part, and they say a prayer or make whatever sort of affirmation they like. 

They are used to this day, upon making a request to the proprietors. Tradition has it that the stones should be bathed every Christmas Eve and given a fresh bed of straw and reeds gathered from the river bank.

The Holy Pool of St Fillan

Another association with St Fillan is the Holy Pool near the church as Tyndrum, a small village on the West Highland Way. Immersion in it was said to cure insanity and wash away all nervous disorders. 

St Fillan's Holy Pool

           

Sympathetic and transference magic

These two associations with St Fillan are fascinating, for they are perfect examples of magic and medicine. The stones are an example of sympathetic magic, or the belief that inanimate objects shaped like the body can be imbued with healing power. It is  a belief that has been found around the world, where holy relics in different religions are thought to have healing power imbued into them. 

Sympathetic magic is widely seen in folk medicine practice around the world, where things that are sympathetic, or very like a condition that someone may be suffering from is used. Thus, an animal, insect or plant with a 'signature' indicating its efficacy, would be eaten, used in an ointment or applied in some such way.  Many fertility remedies and aphrodisiacs were made according to this principle. Mandrake and bryony roots, being phallus-like were considered potency stimulators. So too were the genitalia of innumerable animals renowned for their 'potency.'

Mandrake root used because of its resemblance to a man

Another way in which sympathetic magic was used was when taking a compound or substance which produced symptoms which were like an illness. In such cases it was believed that is someone was afflicted with certain symptoms, they could be improved by using the magic of a herb or whatever to overcome the ill magic, which was causing the illness. For example, a hallucinogenic fungus might be given to overcome hysteria or madness caused by an evil spirit. Or a herb which caused sweating might be given to someone with a fever. 

Transference magic depends upon using an object, plant or creature to take away an illness. For example, Nicolas Culpeper, the seventeenth century herbalist, advocated taking a black snail and rubbing it in both directions nine times over a wart, in order to get rid of it. The snail was then to be impaled upon a black-thorn. As it died, so too, would the wart waste away. 

Nicholas Culpeper (1616-1654) note the astrological signs around his portrait. He advocated collecting herbs and administering them under various signs.

The Holy Pool of St Fillan, of course, is a good example of transference magic, for the water was thought to wash away madness or any bad medicine or spirit that was causing it.

 Toothache and gum conditions were similarly treated by scratching the gum with a nail piece of wood found in a graveyard. The nail was then hammered into a tree or the wood was burned on an old grave. Either way, the pain was thought to be transferred from the sufferer.

Frogs came in for a lot of ill treatment in folk medicine.  In the highlands of Scotland, if a live frog was placed in a bag and hung up a chimney it was thought that as it caked its last, it would cure a child of whooping cough.

Frogs were also thought capable of curing mouth conditions by transference. A live frog's head was placed in the sufferer's mouth an then dragged out by its legs and hurled as far away as possible, it would take the ailment. 

Frogs commonly used in folk medicine

Transference magic was also used to treat epilepsy. An ancient 'cure' involved taking hair clippings and nail pairings and wrapping them up in a small bag together with a small coin. These were then buried or left at a crossroads, where three or four trails met. If the bag was picked up by some unfortunate passer-by, then it was hoped that the disease would transfer to them and mysteriously disappear from the sufferer. 

*****
CURE CRAFT - Traditional folk remedies and treatment from antiquity to the present day
published by CW Daniel (1995)

A very old book! (but you can pick it up for a dollar or two!)

CURE CRAFT

THE DOCTOR'S BAG - MEDICINE AND SURGERY OF YESTERYEAR has been published by Sundown Press, available in ebook or paperback.

THE DOCTOR'S BAG

Clay More's novel about Dr George Goodfellow is published in the West of the Big River series by Western Fictioneers. 

THE DOCTOR

WARRIOR IN STONE by VONN McKEE

Lakota Chief Henry Standing Bear surveyed the faces of the four American great leaders carved into the sheer mountainside. For ten years, Standing Bear had pondered the white men hanging by scaffolds from the face of Mt. Rushmore, which happened to lie on his native homeland, the Black Hills of South Dakota. The irony stirred him deeply, and an idea came to him. Finally, in the fall of 1939, he wrote a letter to one of Mt. Rushmore’s sculptors, which read, ''My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know that the red man has great heroes, too.''

