Louis Kraft talks about what drives his writing and life

Website & blogs © Louis Kraft 2013-2020

Contact Kraft at writerkraft@gmail.com or comment at the end of the blogs


Terrible times beyond belief

First and foremost I need to say a few things that have impacted, and are impacting, my life (and one of them has become a curse on all of us the world over).

  • The COVID-19 pandemic (by now way too many of us know someone who has fallen prey to this heinous virus).
  • We still have two more months of fire season in California, and already 2020 has been the worst season on record, and this includes the worst air quality in LA County in 40 years (at these times wear a mask to protect your lungs).
  • A great friend and one of the most talented people I’ve ever known has suffered a terrible tragedy in his family (it is not for me to share).
  • Olivia de Havilland died (I had thought that she would outlive me; certainly that was my hope but it was not to be).
  • My great bro throughout time, Glen Williams, has died.
  • Not to brag, but this has been a dreadful year for me. Although it has nothing to do with the COVID-19 pandemic, it has cost me 27 weeks of no exercise, no lifting, no yardwork, no walking, … no—you name it.
  • My brain functions at all times, and believe it or not, at this sad time of woe that all of us will remember for the rest of our lives, … I have more freelance writing, related work, and deadlines than ever before (to the point that I’ve had to turn away work).

I’m the luckiest guy you know, … but time is clicking at an alarming speed, which means that I must complete my next, and perhaps last, delivery to the Louis Kraft Collection in New Mexico, as well as have a complete first draft of Errol & Olivia in case my time of walking Mother Earth is shorter than I want. These are major projects for me and I pray to my God every day that I complete them.

A request to review a Ned Wynkoop document by the National Park Service

LK playing Ned Wynkoop in a five-week run of Cheyenne Blood in SoCal in 2009. Folks, this was a highlight in my life. Yep, LK knows a hell of a lot about this extraordinary human being. (photo © Louis Kraft 2009)

Whoa cowboy!!!!! Yeah, the NPS was doing a flyer on ol’ Ned for a few of their National Historic Sites (NHS), such as Fort Larned NHS, Sand Creek Massacre NHS, and the Washita Battlefield NHS. To say that I was honored is an understatement of major proportions.

I treated this as a major project, and it took weeks to complete. The response from the NPS? Zero!!! Not a peep. Ha-ha, you know exactly where my view of the National Park Service went. Yep, right into the trashcan. I need to say, that regardless of what I wrote—and it had to have been hard for NPS management to swallow a review that was less than a thrilling kiss-ass of love for every piece of bullshit that they came up with—but what pissed me off was that the NPS never replied, never said we disagree with everything you wrote. Hell, that would have been acceptable.

Nada! Not anything from the National Park Service. Of course, your pal Kraft couldn’t keep his mouth shut. See my review of the travesty of BS that the NPS would eventually print: National Park Service, Ned Wynkoop, & a bad taste.

LK with Shawn Gillette at the Sand Creek Massacre NHS headquarters in Eads, Co., on 3oct2014. I think that Shawn is an upstanding person, and I’m lucky to know him. Our relationship has nothing to do with the National Park Service and I hope that this remains true as our lives move forward. (photo © Shawn Gillette, Louis Kraft, & Pailin Subanna-Kraft 2014)

In 2014 great Cheyenne wars historian John Monnett and his wonderful wife Linda invited us to visit them in Lafayette, Colorado, and this included them taking Pailin and myself to the Sand Creek Massacre NHS. After walking the grounds (as much as we could, but this wasn’t much), we went to Eads, where the headquarters for the Sand Creek Massacre NHS was located. Here I met Shawn Gillette, chief of interpretation, in person for the first time. He told me that the chiefs of interpretation agreed with my review but upper management ruled the day.

I could agree with this. … But my bad taste for the USA government grows by the day (I need to say that the National Park Service isn’t at the top of my list—the Federal government is, and from all indications this isn’t going to change for the rest of my life).

An LK interview that was to accompany a review of Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway

This was a book that I didn’t want to write, but my good friend and former editor-in-chief at the University of Oklahoma Press refused to accept my “No, I don’t write books about war” refusal. To this date in time—egotism aside—this is not only the best,  but also the most important book that I’ve ever written.

The interview was to accompany a review of Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a LIfeway. I’m wordy, so it appeared in two editions of the paper (August and September 2020), but everything personal, everything that led up to why I write about the American Indian wars, everything that directs what I write and why, along with my next major writing project (which was a major question) was totally cut from the two issues of the newspaper.

Oh, the review of the Sand Creek book was five sentences. Five sentences! It was okay, but why bother? A silent parting of ways. Been here before.

I spent a fair amount of time writing what follows but the paper wasn’t interested in the Sand Creek book. It wanted information on Lt. Charles Gatewood and Geronimo, while totally uninterested in why I spent 10 years to write two books about Gatewood, Geronimo, and the Apaches, and follow them through to publication. Additional questions wanted to know what drove me to write about the Indian wars and racism.

As I stated in my submitted draft of the interview, I retained the copyright to my words and that I intended to use them in a memoir and in my blogs. As two procedures and two operations have knocked my health for a loop this year, not to mention the coronavirus pandemic, a major delivery to the Louis Kraft Collection, an upcoming talk on the Sand Creek Massacre, among other deadlines—and I haven’t even mentioned Errol & Olivia.

What follows are words that will give you an inside peek at who I am and what drives me.

In late spring 2020
I received two requests to do an interview

I stupidly agreed to the requests. The first one is still floating on the wind somewhere on the lone prairie. But this is no longer true, for that person is a human being by the name of Bob Reese, who, if I get lucky, will someday meet in person and spend good time with him. Recently he confirmed that changes in personal and that this slowed the production process; this also included his health. Bob Reese is one of the good guys in this world (hopefully he is again healthy). … As said above the other person purged every word that I shared that was personal and would have given his readers an understanding of who I am and why I write what I write. My opinion of what was printed in the two editions of that publication is unprintable. Will I ever read another word published by that publication? probably not. Will I ever write another piece for that publication? No.

LK with great friend Lt. Col. Paul Fardink, USA, Ret., in the Beverly Hills Hilton dining room on 16Jan2015. He and his wife Cheryl had flown to Los Angeles for a huge military awards ceremony at the hotel. The three of us had a terrific time enjoying each other’s company and discussing Lt. Charles Gatewood’s chances of being awarded a posthumous Medal of Honor. Paul had brought several of my articles and books for me to sign. I brought his terrific article on Gatewood and myself in On Point, which would play a key role in his upcoming presentation (which also included an amazing amount of primary source material). (photo © Paul Fardink & Louis Kraft 2015)

This person used me to comment on his hot topic/a major writing topic from my past that is dead and will never happen—that is, present the Medal of Honor to Lt. Charles Gatewood for the part he played in ending the last Apache war in 1886. Years back I had worked closely with Lt. Colonel Paul Fardink, USA-Ret., to create a major submission to obtain Gatewood this honor. Paul had a major general, and a handful of other generals, supporting the project. They had forewarned us that the answer would be “no,” and it would forever be “no.” Will this person—who wants to be a crusader but is always too busy; hell, he couldn’t even provide the publication dates for the two issues of the paper—ever contact me again? Honestly I don’t think so (his silence has been golden).

Was this wasted time lost by me when I’m in a zone wherein I have no free time?
Yes! and No!

My brother Lee Kraft in fall 1988. I can’t begin to tell you how close we were (whether at war or as buddies). We partied together, we worked together, we played ball together. Like our father, who was always there for both of us, he was for me and me for him. His premature death in March 1990 is still the most devastating day in my life. (photo Louis Kraft 1988)

This paragraph initially shared my views on the above—and certainly of the second interview. Unfortunately it got a little too personal, a little too gunslinger-like with LK walking the Southwest looking to put yet another notch on his Colt.

Hell, I’m a Kraft, and like my brother Lee, we were spittin’ images of our father—that is we always walked our own trail, come hell or high water. … Always.

ALWAYS.

I deleted what was to be the following text also.* Too bad, for it was lively and zinged off the page. …

* I should state that when I delete text that is on point or too personal I usually drop it into a potential blog that serves as a holding tank, as it will never be posted. Sometimes I go digging and discover gems that I had buried.

Maybe I should return to some of my favorite Arizona and New Mexico haunts and strut about and play-act doing what I don’t dare saying in print. Oh yeah, Kraft can still do this. That said, I have allowed my life experiences determine the trail that I would follow through life.

The following isn’t bragging; it’s simply fact. I’ve been knocked cold by my father (who was, and still is, the most important person in my life). I’ve taken my motorcycle over a cliff. I’ve had a knife at my throat (in Austin, Texas). I’ve had guns pointed me (and I’ve never been to war). I’ve survived high-speed crashes in fast cars that defy description and yet I walked away from them unharmed. I’ve had 24 surgeries; that’s right 24, and let me tell that wild cats, rats, and possums that cross my path in the wee hours of morning run for the hills when they see me. Am I the devil?

(I’m smiling) I don’t think so.

At my age, macho is good, for it means that I’m still breathing.

My bro Glen Williams would love the above—hopefully he sees it in heaven.

The Tombstone Epitaph
Interview, Louis Kraft
June 2020

Interview © Louis Kraft 2020. This said The Tombstone Epitaph has full right to publish
all or part of this interview in print and online. Also know that I intend to use portions of the following interview in a memoir and in my blogs and I retain the right to do so.

