I see that Richard Boone, star of the television series Have Gun – Will Travel which ran on the cusp of the nineteen sixties, was born on this day in 1917. I was nine when the series began and fifteen when it ended. My father loved it, and therefore it was on our television every week for the duration.
And, yes, I loved it, too…
I’m not sure this story of an erudite gunfighter had any particular effect on me, other than as part of the ubiquitous American western mythology. And the truth be told I probably was more enamored at the time with the comedic Maverick, which ran just about the same period of time…
Of course the myth writ large did seep into my consciousness, probably just as it did for the majority of boys and girls whose childhood was the nineteen fifties and early sixties.
I suspect the libertarian streak we experience today was in some way informed by these television shows. Cleaned up in our memories, as well. I was a little surprised to read the Wikipedia article on Have Gun and be reminded of the Chinese character “Hey Boy.” I fear my fellow boomer, the former president George W Bush’s quick trigger finger may have, at least in part, been informed by his time in front of the TV and these very same television shows…
Beyond that, hard to say…
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