The sculptor was Korczak Ziolkowski and he became so intrigued with Standing Bear’s idea of creating a stone memorial honoring Native Americans that he eventually moved west to begin work. Standing Bear and the other Lakota leaders chose the warrior Crazy Horse’s likeness to represent them in stone.

It was Crazy Horse’s band of Lakota warriors who defeated Custer’s Seventh U.S. Cavalry battalion in the Battle of the Little Big Horn, known as "Custer’s Last Stand.”  The warrior Crazy Horse was killed in 1877 at Ft. Robinson, where he rode in under a flag of truce. A misunderstanding, possible the fault of a poor translator, led to a scuffle and Crazy Horse was mortally wounded with a bayonet.

In 1948, Korczak Ziolkowski’s hammer struck a chisel into the granite of Thunderhead Mountain, only 17 miles from Mt. Rushmore. Being a self-taught sculptor, he made many early miscalculations, some resulting in bodily injuries. He fell in love with Ruth, a young volunteer on the project, and eventually married her. The Ziolkowskis welcomed a total of 10 children. Ruth worked alongside him until his death in 1982, then took over supervision of the carving, taking to heart his instructions to “go slowly so you do it right.” At this point, not even the face of Crazy Horse was finished.

Korczak and Ruth Ziolkowski

The privately funded transformation from mountain to statue has been a long one, and it is still not complete. Today, four of the Ziolkowski children and several grandchildren carry on the work. After 69 years of construction, the sons and daughters of Korczak Ziolkowski say they will not see completion of the statue in their lifetimes. (In comparison, the Great Pyramid of Egypt is thought to have been built in about 20 years.) Eventually, the image of Crazy Horse will be wider than two football fields and taller than the Washington Monument.

Crazy Horse’s pose was inspired by the story that, after the defeat of the Lakota, a derisive Cavalryman asked him the question, “Where are your lands now?” With his left hand pointing over his horse’s head, Crazy Horse answered, “My lands are where my dead lie buried.”

Strangely, a few years after the warrior’s death, a medicine man, Black Elk, told an interviewer that Crazy Horse had predicted to him: ''I will return to you in stone.'' The prophecy is coming true, one chip of granite at a time.

For more information about the Crazy Horse Memorial, visit crazyhorsememorial.org.

 

Rendering of the future Crazy Horse Memorial Visitor Complex

All the best,

Vonn

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2015 WWA Spur Finalist (Short Fiction)
2015 Western Fictioneers Peacemaker Finalist (Short Fiction)

Gunsmoke: Chester or Festus?

In this installment of my Gunsmoke musings, I ask the all-important question:

Chester or Festus?

Which was your favorite? Which was the most help to Marshal Dillon?

It ranks in importance with other earth shattering pop culture decisions- who was your favorite Bond? Your favorite Law & Order detective? Your favorite Third Stooge? (for me it’s a close call between Curly and Shemp… I wish they could’ve been the Four Stooges! But I digress.)

First, a little background.

Chester Goode, played by Dennis Weaver, was a member of the original cast- and, like all the other originals, was a carryover from the radio program. On the radio version his name had been Chester Wesley Proudfoot, and he did not have the distinctive stiff-legged limp –that was introduced by Weaver. The limp is never explained; Chester does, however, mention serving in the army, so I always figured it was probably a war wound. The fact he got into the army suggests the limp came afterwards.

A common misperception: Chester was not a deputy. He wore no badge, and was described as “the marshal’s assistant.” It seems that he had been hired by Matt to help out around the jail; cleaning up, running errands, making coffee. However, Chester did often back the marshal’s play when apprehending bad guys –always taking a shotgun or one of the rifles from the rack in the office, never wearing a pistol.

In one episode (“Reward for Matt,” Season One), fearing for Matt’s safety, Chester surreptitiously took the marshal’s back-up revolver- “that old rusty Remington you keep in your desk.” Matt takes it away from him: “Sorry, Chester. A man has to kill his own snakes.”

