Tipping his hat to Tombstone
Bob Boze Bell’s art paints tribute to125th anniversary of O.K. Corral
by Chris Moore

CAVE CREEK – “I still consider myself a cartoonist,” says Bob Boze Bell from his office at True West magazine. The walls are adorned with rich, evocative, colorful paintings of Old West scenes and figures that are signed “Boze” in the bottom corner.

True, he used to do the wildly popular comic strip “Honkytonk Sue” in the 1970s. True, he brightened up for years the pages of Arizona Highways with his illustrations. True, he inhabited the airwaves throughout the 1990s on several different radio programs. True, you can see him on Starz Encore Westerns channel everyday pitting History against Hollywood.

But after winding his way down that dusty media trail for quite a spell, he now seems quite at home, truly in western style, as the driving force of his own magazine, True West. Just take a quick look through an issue and you know this is his baby.

He’s not one of those dry academic types. Boze Bell’s love of the Old West, his authentic perspective and his sense of humor really become accessible through his art, which these days is mostly gouache and scratch board, an artistic choice based on a criterion that strikes one, for some reason, as characteristically BozeBellian–the time it takes oils to dry.

“I like gouache because it mimics oils,” he says. “I can’t remember the last time I did an oil. I just don’t have the time for oils.”

But glance around the walls at the brilliant gouache and somehow you don’t feel slighted.

He also writes about the Old West but sees himself essentially as a visual artist. With a wry smile under his moustache, Boze Bell says, “I’ve had to do the writing just to defend myself. I have a great editor who translates everything I write into English–which is a full‑time gig, by the way.”

That “translator,” in the office right next door to Boze Bell’s, is Meghan Saar, the monthly magazine’s editor. Saar cheerily describes her work as, “Fascinating. I learn a lot.”

Reinforcing the educational aspect of True West, Boze Bell too admits, “I learn something new every time, every issue.”

The untold stories are hiding somewhere in history, Boze Bell maintains, and he’s always on the lookout to unearth, and dramatize them in words and pictures. He says he isn’t the only one searching for legends of the Old West.

“I have some crazy friends that make even me look like a piker,” he says.

Accuracy is also a concern for Boze Bell. And the movies often miss the mark. That’s why Boze Bell prepares short daily segments for Starz Encore Western television which let viewers know that not everything they see on the screen is necessarily as it was.

“I’m kind of a Hat Nazi,” Boze Bell says. “I hate bad hats.” Mostly, in the movies, he says, Hollywood’s version of cowboys, gunfighters, and rustlers wear the wrong kind of hats, meaning they don the  contemporary style that didn’t come along until the 1900s and feature swept‑up brims on the sides.

“Cowboys didn’t wear those hats,” he said, adding the type of hats the real cowboys wore were quite large and had a tendency to curl up in front. Look through a collection of Boze Bell’s paintings and you’ll get the idea.

“They might as well be wearing Nikes,” he says. “And horses! In the movies, everyone’s riding quarter horses. Most cowboys and Indians actually rode ponies ... and mules. That’s one thing that bugs me about Westerns, they’re so one dimensional.”

He does, however, have a kind sartorial word about HBO’s profane, Shakespeare‑flavored western series “Deadwood.” Boze Bell’s criticism of the series’ costumes has been, much to creator David Milch’s consternation, less than laudatory.

But there is a silver lining. “Bullock’s got a great hat,” Boze Bell says of actor Tim Oliphant’s character, Deadwood’s sheriff Seth Bullock. “He’s got a great outfit.”

“The Starz Westerns show has been extremely valuable for the magazine,” Boze Bell explains.   “A lot of people watch that station and it’s been a big boon to my life and career. It’s really promoted the magazine, not just locally but worldwide. I get e‑mails from all over the world–Finland, Australia, all over. The world has gotten a lot smaller since the O.K. Corral.”

But the West is always getting bigger, at least in terms of the scope of its representations. Magazines, books, movies, etc.

“The Western genre is extremely adaptable,” Boze Bell says. “That’s its strength. From ‘Billy the Kid vs. Dracula’ to ‘Lonesome Dove’ is a mighty wide space. And that’s befitting the West itself. There’s a lot of space out here for a lot of stories that haven’t been told.”

And that’s one of the impetuses behind his latest book, “Blaze Away! The 25 Gunfights Behind the O.K. Corral: Classic Gunfights–Volume Two.”

The book showcases text and many paintings and drawings by Boze Bell, maps and graphics by Gus Walker, and it features historic photographs from the collection of Robert G. McCubbin.

The new book, published in October 2005, was first presented publicly at the  Cowboy Legacy Gallery in Carefree.

The book, he went on to say, is an attempt to put the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral in perspective by placing it in the context of the other events–stage robberies, smuggling, rustling, more gunfights.  Tombstone at the time was particularly rife with riffraff due to an influx of outlaws to Arizona from Texas and Mexico, he said.

Two of Boze Bell’s previous books, “The Illustrated Life & Times of Wyatt Earp” (1993) and “The Illustrated Life & Times of Doc Holliday” (1994), also dealt extensively with the activities in Tombstone and at the O.K. Corral which, along with another of his favorite subjects–Billy the Kid (“The Illustrated Life & Times of Billy the Kid,” 1992)–make up a large part of his art.

“When I took over the magazine in 1999, the goal was to do the classic gunfights using the best information, the best photos, the best artwork and the best maps. Volume One of ‘Classic Gunfights’ was a compilation of that magazine stuff. For ‘Blaze Away’ (Volume Two) I realized that nobody had looked at everything going on in and around Tombstone at the time. So I said, let’s put the gunfight in the proper sequence of events.”

The October issue of True West (hitting newsstands August 29) will also focus on Tombstone and the O.K. Corral because October 26 of 2006 marks the 125th anniversary of the famous gunfight.

The Bella Union restaurant and live theatre in Tombstone will display 25 of Boze Bell’s original paintings and illustrations in late October. The presentation of his Tombstone work there is part of a wide‑ranging anniversary celebration. He will sign and date copies of “Blaze Away” on the day and at the site of the legendary gunfight from 12‑1 p.m.                             

There shouldn’t be any casualties at the corral this year, but in this day and age, the West doesn’t get any truer than that.

Just ask Bob Boze Bell. He’ll paint you a picture.

True West magazine is published by True West Publishing, Inc., 6702 E. Cave Creek Road, Suite 5, Cave Creek. For information on Bob Boze Bell or the 125th anniversary celebration of the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, call (480) 575‑1881 or (888) 687‑1881, or visit www.twmag.com.

Reach the reporter at cmoore@thedesertadvocate.com.