I signed no contract for my FREE interview,
and the words are mine. I am reprinting them here.

TE: Talk about your new book Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway. What inspired you to tackle the history of the Sand Creek Massacre?

LK: This answer can be short and sweet. I met Chuck Rankin, former editor-in-chief of the University of Oklahoma Press (OU Press) at the beginning of this century. No Chuck, no Sand Creek book. Next question. …

Just joking but not about Chuck. More’s a comin’.

This image is from the 2012 Western Heritage Awards ceremony in Oklahoma City in April 2012.

At that time when we met I was in the process of trying to work out a contract with the University of New Mexico Press for my second book dealing with Lieutenant Charles Gatewood; actually piecing together his incomplete and failed attempt to write a memoir about his experiences with the Apache Indians in the 1880s. I had a terrific contract for the first Gatewood book but this contract was peanuts in comparison. I countered, but the publisher refused, I said goodbye and never looked back. In retrospect this was a very good day for LK. Chuck was interested, but the two OU Press peer reviews were negative and he sent me a short letter saying that Oklahoma would pass. I took what I agreed with from the reviews, incorporated it into my manuscript, and sent a proposal to the University of Nebraska Press. They quickly requested the manuscript, liked it (as did their peer reviewers), and added an advance to my first Gatewood contract.

During this time Chuck and I continued to discuss a book about Ned Wynkoop, a soldier turned U.S. Indian agent due to events that surrounded the Sand Creek Massacre in Colorado Territory in 1864 (he wasn’t present at the massacre). He had migrated to what would become Colorado Territory in 1858 at the beginning of the gold rush, and as many who migrated westward harbored the typical racial hatred of American Indians. Although he didn’t realize it at that time, he was different than most of his comrades. … By fall 1864 he was a major in the First Colorado Volunteer Cavalry and commanded Fort Lyon (southeast Colorado Territory). That spring events led to the Cheyenne war of 1864, and the hatred and violence escalated as the summer moved toward fall. He had already stated that he intended to kill every Indian he came across, but to date (and this included a command he led against the Utes in 1863, and during which he never saw the enemy) he had not fired his revolver at a Cheyenne or Arapaho Indian.

This LK art of Black Kettle dates to 2015. It has appeared on these blogs but has never been published (the reason is simple: I never liked it enough to submit it to a publisher). Maybe I’ll think about repainting and improving it. Time will tell (or not tell). (art © Louis Kraft 2015)

That September 3, he received two letters (to the commanding officer of Fort Lyon and the Cheyenne-Arapaho Indian agent) dictated by Cheyenne Chief Black Kettle that stated that there was a large village (about 2,000 people) of mostly Cheyennes and Arapahos on a tributary of the Smoky Hill River in Kansas. Black Kettle and other chiefs wanted to discuss ending the war while juggling a carrot that they had white prisoners that they would give up if he met with them. His officers viewed it as a suicide mission, but Wynkoop refused to listen to them. A village that large couldn’t remain in one location for any length of time due to their huge horse and mule herds as well as supplying fresh meat, fruit, and vegetables that grew in the area. To send a courier to headquarters in Kansas would take at least a week (most likely longer) and the same amount of time for a return answer. Wynkoop couldn’t wait, and without orders set out for the village with 127 men. …

Much would happen, including facing a large warrior battle line; speaking with angry chiefs; eventually talking seven chiefs into traveling to Denver to meet with John Evans, the territorial governor; and receiving four children. During the council, which took place south of the city at Camp Weld, Evans made it clear that the war would continue. However, when Colonel John Chivington, who commanded the District of Colorado, verbally passed the Indians to Wynkoop to oversee them at Fort Lyon, the major, Indian chiefs, and Rocky Mountain News editor and publisher William Byers thought a tentative peace had been reached until the military command in Kansas decided what action it would take.

By early November Wynkoop was removed from command at Fort Lyon, and replaced by Major Scott Anthony. Before setting out for Kansas, where he anticipated being cashiered out of the military, Wynkoop was present when Anthony told Black Kettle and Arapaho Chief Left Hand, among others to move to Sand Creek, about forty miles northeast of the fort. Anthony also told them that he would inform them of the military’s decision in regards to the war ending or not.

This was my first attempt at creating a portrait of Ned Wynkoop. The pin and ink portrait is framed and is displayed at Tujunga House. It was based upon a woodcut of him in 1867, and has been printed at least once (I need to check, for it may more than once). (art © Louis Kraft 1990)

During Wynkoop’s brief time with the Cheyennes and Arapahos he had realized that they were human beings. When he learned that Chivington and Colorado Volunteers attacked the Sand Creek village and brutally butchered men, women, and children who thought that they had been removed from the war, he was outraged. He considered the massacre heinous, and it changed his life forever. By 1866 he was well on his way to becoming an U.S. Indian agent for the Cheyennes and Arapahos, … and perhaps the most hated white man in Colorado Territory.

I had discovered Wynkoop when looking for an Indian agent on the take for a novel I intended to write; that is defrauding the U.S. government and the Indians he represented to become rich. I never wrote the story, but by 1987 my first article on him had been published (this was my first Indian wars article). Two years later I delivered my first talk on him. By the mid-1990s I was moving forward with a planned biography on him.

Chuck Rankin was definitely interested in my Wynkoop manuscript. There was one problem. Chuck didn’t want was a duel biography like Gatewood & Geronimo; in other words, no Wynkoop & Black Kettle. Actually this was not a problem, for I never considered a joint biography—this book would focus on Wynkoop.

This is a portrait of interpreter/trader John Simpson Smith. It is one of numerous portraits that I’ve done of him (to date none have been printed). This man spoke many languages; this man had numerous wives and none of them were white. Was he a racist? I don’t think so. If you ever read Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway you’ll get to know Mr. Smith. Trust me: he was a combination of good and evil, and more important he was a human being. (art © Louis Kraft 2016)

Over the coming years we often talked about how to handle the massacre in the book. As Ned Wynkoop and the Lonely Road from Sand Creek went into production (OU Press published it in 2011), Chuck returned to that tragic November when men, women, and children were murdered and savagely hacked to pieces. This led to us discussing me writing a book about the massacre. At first my reply was “no” for the simple reason that I consider myself a biographer as opposed to a historian (even though history has a large presence in all my nonfiction and fiction). At that time I still wrote for software companies—meaning that travel and research were never a concern—and we talked in person, on the phone, and with email. We both listened and between us we discussed a book that would be acceptable to both of us. The massacre was a key piece in the proposal, and we both agreed that I would deal with it similar to how I did in the Wynkoop book. But people, their words, and actions would drive the story to conclusion. I wanted to write the book through the eyes of the Southern Cheyennes and Arapahos, whites who married into the tribes, their offspring, whites who coveted Indian land to the east of the Rocky Mountains, and whites who dared to speak out against the Sand Creek Massacre. Once we were in agreement on how I would approach the storyline everything else fell into place. …

That is until I began to write the book. It didn’t take long for me to realize that I needed more research, a lot more research. As always, I allowed my research to drive the flow of the manuscript, and the more I learned and understood, the deeper I had to dig. There were surprises—big surprises. People that I thought would have leading parts became supporting players and people I thought would have smaller roles became the focus. Two huge examples here are Arapaho Chief Little Raven (who I really didn’t know that much about) became the Indian lead, along with Black Kettle, whom I always knew would have a large role. But digging into Black Kettle also presented a lot of information about him that I never knew existed.

Arapaho Chief Little Raven examines journalist Albert Deane Richardson’s revolver in this 1859 woodcut. New York Tribune publisher Horace Greeley relaxes in the background (woodcut in the Louis Kraft Collection)

For me it is the process of research, writing, more research, more writing, rewriting, research, writing, editing, and more research, until the manuscript begins to take shape. Then comes the hard part, and that is trying to make all the facts, events, and people flow together in hopefully a readable manner. It doesn’t stop there, for I play a large role in the production process.

For the record if I ever become homeless and can have only one of my books, it would be Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway. Yeah, and this was a book that I initially didn’t want to write.

TE: What challenges did you face while researching American Indian history?

LK: This is a wide open question, but my answer is simple: how to locate information that gives life to (in my case) the Cheyennes, Arapahos, Apaches, and, if I live long enough, the Navajos’ side of their history and culture. A good portion of the life and times of these people has been told by the white man, and much of it has been biased, but not all of it. Often raiding warrior numbers have been inflated, as has been white casualties. And this goes the other way also, and the Sand Creek Massacre is a good example of this. I’m going to stick with my current book for this question.

Colonel John Chivington wrote two official reports of his November 29, 1864, attack on the Cheyenne village circles and the Arapaho village, which may have had two camp circles on Sand Creek in southeastern Colorado Territory. On the day of the massacre Chivington reported that he killed between 500 and 600 Indians, including Black Kettle. Sand Creek Massacre NHS ranger, and the most knowledgeable person on what happened on those two days, Jeff Campbell’s calculations places the death count at 230 with 75 percent of the dead being non-combatants. This means that approximately 67 of the dead were chiefs and warriors. By the way, Black Kettle wasn’t even wounded.

Not all the soldiers present took part in the carnage, and some refused to fire their weapons. Two of them were Wynkoop’s subordinates, Captain Silas Soule and Lieutenant Joseph Cramer. Both dared to speak out against the massacre during the investigations, and Soule was later murdered on the streets of Denver. Wynkoop, who was exonerated in late December 1864 might have shared the same fate, but was again in command of Fort Lyon. Even so he was called “Black Kettle’s puppet.”