Dennis Weaver left the series in the middle of the ninth season, having appeared in 290 episodes. He left to star in his own series, Kentucky Jones, which only lasted one season (but he had much more success later, with Gentle Ben and McCloud, and gave an excellence performance as trail-boss R.J. Poteet in the miniseries Centennial.)

The Gunsmoke writers gave no reason for Chester’s departure- one week he was there, the next week he was not, and he was never mentioned again that I am aware of. In fact, that tended to be the procedure on the show; new cast members were always introduced with an “origin” episode, showing them arrive in town, but when they left they were just gone without a word of explanation. The half-Comanche blacksmith Quint Asper, played by Burt Reynolds, is the only character I ever recall being mentioned again after they left (Festus: “Matthew, we’ve gone through several blacksmiths since the Comanche left.”)

Festus Haggen, played by Ken Curtis, was introduced in an eighth-season episode (“Us Haggens”), became a recurring character in the ninth season, and took over as Matt’s sidekick when Chester left –edging his predecessor out by appearing in 304 episodes. The apparently unlimited Haggen clan are sometimes referred to as Missouri ridge-runners, and Ken Curtis said he based the accent on someone he knew from his native Colorado… but said accent is very authentic Appalachian dialect.

Ken Curtis- a singer as well as an actor, and a former member of the Sons of the Pioneers –released two albums in the late ‘60s, singing and telling stories in character as Festus.

In one of the tales, “Ode to a Mule,” he tells of being a mule skinner in the Confederate Army, and specifically at the battle of Franklin in Tennessee. General Schofield (the Union commander) “was mighty hard on us Tennessee boys.” Festus came under heavy fire while trying to recover Confederate dead from Hood’s ill-fated charge- he survived only because his faithful mule Ruth carried him through the hail of bullets, succumbing herself once they reached safety. In gratitude to the mule who died carrying him to safety, he swore to name every mule he owned thereafter “Ruth,” no matter their sex.

The story tells us a lot about Festus. We can safely assume that the Haggen clan was comprised of East Tennessee mountain folk who migrated to Missouri at some point. Again, being from the area myself, the accent is perfect- my wife didn’t believe ye could be jobbed in the eye with a stob till she heard Festus say it too.

When we first met him, Festus was a man who had apparently spent most of his life on the wrong side of the law –like all his kin. His brother Jeff had been killed by a shotgun blast while trying to rob a stagecoach, and his twin brother Fergus had died of wounds received from a posse after a botched bank robbery. Festus first encounters Matt when they are hunting the same man- Black Jack Haggen, Festus’ uncle, who had abandoned the injured Fergus, stealing his horse and leaving him for dead. Matt and Festus strike up an uneasy partnership, catching the older bandit (who winds up shot dead by the marshal.)

We see Festus again the following season (the ninth)… trying to keep to the straight and narrow, he is now working in the Dodge area as a prairie wolfer. He shows up in town from time to time to trade in his hides, and winds up helping Matt more than once. For a very brief spell, Festus and Chester are both in Dodge- and they seemed to be fast friends.

After Chester leaves, Matt begins occasionally deputizing Festus and leaving him to watch over things when the marshal has to be out of town (this as-needed situation is first described in the season ten episode “Deputy Festus.”) Later, Thad Greenwood and then Newly O’Brien also serve as part-time deputies. Festus initially works part-time at Moss Grimmick’s livery stable, doing repair work to wagons (a skill he would’ve learned as a mule-skinner, no doubt) but eventually seems to be Matt’s full-time deputy, even doing the work of a deputy U.S. marshal (tracking fugitives in other states.) In the final season, Matt usually leaves Newly “in charge” –and, as we learn in the first TV movie, Newly eventually takes Matt’s place as marshal.

There’s the background. So who’s your favorite? I’ll say upfront that –while I like both characters –if I were the marshal and had to pick one I’d go with Festus. Here is how the two match up, in various categories…

COMPETENCE

Though Chester can be relied on in a posse, or for laying down covering fire… he’s not really a tough guy. He is hampered physically by his bad leg; he is also high-strung, nervous, fastidious, and a hypochondriac. One gets the distinct feeling he doesn’t wear a pistol because Matt doesn’t allow him to, figuring he’d get himself killed.

However, Chester is brave and determined… and as the show progresses, you can almost see the frustration in Dennis Weaver as he tires of being the gimpy sidekick and wishes for a more central, heroic role. He gets it a few times, in his last couple of seasons – catching some bad guys and solving some mysteries. The very last episode he appears in, “Bently,” features Chester figuring out who the killer is –only to be brushed off somewhat ignominiously by Matt, Doc, Quint, and Kitty. Not only do they not believe him, they are impatient with his antics, treating him like an idiot. Turns out Chester was right –the old farmer who had died leaving everyone to believe he had robbed and murdered Dave Bently was innocent; the bad-guy rancher who had really committed the crime (due to jealousy) tried to have Chester killed because he was snooping around too much, and accidentally killed his own young wife –who had been trying to warn Chester.

The last time we see Chester he is deeply shaken by the turn of events, and offers to escort the innocent man’s elderly widow to the stage, right after she learned that her husband had not been a killer and that Chester was the only one who had believed in him. In the last scene they are walking silently together to the depot. The more I watch that final scene, the more convinced I am that Chester just got on that stage with her and went someplace he’d be appreciated.

So I think in the final analysis Chester was more competent than the audience –or any of his friends –really realized.

Festus, on the other hand, was portrayed from the very beginning as a handy person to have in a shooting scrape or a brawl, as well as a talented tracker. If anything, he became more of a caricature as time went on –for some reason getting more scruffy and squinty-eyed after his first few seasons (Curtis also changed the character’s voice, making it deeper.) Toward the end of the series, the viewer could pretty much know that when Matt left town someone or other was going to knock Festus and Newly in the head and take over Dodge. Even then, however, Festus was presented as much more competent than Chester would have been –and many episodes were centered on Festus trailing desperadoes alone. And he was a hellion in a rough-and-tumble, apt to bite off that there hangy-down part of your ear.

From day one, Matt’s interactions with Festus demonstrated mutual respect and trust in his abilities, while his treatment of Chester was condescending and protective.

ADVANTAGE: FESTUS

BEING THE MARSHAL’S ASSISTANT

This was Chester’s official designation, and he was much better at the duties it entailed than Festus would or could have been. He always kept the coffee fresh, cleaned the place up (although I recall him grumbling once about Matt making him wash windows, which “ain’t no type of job for a man”), delivered messages, kept the prisoners fed, and so on. Festus, on the other hand, was seriously hampered by the fact he was completely illiterate… and he just wasn’t a tidy person like Chester.

ADVANTAGE: CHESTER

FASHION SENSE

Believe it or not, Festus wins this one… scruffy as he was on a normal day (and when he was prairie-wolfin’ he was even scruffier), Festus had something Chester did not.

A fancy dress shirt.

When the occasion suggests it, Festus foregoes his usual white shirt and goes with a sort of paisley one –he fastens the collar button, and even adds arm garters. The best Chester does is sometimes add a vest to his simple wardrobe.

ADVANTAGE: FESTUS

MUSICAL ABILITY

Chester sings to himself while he putters around the office –his favorite tune, which I don’t recognize, is about moving to Kansas. He also plays guitar pretty well, and blows a mean comb.

But he can’t compete with Festus. In his early episodes, Deputy Haggen occasionally unleashes that mellifluous Ken Curtis singing voice. He also, in those first few seasons he was on the show, frequently sings his own theme song: “Festus, don’t let no pretty woman make a fool of you… build yourself a herd, then you can cull one out if you want to…”

ADVANTAGE: FESTUS

AMBITION

Both Chester and Festus are known for working hard when the occasion warrants, and for working hard to make sure the occasion doesn’t warrant. They’re also both cheap, and always on the lookout for a free drink or meal.