Honestly, the hardest part was trying to remain in the point-of-view (POV, a film term) of the person I was currently writing about. We already know all the negative prose directed at Black Kettle regardless of his efforts to maintain peace. There were many leading and supporting players in the Sand Creek story, including Black Kettle, Cheyenne chief and Keeper of the Sacred Arrows Stone Forehead; Dog Men (“Dog Soldiers” is a white-man term) Tall Bull and Bull Bear; Arapaho chiefs Little Raven, Left Hand, Neva; trader William Bent, and his mixed-blood Cheyenne sons George Bent, Charley Bent; mixed-blood Cheyennes Edmund Guerrier and Jack Smith, and his father, trader John S. Smith; and Byers, Evans, Chivington, Soule, and Wynkoop to name a few. The goal has always been to present them with their words, their actions, and views of them by their contemporaries.

Regardless of my views—and those of you who read my writing know what they are for I mostly focus on people who try to end war or keep the peace. These are people who reach across racial boundaries to do this. Some of them understand this and become friends, while others do what they think is right regardless of their racial feelings. Bottom line: these are the people I write about. That said, I view the Los Angeles mass murderer Charles Manson as a heinous villain; ditto Adolph Hitler. … None of the people that I write about in the Indian wars do I consider a heinous villain. I believe that what they did when they did it they thought that they were doing what was right. If I do my job correctly, you will be able to make your own decision about them. That is my goal.

TE: What is the legacy of the Sand Creek Massacre today?

LK: To begin with there is still a large divide between white-Indian relations. And certainly a lot of what I’ve watched move forward with racial equality since the 1960s, although slow I thought that it was steady. Over the last three and a half years we have a national government that fosters racial hatred, and it’s almost as if the last 60 years of progress never happened.

LK speaking about Ned Wynkoop’s efforts to save the joint Cheyenne-Dog Man-Lakota Pawnee Fork village in Kansas from destruction in April 1867 on the preserved land where Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock refused to listen, destroyed the village, and began the 1867 Cheyenne war (September 2012).

A truthful reporting of what happened on that bloody ground on November 29 and 30, 1864, is shocking. It affects my psyche and brings tears to my eyes every time I think about the details. Most of us are lucky to have loved ones, children, parents, friends. The words that describe what happened on that bloody ground are horrifying. Do you get the gist of what I’m talking about?

I have a talk coming up with the University of New Mexico on the afternoon of October 21 titled “An attempt to kill every Cheyenne man, woman, and child: The Sand Creek Massacre, Colorado (November 29, 1864).”* I thought that the novel coronavirus had killed this talk, but luckily Tomas Jaehn (Director, Special Collections/CSWR University of New Mexico Libraries) who hosts monthly talks at UNM saved the day when he decided to have them continue live via Zoom. I don’t want to share much about the talk other than to say that I intend to focus on the scramble from within the various Cheyenne village circles as people attempt to survive sexual butchery. A number of Cheyenne mixed-bloods were in the village. Over the years many of them have gotten a bad rap, as traitors to the white race, and worse, little more than renegades and pure evil. All I’ll say here is that they saw what happened. Some of them grew up walking between the two races and indeed attended school in Missouri. This dark time would remain with them for the remainder of their lives. To this point in time, they had moved back and forth between the races. Not any longer (although Edmund Guerrier did well working with the white man, and he was present) for young men like George and Charley Bent were horribly affected by what they saw and from that time forward they considered themselves Cheyennes.

* LK: This wasn’t in the interview: If you would like to see the talk, which will be live on October 21, you need to send Tomas an email with your name and email address (tjaehn@unm.edu). He will add you to the attendee list, and the Zoom information will be emailed to you two days before the talk. Signing in will be between 4:00 and 4:30 pm Pacific time/5:00 and 5:30 pm Mountain time, with the talk beginning at 4:30/5:30, and so on depending upon your time zone.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (art Louis Kraft 2016)

Racism has been different during my lifetime than how it was in the 1860s. The twentieth century saw lots of theft, incarceration, brutality, rape, and murder—so much so that I’m not going to even attempt to talk about it here. I don’t want to go into the American Indian Movement (AIM) in the 1960s, 1970s, and beyond, other than to say that I do not consider their continued fight to protect what was theirs while fighting racism as criminal activity. What was in place when I was young has never ended. Hopefully what is happening on the streets of America today can somehow lead the USA to become one country where every man, woman, and child are treated the same, and that is as human beings. When I was young, I thought that I’d live to see that day. As the days grow shorter, I’m doubtful. But hope burns eternally.

The legacy of the Sand Creek Massacre is present today, and it will most likely never end, never fade away. What happened on those two days of horror will live forever in infamy. Certainly for every Cheyenne, Arapaho, as well as many other American Indians living today. It is burned in their souls. It is also front-and-center in the lives of a lot of people I know, people I call friends (and some of them are Cheyennes), and they damn it.

This is how it should be, for November 29-30, 1864, were two days that can never be forgotten. This said, we cannot and should never censor history. If we do, this plague on humanity will continue to tear us apart until we figure out how to destroy life on earth as we know it. History must be told from all sides—from all sides. We’re all people with our views. Just because you disagree with me, or I with you, doesn’t make either of us evil. This is our world, and regardless of what we look like we’re all human beings.

What is the legacy of the Sand Creek Massacre? Don’t hate me, for I believe that the racial hatred of the 1860s is alive and thriving in the year 2020. It is on us to end it.

TE: Your career as a historian and writer has been hallmarked by books dealing with the intersection of the U.S. military and the American Indian. What prompted this interest in you early on?

Olympian and champion duelist, actor, stunt man, sword choreographer, and fencing instructor Ralph Faulkner in the late 1950s, and just a few years before he coached me at Falcon Studios on Hollywood Blvd.

LK: I like this question, but it is a question that you shouldn’t ask me for you are going to get a mouthful (please delete this sentence, for it was only for you).

I think that I discovered Errol Flynn and his films while in the fourth grade. Two Warner Bros. films stood out: The Sea Hawk (1940) and They Died with Their Boots On (1941). Many people think that The Sea Hawk was based on Rafael Sabatini’s classic novel. No. Warners Bros. had the rights to his book, but it wasn’t about an Elizabethan pirate during the time leading up to the Spanish Armada and the invasion of England in 1588. Instead it was about an English nobleman sold into slavery in North Africa, who later became an infamous Tunisian pirate who raided British ships. I highly recommend Flynn’s The Sea Hawk.

This film led to me studying fencing with the U.S. Olympian Ralph Faulkner, who turned actor, stunt double with swords on film, and eventually taught fencing in Hollywood, California. While in junior high school I studied under him, and in the only competition at his studio that I took part in I placed third in foil (my competition were all male adults). In college I took fencing in my first semester, was good enough with the foil that the coach asked me to join the team. I consented, providing I could learn and fight with a sabre, and only a sabre. Reason: almost all the great duels on film are shot with a combination of thrusting and slicing. She agreed. … This Flynn performance is important for it led to me studying acting in junior high school, high school, and college. Eventually I learned “swashbuckling” or stage combat, and would choreograph duels and swordfight on stage. Great times.

CD cover of the film score.

Now to They Died with Their Boots On, and on looking back, it, although not at first, has had a much greater impact on my life. Errol Flynn played George Armstrong Custer and Olivia de Havilland played his wife Elizabeth Bacon Custer (“Libbie” is the correct spelling of her nickname). I have written at least four articles about this film (including a cover story for American History (February 2008), and have spoken about it five times in four states (Missouri, Montana, Texas, and California). Mr. Custer and the American Indian wars (as depicted in this film) grabbed my interest and refused to let go. Back in those days long gone there were many bookstores in Hollywood, California, and one featured nonfiction western history books. I bought a lot of Custer books, read them, enjoyed them, but then the anti-hero worship again struck (at least in Southern California) in the 1960s. Custer was one of the people hardest hit, and he became a caricature that stood for racism and butchery of American Indians. By the end of the decade I boxed up all my Custer books. Luckily I exiled them to a closet and didn’t throw them away. In the late 1970s I visited Arizona (over the years I would spend between six and eight months of my life in Scottsdale, Tucson, and elsewhere hanging out, doing research in archives and on the road). On this trip I discovered Aaron and Ruth Cohen’s Guidon Books in Old Scottsdale, and immediately fell in love with their store. It was the beginning of a wonderful relationship with them. During that trip I visited their shop at least three times. They had a bookshelf that was perhaps seven or eight feet high that featured Custer books. I bought some, and before heading home I bought more. I read them all, and then rescued my exiled books and reread them. I was hooked and knew where my future headed.

Be patient, for everything that I do (or now more important to my writing) is interlinked. Everything.

In summer 1976 I played the lead in two plays in Lubbock, Texas.

Before moving forward here, let me say that I grew up with parents who had an open door to anyone, regardless of race, color, or religion. I had marched for Martin Luther King Jr., and in 1970 I joined VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America). This was like the Peace Corps but in the continental United States. I had hoped to work with American Indians (the other two choices were with Blacks and Chicanos, as they were called during my tenure). The training was in Austin, Texas (we housed in the dormitory where a sniper way back shot and killed people on the University of Texas; women on one floor, men on another). At that time they rolled up the sidewalks at 10:00 pm. Before that time we loaded up with beer and wine before returning to the dorm. One night in one of the dorm rooms I said something to a married couple that I liked. It didn’t bother them, but it did a Chicano leader who would soon pick volunteers to work with his people.

LK rehearsing Eat Your Heart Out, a play about an actor who is forced to wait on tables while trying to survive in Hollywood. The week before it opened we rehearsed every day until about two hours before the current play, What Did We Do Wrong (a generation gap comedy that led to a father and son (me) swapping places), was performed (we had seven performances each week). This was during summer 1976 in Lubbock. (photo Louis Kraft 1976)

Suddenly I had an arm around me, and a knife at my throat. It was about 2:00 am and there were between 15 and 20 people in the room. I told my attacker (and I knew his name, but not now) that if he killed me he would destroy his cause. He laughed and called me a number of choice names. I continued, and asked him if he intended to kill everyone else in the room, that is to eliminate all the witnesses. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but the words worked and he released me. Breakfast began at six, and to my shock I was a hero. Bleep no! I was one scared person who was thrilled to see the sun come up. When the time came I was quickly chosen to work and live with Blacks in Oklahoma City.

Back to Lubbock … During our first week we stayed in a motel (the director and three leading actors were from LA). My roommate was a Black actor named Jim Reynolds. We hit it off immediately. However, our first visit to the motel’s restaurant let me know what was coming. The waitress gave me a menu and a cup of coffee. When she returned, I said: “Where’s his coffee and menu?” She gave me a dirty look but did as requested. During my three months there I saw a lot that turned my stomach upside down (some good too). When I returned to Los Angeles I wrote a screenplay about my experience. The agent I submitted it to, said, “This is terrible, but let’s talk.” We did, and he became my agent for the next seven years. We came close to selling and optioning screenplays, but never did. Often I dealt with race relations. My favorite was called Wonderboat, which dealt with a U-Boat commander during WWII, the downfall of Nazi Germany, and his Jewish girlfriend. A producer wanted to produce it, but only if I moved the story to WWI and removed the Jewish connection. I refused.

This image is of Boston Red Sox 1st baseman Bill Buckner just before he hit his first home run of 1985 on April 4 at Fenway Park. If my memory is good, this was an image that I used in one of my articles about him. (photo © Louis Kraft 1985)

In 1984 I decided that I needed to make money with my writing. I quit writing screenplays and began selling magazine articles. Since I played competition softball year round, knew baseball, and spent time with Brooklyn and Los Angeles Dodgers great Duke Snider (and even pitched him on writing his biography with him; unfortunately he had already signed a contract to coauthor what would be published as The Duke of Flatbush, 1988). I had a number of articles on the Duke, as well as my favorite baseball player of all time—Bill Buckner. Most of what he accomplished during his career he did on one leg, and my articles about him were all published while he was still playing.

The baseball writing was just to get my foot in the published writing door. I did an about-face and began writing about the American Indian wars. A feature on George Armstrong Custer would be my second published article in this category.

This opened a floodgate that would soon blossom to talks, a novel, and finally to nonfiction: Custer and the Cheyenne: George Armstrong Custer’s Winter Campaign on the Southern Plains (Upton and Sons, Publishers, 1995; and God bless Dick and Frankie Upton, for without them my nonfiction book future would have never been). The focus of this book dealt with Custer’s efforts to roundup the Southern Cheyennes and Arapahos without further bloodshed after his November 27, 1868, surprise attack on Cheyenne Chief Black Kettle’s Washita village in Indian Territory (almost four years to the day had passed since Sand Creek, but this time the chief and his wife didn’t survive the attack). Custer had two armies behind him and they craved blood. Custer pulled off his task with no additional deaths.

The above is all key to who I am as a writer today. I’m lucky for I’ve been in control of my writing path every step of the way.

TE: What about Geronimo? What kind of a man was he?
LK: I think that this question should move above the Gatewood question, and have moved it upward. The reason is a film, Geronimo: An American Legend, for without this film there would have never been two Gatewood/Apache books. Hope that you agree.

LK: I know film intimately, and study it all the time. The reason is simple: I can’t begin to tell you how much it helps me as a writer—plot development, character, dialogue, and transitions from one plot point to the next. Yes! This is totally valid for a nonfiction writer.

Left: A German lobby card of Geronimo: An American Legend with Wes Studi portraying the Bedonkohe Chiricahua Apache mystic and war leader. If I never saw this film I never would have written a word about Geronimo, Lt. Charles Gatewood, or the Apache Indians. (entire lobby card set in the Louis Kraft personal collection)

In regards to Geronimo, I think that we have to start with a film about him: Geronimo: An American Legend (Columbia, 1993), with Wes Studi playing him. I saw the film twice when it opened in Los Angeles in December 1993. I loved the grandeur, scope, and some of the character development, but hated the lack of focus. That title states that it is about Geronimo but there are too many other characters that have major focus, and shouldn’t. If there was to be a second lead it would be Lieutenant Charles Gatewood, and he had plenty of focus in this film. I was good with that, but not the large focus on scout Al Sieber and General George Crook. Also, there were too many other players that shouldn’t have been in the film. Read that much of this film was total fiction (perhaps even more than Flynn’s They Died with Their Boots On). Oh yeah, fiction dominates this film, although I didn’t know this in 1993. Actually I knew nothing about Geronimo or Gatewood at that time. Zero! Two years later in April 1995 I visited Aaron and Ruth Cohen at Guidon Books to sign Custer and the Cheyenne. Our talk turned to film and how it impacts book sales. Tombstone (1993) with Kurt Russell and Val Kilmer had been a major hit at the box office and increased Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday sales while Geronimo: An American Legend failed at the box office and had no impact on Geronimo sales. During the course of our conversation Ruth told me about the Charles Gatewood Collection at the Arizona Historical Society in Tucson. The following month I took a week off (nine days), visited the collection, and was blown away. In June I took two weeks off (16 days). At that time Gatewood put Wynkoop on hold and became my next nonfiction project. Two years later it became a joint biography about two men on collision course—Gatewood & Geronimo. I can never begin to tell you what this book has meant to my life and career.

Before moving forward, I want to say that Wes Studi’s portrayal of Geronimo was magnificent, as have been some of his other filmed performances. He is great actor, and his honorary Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences Lifetime Achievement award this year was long overdue. I luckily met him shortly after Dances with Wolves (1990) was released in an American Indian gift shop in Tarzana (a suburb in Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley) in 1990. He was excited and I enjoyed our half hour or so of time together. Alas, I’ve never seen him since.

LK talking about Gatewood finding Geronimo in Mexico and talking him, Naiche, and the remnants of their people into returning to the United States and surrendering at the Festival of the West in Scottsdale, Ariz., on 18mar2004. (art © Louis Kraft 2013)

Every time I have written or spoken about Geronimo I have tried to be in his viewpoint. Trust me, for this hasn’t been hard to do. Beginning in 1851 when he lost his first wife and family in a raid in Río de Janos in Mexico until his final surrender in fall 1886 he would lose more wives, children, family members, friends, and tribal members to death or abduction. His outrage was instantaneous and totally justified. There were major cultural and political ideologies at stake during the Chiricahua Apaches’ long fight with Mexico and the United States to keep their land, their culture, their lifeway, their language, their religion, their children, and their freedom. Geronimo was a mystic and war leader, and more—for he was a survivor.

LK portrait of Geronimo. (art © Louis Kraft 2015)

What happened to him and his loved ones over the course of his lifetime was unbelievable. Often he, the Bedonkohe (his band of the Chiricahua Apaches) as well as all the other bands of Chiricahuas have been branded as aggressive outlaws who raided, raped, stole, and killed at random on both sides of the American-Mexican border. There are some good historians who made it clear that the Chiricahuas considered the land that they claimed was theirs. They had nothing to do with the Americans’ land grab from Mexico, but suddenly their land wasn’t their land in the north (and ditto in the south). They didn’t sign any treaties giving away their land. It was still their land, and Geronimo, Naiche, and those who dared to fight for their freedom and lifeway became murderers, robbers, and worse. What about all the murder, rape, abduction, and constant fear of attack that they had to deal with, live with, during their lives? They were in the way of American progress, and what the hell! They had no rights! I’ve often seen Geronimo listed as a chief. He was never a chief. I’ve also seen him listed as little more than a hellion who never came close to becoming a leader, for all he cared about was himself and his immediate situation. Read the facts about his life, and you’ll quickly see what he had to deal with. He reacted with hate, anger, and vengeance. How would I react in the same situation? How would you react? How are many people in the United States today reacting?

This question is about Geronimo, but I’m sorry, for it is also about me, you, and everyone else in our homeland today. If this generates hate and anger at me, that’s life. I’ve been there before, and I deal with it more often than I want in my life. Way too many times I’ve been called a racist and traitor to my own kind and my homeland. What a bleeping joke!

Geronimo was a patriot, and he had the guts to fight back against what he considered wrong. He lived during a time of violence when his lifeway was coming to an end for all time. We’ve all suffered tragedy during our lifetimes, some of us more than others, but when looking at Geronimo’s life it was an ongoing hell without end. Regardless of what you think about him, he was a very intelligent man. He knew how to fight, when to fight, and when to run. Moreover, he had no intention of giving up the fight for his freedom until that fatal day in September 1886 when he, Naiche, and the remnants of their followers discussed surrendering with Lieutenant Charles Gatewood and returning to the United States to become prisoners of war. As Gatewood had told Naiche and him, surrender, for if not all of you will die.