ADVANTAGE: DRAW

COLORFUL RELATIVES

We get to meet Chester’s “wild” brother Magnus, and the uncle who raised Chester after his father died, Wesley Goode (Magnus ran away and went wild when he was ten, never sleeping in a bed again. My guess would be that when Wesley’s brother died, he tried to take in both boys but Magnus didn’t cooperate.)

 In a first season episode, "How to Die for Nothing," however, Chester -after remarking that he was ten years old before he realized boys were supposed to have a ma -says he was raised up by Ben Cherry, a friend of his father's. When asked how long he stayed with him, Chester said "till he pegged out in his sleep one night, then I buried him in the ground and started out on my own." Maybe Uncle Wesley took him in for awhile, then he ended up with Cherry.

Uncle Wesley appears in a fourth season episode that was adapted from one of the radio episodes. Chester’s uncle shows up in town unannounced, to his nephew’s consternation; Chester had been writing home and saying that he was the marshal of Dodge City, and he had an assistant named Mister Dillon. Chester’s friends play along with the charade to help him save face. His uncle is impressed, for he too had a low opinion of his nephew’s competence:

““I had 11 nephews, and Chester was nowhere near the brightest. About number nine. Chester just borders on bein’ ignorant, I’d say… I never thought he’d amount to anything.”

Chester foils a robbery, proving he is not the klutz everyone takes him to be. Well, not completely.

This episode, oddly, keeps the original radio title: “Marshal Proudfoot.”

As discussed earlier, we also met Festus’ uncle (Black Jack) early on. The Haggens just keep coming (“there’s a sight of us around.”) We probably encounter over a dozen, plus we learn of many more via Festus’ stories (he frequently quotes his Grandpa Hawg Haggen.) There were so many, in fact, I’m not going to go into detail here and instead make them the subject of a future installment.

ADVANTAGE: FESTUS

ANNOYING DOC

Both Chester and Festus make a second career out of arguing with Doc Adams, often reducing him to dyspeptic sputtering.

ADVANTAGE: DRAW

FUN FACTOR

One thing that sets Festus apart in his first couple of seasons is his close friendship with the blacksmith, Quint Asper (Burt Reynolds.) It is a very playful relationship, showing us a side of Festus we rarely see otherwise. The episode “Comanches Is Soft” (Festus’ frequent rejoinder to the half-Comanche blacksmith), in which Festus and Quint go on a drunken, carousing adventure, is one of the funniest of the series.

“Mad Dog” is another favorite of mine, in which Festus is mistaken for a deadly gunfighter in another town… and also thinks he is dying of rabies, and decides he’d rather go out shooting (and biting) his enemies.

The funniest Chester episode (and one of the best in the series), by contrast, is “Chesterland”… in which Chester tries to satisfy his (somewhat accidental) fiancée by building a house out on the prairie. His housekeeping/homebuilding efforts are one hilarious disaster after another, and the girl was only after what little money he had anyway. So in the midst of the hilarity, there is still great sadness… and the humor with Chester, almost always, is along the lines of “Poor Chester… he really does try so hard, but he just can’t accomplish anything.” While often funny, that’s no fun.

ADVANTAGE: FESTUS

LOVE LIFE

“Chesterland” is probably the high point of Chester’s love life. He has a few unrequited crushes, gets taken advantage of a lot, and the one time he meets a woman who really does appreciate him –she throws him over and runs off with an outlaw, to keep the outlaw from killing him (“He Learned about Women.”)

Festus at least does have a steady girlfriend for awhile- April, who was introduced in the same episode he was and who appeared several times in the ninth season. There are also a few widder-women that take an interest in Festus, and sometimes vice-versa (Chester had an ill-fated widow adventure as well, and an ill-fated mail order bride.)

ADVANTAGE: FESTUS

That’s MY assessment- of course, I may be biased in favor of Festus, because he is the Gunsmoke sidekick I grew up with. When I talk to folks older than me, they tend to prefer Chester. I think that if they ever do a  TV or big screen remake of Gunsmoke –as they are about to do with The Big Valley and The Rifleman –they should use both Chester AND Festus, with Chester as the “marshal’s assistant” taking care of things at the jail and Festus as the chief deputy. That would be perfect.

What do you think?