Geronimo, Naiche, and their followers (less than 40 men, women, and children) surrendered. They would be lied to, but not by Gatewood. For the rest of Geronimo’s life he was a prisoner of war. Still he learned how to survive in the white man’s world of incarceration. Actually he became a celebrity, and realized that if he could sign his name he could earn money. He extended his marketability and began signing photographs of himself (as well as maps). He had not only learned how to play the white man’s game, he excelled at it. Unfortunately General Nelson Miles’s promise that he and those who surrendered with him 1886 would only be exiled to Florida for two years was a lie. When he died in 1909 he was still a prisoner of war.

I have often been asked if I could pick one American Indian who would you select? I don’t have one, I have two: Geronimo and Black Kettle.

TE: Let’s talk about Lt. Charles Gatewood who was the subject of two of your earlier books. Who was he and why do people today not remember his contributions to the taming of the west?

Gatewood (Jason Patric) reaches the top of the mountain at the bend of Río Bapispe in Sonora, Mexico, to meet Geronimo in Geronimo: An American Legend (another German lobby card). A bunch of problems here, including everyone that accompanied Gatewood into Mexico weren’t in the film, Naiche wasn’t in it, and the meeting took place near a bend in the river where there was trees, shade, and water. (Louis Kraft personal collection)

LK: First Lieutenant Charles Gatewood (Sixth U.S. Cavalry) convinced Naiche (the last hereditary Chiricahua chief), Geronimo, and the remnants of their people still with them in Mexico to return to the United States and surrender in fall 1886. He was known as a (General George) “Crook man” as he had served under him, but they had a huge falling out in 1884. At that time Gatewood, who had been a commander of Apache scouts, was in charge of the White Mountain Indian Reservation, headquartered at Fort Apache, Arizona Territory. That year Arizona Territorial Judge Francis M. Zuck defrauded Gatewood’s wards (the White Mountain Apaches), and the lieutenant arrested him. The judge was outraged. Crook agreed with Zuck, and ordered Gatewood to drop the charges. Gatewood refused. When the trial began, the presiding judge dismissed the case on a technicality: Zuck was a judge and should be in his own district presiding over his court. Zuck immediately arrested Gatewood for felonious false arrest. Gatewood appealed to Crook, who turned his back on him. When Gatewood’s trial began, the presiding judge tossed out the case, as the arrest of Zuck had taken place on an Indian reservation and U.S. courts had no jurisdiction on Indian land. For all intensive purposes this destroyed what had been a good working relationship between Gatewood and Crook.

In March 1886 Geronimo and those with him appeared at Cañon de los Embudos, Sonora, to speak with Crook (Gatewood wasn’t present). On the 25th Geronimo told the general why he left the reservation in 1885 (he thought that he would be murdered), of wanting peace, while unhappy with newspapers stating that he should be hanged. He wanted his actions deleted. While he spoke Crook refused to look at him; this angered Geronimo. When Crook did speak, he called Geronimo a liar.

LK tracking Gatewood and Geronimo in Arizona and New Mexico (23jul1996). My daughter Marissa took this image. I can’t begin to count all the trips that we have made together over the years. Good times. (photo Louis & Marissa Kraft 1996)

The following morning Geronimo told Crook that he, Naiche, and the others wanted to return to the White Mountains as they had in 1883. Crook refused; they had to spend two years in Florida. After agreeing to surrender and return to the States, and at a camp while traveling northward, Geronimo, Naiche, and some of their followers feared being killed. In the wee hours they vanished into the night.

Crook had failed and was soon gone and Miles now commanded the mop-up operation of the Chiricahua Apaches that had refused to surrender. Many troops patrolled the U.S.-Mexico border, while others from the Fourth U.S. Cavalry were in Mexico hunting the warring Indians (less than 40 men, women, and children) with one goal—to kill them. Many of these officers would win Medals of Honor for their actions. Not Gatewood, who was ill when Miles summoned him to his headquarters in July 1886 and ordered him to find Geronimo in Mexico and get him to surrender.

Gatewood wasn’t part of Miles’s campaign of capturing and destroying the warring Apaches, but the first lieutenant would pull off an impossible task while the Fourth Cavalry continued to hunt the Apaches. After talking Geronimo and Naiche into returning to the USA and ending the current Apache war, he did everything possible to get them back to the United States. This was not an easy task as both the Mexican authorities and the U.S. troops wanted them dead. This included convincing Geronimo to meet with Jesus Aguirre, the prefect who commanded the Sonoran district of Arispe (headquartered at Fronteras, Mexico), and defusing an attempt by two officers in the Fourth U.S. Cavalry (Surgeon Leonard Wood and First Lieutenant Abiel Smith) that plotted to kill Geronimo. For more on this see Gatewood & Geronimo (University of New Mexico Press, 2000) and Lt. Charles Gatewood & His Apache Wars Memoir (University of Nebraska Press, 2005). Gatewood was a first lieutenant in 1886; he was still a first lieutenant when he died in 1896, while many of Miles’s officers (captains and lieutenants) in Mexico that summer and fall of 1886 were colonels and generals when they retired or died. Miles totally wrote Gatewood out of the last Apache war. To quickly get an idea of Gatewood’s contribution to what happened in Mexico in late summer-early fall 1886 see a talk that I gave at an Order of the Indian Wars Geronimo symposium in Tucson on September 26, 2013: “Gatewood’s Assignment: Geronimo” (on YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3AaI2l8J6I).

TE: What is next for Louis Kraft?

(magazine in Louis Kraft personal collection)

LK: My next nonfiction book is Errol & Olivia, which deals with the life and times of actors Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland during their time at Warner Bros. in the 1930s and 1940s. Between 1935 and 1941 they made eight films together, and their onscreen chemistry was real and vibrant. Three of their films were westerns: Dodge City (1939), Santa Fe Trail (1940), and They Died with Their Boots On. (By the way, I talked about Flynn, de Havilland, and the Santa Fe Trail in Scottsdale, Arizona, in 2005. Afterward I realized how important this talk was to my upcoming manuscript, and have never again shared this information. Luckily the talk wasn’t filmed.) Surprisingly Errol and Olivia seldom had any personal contact except on their film sets. There were many reasons for this, and much of what has been printed about their relationship is false. Shockingly some of the untruths have been reprinted so often that they are no longer cited and worse, accepted as fact.

As stated above I discovered Errol Flynn while in elementary school, and he has remained with me all these years. Luckily in Los Angeles Flynn’s films still play in movie theaters (although not in 2020 due to the theaters being shut down). Without realizing what I was doing I began researching Flynn at an early age. At first just for myself, but in the early 1990s I began thinking about writing a book about him. This led to the articles and talks.

Art based upon a photo of Olivia de Havilland and LK at her Paris, France, home in July 2009. It is in the Louis Kraft Collection. (art © Louis Kraft 2013)

In 1995 professor, historian, and friend Eric Niderost knew of my Flynn project and shared Olivia’s address in Paris, France. I wrote her once, twice, and perhaps three times with no response to questions about Flynn. This obviously wasn’t working, so I turned on my charm and began sending her Christmas and birthday cards, gifts (mostly my books and articles), and another letter dealing with an article that would soon be printed that dealt with They Died with Their Boots On, which as it turned out would be the last film they made together although neither knew this at that time. She did reply to this letter, but too late for that article. … Everything changed for the better when I sent her a hardbound copy of Gatewood & Geronimo in 2000. She liked the book and my approach to the Flynn manuscript, and answered quite a number of questions I had sent her in 1999. This opened a floodgate that led to her inviting me to visit her at her Paris home to interview her (first in 2004 and again in 2009), and to her big 2006 shindig at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences in Beverly Hills, California, when the Academy honored her and her film career. It has included roughly twenty-plus years of correspondence, and this influenced me on how I would move forward.

I believe that it was sometime in 2002 that my Flynn book became a story of two people over the course of roughly 15 years—that is Errol & Olivia. Over the last 25 years I have accumulated a massive amount of primary source material. Los Angeles is a goldmine for those who write about the Golden Age of the Cinema, and for me the center-point is the USC Warner Bros. Archives. For the record, I’m approaching this book just as I have with all my nonfiction Indian wars books.

Another heart surgery

What follows could be a book, and I have been struggling to cut it to pieces. I think it is best to lead with a sentence or two, maybe a short paragraph of 2016-2017, and then focus on the most recent.

As soon as Carlos Castillo, who is a key part of Pailin’s and my small family  in the USA, got me home from Providence Saint Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, Ca., Pailin helped me get out of my clothes so that she could take this photo (which has been cropped). Although you can’t see it in this image there were three locations on my left arm and one on my right that were set up to handle multiple needles and drains. Also there were also a number of patches that the hospital didn’t bother to remove. … In 2017 Pailin had taken a similar photo. It, also, was cropped, but only as I didn’t want to shock you, for in that photo I was au naturel. For the record there will never be a nude photo on these blogs. I’m not a prude, but they simply don’t belong here. (photo © Pailin Kraft & Louis Kraft 2020)

I have had some health problems (an understatement), but I’m alive. I should have died in 2003, 2006, 2017, and this year. … I really don’t want to talk about the past now, but I also don’t want to leave you hanging. Long story very short. I’ve had two procedures and two operations this year. When I awoke from the first operation in March, my heart surgeon and a technician from Boston Scientific, the company that manufactured the pacemaker that saved my life in 2017, were monitoring my heart and pacemaker. My surgeon confirmed information that I already knew, mainly that a lead had separated from the lower right ventricle of my heart. Originally the pacemaker was supposed to last 13½ years. By fall of 2019 the pacemaker was down to 4½ years of life. My heart surgeon told me that this was no longer so, for the pacemaker now moved toward the end of life. There was a good chance that it wouldn’t make it until the end of the year. He also told me that the loose lead had punctured my heart, and that the pacemaker no longer functioned properly. He told me that I needed to replace the pacemaker when I had healed from the March surgery (that is, in mid-June). One problem, the coronavirus made elective surgeries no longer possible in Los Angeles. All my heart appointments in March, April, May, and June were canceled. This changed in mid-June. My pacemaker is monitored whenever I’m home 24/7 by a Boston Scientific Latitude device that sits next to my computer. What was happening during the March surgery was now constant and my heart rate was rarely above 40. When I met my heart surgeon on June 23 he told me I needed the surgery ASAP, but that he couldn’t perform this operation. He recommended the best surgeon for the task in LA. I met with him a little over a week later, and we discussed my X-rays on two computers, he informed me of all that could happen (negative and positive), and that he wouldn’t know how to proceed until he cut me open on the day of the surgery. He then asked if I wanted to proceed. “Yes, I want your next available time.” The surgery was on July 10, and there were problems but I didn’t learn about them until August 4 when we met for a post-OP examination and he gave me the official surgical report. This said, the surgery was successful. I again have a new life.

To repeat part of the interview: When wild cats, possums, or rats see me at night, it is as I am the Devil staring at them and they run like hell. We have mountain lions (my favorite animal) and coyotes pass by at times. If I show my face I hope that they don’t run but allow me to talk to them.

They say a photo is worth a thousand words

The year of 2020 has been one of the COVID-19 pandemic; massive unemployment and the drastic loss of savings; outrage over systemic racial prejudice that is fueled by white supremacists; debunked and yet widespread conspiracy theories; and the continuation of horrific climate change. The United States as I and perhaps you once thought we knew it is coming to an end. Granted much of what is happening today is simply a continuation of what has been ongoing for a long time. A good part of what is now is on us, and I’m talking about human beings; that is I’m talking about me, you, and everyone else on earth. We’re all people regardless of our race, color, religion, or if we are rich or poor. We need to work together and not for our specific agendas. Our leaders must work to bring all of the countries together and not work at destroying relationships and creating enemies. Our local leaders must work to eliminate the huge and growing gap between the haves and the have-nots; they must work at eliminating homelessness and not just talking about it and raising taxes; they must stamp out the ongoing violence that is most often directed African Americans and people of Hispanic decent. Supposedly our country is the land of the free. Well I’ve got to tell you that today this is little more than a bad joke, for it is the land of the rich, and more specifically it is the land of the white rich and to hell with everyone else.

This photo of No. Hollywood, Calif., was taken from Burbank, the city that borders it from the east-southeast by Kent Nishimura of the Los Angeles Times on 4jul2020 (and printed in the California Section of The Times on the 6th, pB5). For those of you who aren’t aware of it, fireworks are totally illegal in Los Angeles County, and can only shot off at events in parks, country clubs, or at large locations such as Universal Studios Hollywood or Dodger Stadium, and then only with permits. On this July 4th there were no fireworks at parks, clubs, Dodger Stadium, and so on because of the ongoing fire season that had been raising havoc since May. Every explosion you see in this image was totally illegal. The Times reported on July 6 that “L.A. firefighters responded to thousands of emergency calls.” I live in No. Hollywood and the joke here has always been that the LAPD takes the evening off (The Times also reported that supposedly over 300 police officers called in sick that day/night). I live about a mile and a quarter from the closest fire station in No. Hollywood and about a mile and a half from the closest police station. Every year Pailin and I are surrounded by illegal fireworks that last deep into the wee hours, and the following morning I clean up all the burnt-up debris in our yard. Now here’s the kicker (and this is not news in No. Hollywood), on this year’s July 4 evening I did not see or hear one fire or law enforcement vehicle. (photo © Los Angeles Times 2020)

Regarding my thoughts on the illegal fireworks as California burns or all of my concern (whining to conspiracy aficionados) in the previous paragraph, it’s on us. Our country is a mess. It’s none of my business how you vote. This said, how are you doing; are you unemployed; can you pay all of your bills or are you living on credit or out of the bank; are you fearful of becoming homeless; how do you feel about your neighbors who are people just like you and me but are being murdered and under attack because their language, religion, or color is different; how many people do you know that have died from COVID-19; have you been affected by climate change? Dig into your soul, your humanity, and make a choice: is today’s world the one you want … or not? Follow your conscience and vote for what you know in your heart is right.

Oh, for the record, Pailin and I earn about 40 percent of what we earned last February.

Louis Kraft Sand Creek Massacre, Errol & Olivia, and Navajo Blood updates

Website & blogs © Louis Kraft 2013-2020

Contact Kraft at writerkraft@gmail.com or comment at the end of the blogs


LK is burned out, a skeleton that
functions on reflex. This came about from weeks,
months, and now pushing three years of working almost
seven days a week on the Sand Creek project. It
is now 11jun2019 and I have much that must
still happen for Sand Creek and the Tragic
End of a Lifeway to see the light of day
in 2020. Everything is business, but
key is that LK must provide
OU Press everything it
requires for the book
to be published.
Everything.

This is on me, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
But before I share my progress I want to give you a hint of what follows it.

I was going to use the above image without the words later in this blog but then changed my mind. It dates to 1982 after I returned to SoCal after playing Miles Hendon during a 1981-1982 135-performance tour in Northern California of The Prince and the Pauper (based upon Mark Twain’s novel and Errol Flynn’s 1937 film). I choreographed the duel in the play and had a living blast during the tour. This image was taken while I worked out with actors that knew how to handle the sword for five one-act plays that were grouped together. We performed them in late spring or early summer. I performed in three of them and wrote one. … A battle of the sexes wherein the hero—yours truly—was done in by a lady who knew how to handle a blade, but was no competition for hero Kraft, who toyed with her before disarming her and forcing her to the ground. She was on her back, unarmed, and at the hero’s mercy as the play ended. But all wasn’t as it seemed to be. While Kraft bowed and enjoyed the audience’s applause and cheering one well-placed punch turned victory into defeat—to the delight of everyone who saw The Fencing Lesson. Well-choreographed slashing blades enacted with sexual innuendo while lightly played for laughs was perhaps one of my better writing/acting efforts … until the lady regained her feet and proceeded to bash the hell out of me with relentless fists that ended the play with a standing ovation—for her. (photo © Louis Kraft 1982)

This blog is much more than a Sand Creek book update

Much-much more. … For it marks the beginning of my writing future. The time has arrived and some of it may shock you, but what follows—like my Indian wars books—has been in place for many years. By that I mean that the research has been ongoing for decades. Decades. This does not mean that I’m turning my back on the American Indian wars, for I’m not … I’m simply changing my focus while continuing to do what I’ve done for a very long time. It feels like it has been a lifetime coming but with Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway racing toward publication the time has arrived.

You know that I’m cryptic at times and certainly secretive. Alas, that still is in place. … This blog will deal with three books, and some important surprises.

There is no reason be silent in regards to the three books

  • Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway (but you knew it was on this list).
  • Errol & Olivia, which is a dual biography of Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland during the making of the eight films they did together.
    • Research continues on two additional nonfiction books on Flynn.

This change is not a move away from my Indian wars/race passion to the world of film (my other passion), but a continuation while I branch out into areas that have been on my plate for what feels like an eternity.

  • Navajo Blood, a novel that deals with dark-dark times in the Southwest during the years 1863 and 1864 and will have a mix of real Diné (as the Navajos call themselves) such as Chiefs Manuelito and Barboncito; as well as frontiersman turned soldier Kit Carson, among others; and fictional players, two of whom are key to the entire story.
    • This novel isn’t a one-and-done effort with Mr. Carson.

What follows is my future.

Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway status

Ohhh baby is time flying past at lightning speed.

My last manuscript status on these blogs was on the last day of December 2018. Time simply disappears when you’re having fun. I often feel as if I’m swimming off the SoCal coast in the Pacific Ocean, and this is good as I’ve been a fish ever since the first or second grade. But not really for although I’m making deliveries that are mandatory for the Sand Creek manuscript to see print I think that OU Press views my progress as I race toward the finish line closer to “a snail’s pace.”

We have Great White sharks off the coast of Los Angeles, and as temperatures warm more and more are seen. This year schools of four and five have been photographed cruising above the surface and just beyond the breakers from helicopters. One can only wonder how many of their brethren are forever searching for their next meal hidden from sight. I refuse to become shark bait screaming as I sink into the murky depths of the Pacific only to have chunks and pieces of a once-cocky writer who is no more float to the surface and gently flow to shore. … This image is an LK vision of Costa Rica’s west coast. It looks like a wonderful place to walk naked along the beach. Oops! Ignore that. … I wonder if Great Whites swim that far south. (art © Louis Kraft 2019)

I will deliver.

Manuscript delivery
I made the final manuscript delivery in mid-January. OU Press Editor-in-Chief Adam Kane and Production Manager Steven Baker (who I worked with on Ned Wynkoop and the Lonely Road from Sand Creek) have told me that the story flows, is readable, and will do well when published. Adam also told me that the book would sell even if there were no photos or art.

I took this image of Cheyenne Chiefs Lawrence Hart (standing center right) and Gordon Yellowman (praying at right) while they blessed the Cheyenne-Dog Man-Lakota village that Maj. Gen. Winfield Hancock destroyed, and in my opinion without cause, in April 1867. Just one of many heinous crimes performed by the U.S. government and their cronies during the entire 1860s when the United States swept westward with the lone goal of securing every acre of land that held value and to hell with any American Indian that dared to say, “Stop! This is my land.” I don’t know if you’ll ever read Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway. If you don’t read the book but see it somewhere look at the last paragraph as it shows you exactly why I signed on for this project without end. The lady with the blanket around her shoulders at center-left is Gordon’s wife Connie. I met her at this two-three day event and spent a lot of time with her. Good times for LK as I enjoyed her company while appreciating what she shared with me. The only other person in this image that I know is George Elmore (left in the sergeant’s uniform). We met in 1990 while I was researching The Final Showdown (1992) and he gave me and my daughter a private tour of the Fort Larned NHS, a lot of which made it into the novel. Both he and Gordon have influenced my life, not to mention having played key roles in the completion of Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway. (photo ©  Louis Kraft 1999)

To get to this point in time has never been a one-man show. There have been a lot of people who have unselfishly shared their knowledge, their time, and their patience with me. They have ranged from writer-historians to National Historic Site personnel to archivists to American Indians to friends whose interest is the same as mine to the staff at the University of Oklahoma Press, for without all of them there would be no book. I’m not listing them here but perhaps when I write the blog that announces the publication of the book I’ll focus on them (more below).

Images
The manuscript has 34 contracted images and all have been delivered to OU Press (the last two in late May). I’ve always known what I thought I wanted, but time and due to simply not finding specific photos or art more often than not made unexpected searches mandatory. As with my research on the manuscript many people and organizations played key roles in me actually completing this list. It goes without saying that at times this search was agonizing.

This is a colorization of a detail of a woodcut in the LK personal collection that I had used a grayscale of in Ned Wynkoop and the Lonely Road from Sand Creek. It is of Bull Bear (left) and Black Kettle on 28sept1864. I had considered using the entire woodcut in Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway but early on decided against this. (Detail colorization © Louis Kraft 2013)

As always for me it is the process, and in the case of photographs, art, and woodcuts it included hot trails that eventually turned ice cold. When this happened I was always disappointed, but that never lasted long. As I’ve always had backup selections identified, and if they weren’t in-house I began new searches.

Working on photos that needed restoration has been an ongoing task of major proportions. Ditto obtaining photos and art from archives as well as individuals. Regrettably some of the archives’ responses have been at a turtle’s pace. Some have come through and some fell by the wayside as I ran out of time and scrambled to obtain other images. Still many people and organizations stepped up to the plate (a baseball term) in my quest to locate, obtain, and when necessary purchase the images and, if required, the use fees. To each and every one of you thank you from the bottom of my heart.

As announced, and I think at the end of last year, I will not share any image that will appear in Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway until it is published. This is firm.

Maps
My cartographer needs to be mentioned; his name is Bill Nelson. I hired him to create two maps for Ned Wynkoop and the Lonely Road from Sand Creek (2011) from my rough drafts. If you’ve seen the book you know that his work sparkles. One of the Wynkoop maps is displayed below. I again hired Bill for this book, but this time I reworked the two Wynkoop maps to create drafts for him, and he has finished them and they will shine. I hope to deliver my draft of the third and final map to him later this week. Like my original drafts for Wynkoop this map will be rough. Although it now has a firm-no move deadline of August 5 that I think will be fine.

Ned Wynkoop and the Lonely Road from Sand Creek map © Louis Kraft 2010.

OU Press Managing Editor Steven Baker was, and still is, nervous over the last map ever seeing the light of day, much less making this final deadline. Based upon the ongoing problems I have encountered to create a rough draft of it I am hopeful that it will be of benefit to those who read Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway. Steven has every right to be a little on edge. I know the reasons, I know them intimately, but I have no intension of sharing them for it would unleash a tirade that none of us want. Now is the perfect time for me to keep my bleepin’ mouth shut. … I needed to calm Steven somewhat, and I had already presented the option of dropping the map from the book, which he shied away from without addressing. I didn’t question his silence. … Bill and I will make our deadline.

Is Kraft cocky? At this point in time, yes. I’ve been in this position so many times over the years (and I’m not talking about just the freelance world) that it’s just another day in the LK world of chaos. My knees aren’t shaking, I’m not walking around in a cold sweat, and I don’t stare with wide-open eyes at the ceiling when I should be sleeping. I have reached the point of deliver or shut up. I’ve been here many times and it is simply taking it one step at a time. I am confident while at the same time know that if I fail now and the book isn’t published that the sun will still rise tomorrow. This is my world, and I’m in my element.

Steven, trust me.

Copyedit
Kerin Tate is my copyeditor for the Sand Creek manuscript. Adam and Steven both highly recommended her. On May 30 she emailed me to inform me that she liked the manuscript, word usage, notes, and was making good progress with minimal changes. Since then we’ve had more contact and all is good. I’m thrilled to be working with her. We’ve agreed that she’d deliver her copyedit to me June 24. Previous to this, Steven had agreed to an extension of my review/edit of the copyedit to August 5, due to events, happenings, and Pailin’s and my now annual Fourth of July open house/party that includes her birthday. Kerin’s delivery is perfect for me and will become my total focus on July 6 (although I will begin working on it after she delivers it).

Years back when I asked a George Armstrong Custer historian (alas, long dancing with angels) if he could have improved his work he replied without batting an eye, “No. My work’s perfect.” Let’s just say no LK comment about his “perfect” work. … I believe that it was in spring 2013 when I spoke at an annual Order of the Indian Wars spring event in Centennial, a suburb (?) of Denver, Colorado. While in the lunch line with friend/historian/writer/radio show host/performer Deb Goodrich—yeah, this lady is multi-talented and I didn’t list all that she does—asked me what I thought about my work. “If I could work on my published writing again,” I said, “I could improve all of it.” This was how I felt then and what I believe today. … History and writing about it is an ongoing process that is in constant change and never ends.

LK w/Deb Goodrich during the evening party after the Order of the Indian Wars Annual Symposium in Centennial, Colo., ended on 20apr2013. I had given a talk about “Ned Wynkoop’s Last Stand” during the event. It is based upon a photo by Frank Bodden. (art © Louis Kraft 2019)

My goal—always—is to bring the leading players to life, make the events jump off the page, and have my readers curse me for they can’t put down the book and the hour is creeping up on midnight. My copyeditors for Lt. Charles Gatewood & His Apache Wars Memoir (2005) and the Wynkoop book played key roles in making this happen. My hope is that Kerin’s copyedit will improve the Sand Creek manuscript while not damaging facts or corrupting Cheyenne words that are correct.

The blog that announces the Sand Creek book publication will also … Gulp … “say it ain’t so,” LK

… but it is so as I hope to feature as many of you that have helped me as possible in that blog. And here, please don’t be like former editor-in-chief of OU Press Chuck Rankin, for if not for him there would be no Sand Creek manuscript or book. My friend prefers to move in the shadows. He couldn’t get away with that with me as I have too many images of him. At the moment many of you are under the radar, and that simply means I would like one or two or three images. Do you have photos of “you” that you could share? If yes, I want them. Here I’m talking about you, and many of you are new to the LK world. Honestly, I really want to publicize your efforts and kindness in the creation of the Sand Creek manuscript and book. As they say … “a photo is worth a thousand words,” so please be generous.

As Sand Creek charges into history LK’s writing future comes into focus

Over the years I have certainly publicized upcoming book projects, and I’m certain that for most of you this has been little more than a lot of hot air. From your point of view, maybe; from mine, reality. What follows is a list, and it is in my current working order. As always, research and more research is behind everything that I write.

Errol & Olivia
Although I didn’t know it Errol Flynn would influence my life more than any other historical person, and it began while I was in elementary school. Flynn introduced me to the American Indian wars, piracy, swords, acting, and most important an openness to people of all races. While still an actor I began to research his life in earnest, and in 1996 decided to write a book about him.

This photo of LK and Olivia was taken on 3jul2009 at her home in Paris. It was an absolutely wonderful day and evening. (photo © Louis Kraft 2009)

My contact with Ms. Olivia de Havilland led to my decision to make it a joint biography beginning with their arrival in Hollywood, being cast in Captain Blood (Warner Bros.-First National Pictures, 1935), their life and times during the eight films they made together between 1935 and 1941 (three of which were westerns). It will include an extended epilogue (similar to Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway). Easily 90 percent of the research is complete, but with this said the research is ongoing. As soon as I complete everything that is required of me during the production of the Sand Creek story this will become my number one project. … No more detours

  • Errol Flynn book number 2 (could be book 3)
    By the way, the second book on Flynn will be the best nonfiction book I write. Certainly this research is underway, but a lot more needs to be completed. This will begin in earnest as soon as the Sand Creek copyediting, my reviews of the designed  book pages, I’m good with the dust jacket design and copy, and I’ve created the index.
  • Errol Flynn book number 3 (could be book 2)
    That’s right, I have three books planned on Flynn and there’s still a chance that I could partner on this book (but in a completely different way); if true, Mr. Flynn will dominate a good portion of the rest of my nonfiction-writing life.

Navajo Blood
This novel deals with an old Diné warrior and his granddaughter during the 1863-1864 timeframe of the Kit Carson Navajo campaign. I have a polished draft, but recently decided that additional information needs to be added to the manuscript. The goal is to stay true to history while making the characters (real and fictional) come to life. My pitches will begin this year.

  • Untitled Kit Carson nonfiction book
    Primary source research is certainly underway for creating a book about Kit Carson; some of it is already in-house but I need more. If I’m able to locate what I need—and this is mandatory—I’m certain that I’ll be able to complete this manuscript without any of the problems I encountered while piecing all the parts of the Sand Creek story into a readable book. A focused continuation of the research will begin in fall 2020.
    * I haven’t begun to draft a proposal or verbally discuss it with editors yet but this will begin as soon as I have all the required research in-house, and I know exactly what I intend to use. … If I can’t find what I believe exists I will extend the scope of the story. For the record I have all the published books on Kit that are worth a damn and way-too-many that aren’t. … As soon as I’m satisfied with my primary source material I will draft an in-depth proposal. As with my previous nonfiction work this book will not be like any others in print.

LK Memoir
I’ve hinted at this for a long time, and both the research and the writing in various forms has been ongoing. Just look at the blogs for they represent some of my digging into the past, but, alas, I have shied away from the incidents/events that if published or made public at this time would cause me to ward off an invasion on Tujunga House by hooded assassins bent upon shutting my mouth for all time. It will be juicy, funny, fast-paced, and truthful (with documentation to back up what I state, something that you usually don’t see in memoirs).

The pirate Francis Drake … fiction and nonfiction
I have an incomplete fictional draft of Drake’s early piratical days that has a lot of promise.

As you can see, LK has been wielding a blade for sometime. (photo © Louis Kraft 1958)

I also have all primary and secondary sources on Drake published since the beginning of the 19th century (and much of the primary source material dates to the 16th century). Looking at the above writing projects this might sound like wishful thinking on my part. For the record Mr. Drake was light years ahead of his time, which was dominated by racial and religious prejudice and hatred. … What can I say other than I’m an optimist. For some of my views on El Draque, see The pirate Francis Drake and LK.

Various fiction projects
This ranges from Chinese fishermen in Monterey, California, during the 19th century … to modern-day Anasazi cannibalism in New Mexico … to bootlegging on the Navajo reservation … to a continuation of the two leading fictional characters introduced in The Final Showdown (1992) and their relationship with the Cheyenne Indians during the latter part of the 1860s.

Decades ago while doing research in the Monterey Peninsula, California, I discovered a photo shop/lab in Pacific Grove and spent the afternoon talking to the gentleman, who if my memory is good was a photographer/owner of it. He specialized in the Asian (mostly Chinese) presence on the California coast in the 19th and 20th centuries. Many of the photos he showed me that day I have since seen printed in books. Hopefully he is still with us, and if not hopefully his quest to preserve and share history from that time continues to live on. That day and afternoon has never left me and I have gathered as much reference material as possible (mostly academic) over the passing years knowing that some day I hope to write about the Chinese experience on the California coast. The California Historical Society call number for this public domain image is FN-22407.

All are outlined, in draft form, scripted, or partially written. I have played down fiction, but this doesn’t mean that it isn’t a medium that I would have any problem returning to full-time.

A slight change of subject, but it is related to LK writing fiction. And it is one that hovers in the shadows of my life on a daily basis. Mainly, will Pailin and I continue to be able to survive in Los Angeles? The cost of living is high, and I hate to say it but it increases almost monthly. California has become the land of the rich.

David Horsey is my favorite political cartoonist, and in this simple image he nailed the Pacific Coast (California, Oregon, and Washington) real estate market. … Simply put middle- and lower-class Angelenos are being taxed out of existence. We’re paying millions and billions for 1) Statewide gasoline taxes (by far the highest in the USA) to improve the roads (I invite you to LA to experience our roads, for it will make you feel as if your driving off-road in a third-world country). I don’t want to discuss this joke other than to say that in LA city hall is removing lanes from pot-holed (and in some cases repaved) streets with the magnificent logic that if they increase drive-time to work—let’s  say from 30 minutes to 45 or more minutes in bumper-to-bumper traffic to drive two or three miles to reach a freeway, which isn’t moving, they’ll force everyone to use public transportation. The farce doesn’t stop here for we are about two years away from being charged $4.00/day to drive into certain areas in Los Angeles County, including the Westside of Los Angeles (Westwood, Santa Monica, Venice, Brentwood, and West LA). Pailin drives there six times per week. Do you realize how many buses she would have to ride, how many subways (southeast to Hollywood and farther east to transfer to one going south to then connect with a westbound subway that will travel much farther west than from where she started her day, which won’t get her close to any of her destinations) twice daily (she has to return home)? Not to mention that she gets off at night. 2) For the homeless, which in LA increases by the year and on the week of June 3rd the LA Times announced that it is now just a few hundred short of 60,000 with somewhere around 20,000 housed. $1.2 B in the last three years. Where is all this money going? 3) Over the years the Los Angeles County School Board (the second largest in the country) has been dysfunctional, and the district is one of the worst in education achievement in the USA. Management at the top of the school board earn more than the governor of the Golden State, which I suppose gives you a good idea where some of this money ends up. There have been two tax increases in the last two or three years, but in 2019 greed took center stage yet again. On Tuesday, June 4, we voted down a new tax for the school board. This one would have levied a $0.16 tax on every square foot of building space in Los Angeles County. Yep, on every house, apartment building, condo, gas station, grocery story, movie theater, office building, factory, car dealership, hospital, ad nauseam. Put simply, that is an additional $160 tax dollars per 1,000 square feet of building space. I think it would be safe to say that the cost of everything in Los Angeles would go up. Horsey’s cartoon is right on target for a problem that is worse today than when he created it. A neighbor’s 800 square foot house sold for $650,000 earlier this year. About 20 people live in a 1200 square foot house including a converted one-car garage nearby (the adults all work and the young children all go to school except for one little girl). For the record the two bedrooms and living room have been divided into cubicles similar to what you would see in software office buildings. The Times article also pointed out that a lot of those living in their vehicles—that is homeless people—are working but can no longer afford housing. (art © Horsey and the Seattle Times 2018)

To repeat myself California has become the land of the rich, the poor, and the vanishing race once called the middle-class. Supposedly if California seceded from the United States it would become I believe the sixth largest economy in the world. This is not a joke and it is something we have to deal with every two or three years when rich clowns (read billionaires) spend a lot of money to make this reality. In two previous attempts to create the new country of California, it had been divided into three states and then six states.

I know the answer and without knowing it so do you (but you won’t admit it).

Due to the turmoil that seems to be a daily occurrence in the Golden State I have logged many hours trying to remain in the USA while also exploring becoming an expatriate.

In 2018 a person I considered a friend called me a renegade to our country, damning me as he didn’t agree with my views on our country’s current policies (which for the most part I avoid sharing, and wasn’t discussing when he slammed me).

For the record LK fits in wherever he goes. Here I’m dancing with Not (left, Pailin’s sister) and Pailin as we approach Wat Phra That Lampang Luang, a Temple in Lampang, Thailand. (photo by Daranee Kosin and © Daranee Kosin, Not Subanna, Pailin Subanna-Kraft, & Louis Kraft 2014)

Being short of cash didn’t count—just looking into living offshore turned me into a traitor or worse. Regardless of which is true, I guarantee that one thing won’t happen. I’ll never become a homeless person. I know a lot of them personally, and my heart sheds tears every time I talk with them as I can’t help their situation. See Horsey’s cartoon, above, for housing is one of the major culprits (along with LA Mayor Eric Garcetti, who talks a good story while sitting on his ass and dreaming of becoming president of the USA).

LK’s office in Uttaradit, Thailand. (photo © Louis Kraft 2014)

The point I’m trying to make is that if Pailin and I are forced to relocate to Thailand or New Mexico or Costa Rica or Arizona or Spain or elsewhere these and other story ideas will find a life of their own as my fingers dance over the keyboard and my fictional world explodes with life.

I know, the above is a shocking mouthful. … So is ‘Stayin’ Alive.’

High Noon (1952) Elmo Williams’ Oscar, UNM, Tomas Jaehn, and Errol & Olivia 

Let’s start with Tomas Jaehn, formerly of the Chávez History Library, Santa Fe, who in the early part of this century created the Louis Kraft Collection AC 402 & AC 010 for photographs.

LK with Tomas Jaehn after a talk on “Edward Wynkoop’s 1867 Fight to Prevent War” at the Chavez History Library, Santa Fe, N.Mex., on 15sept2004. (photo © Louis Kraft & Tomas Jaehn 2004)

The last two deliveries to the LK Collection have not been catalogued and the archive has not been updated. I’ve begun to prepare next delivery that will happen after Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway is published. It will consist of two books, including The Discovery (2016), magazine articles, and talks, along with personal correspondence and additional photos and art. Access to the archive is by appointment only. Contact Heather McClure at 505.476.5090, heather.mcclure@state.nm.us. This delivery will happen at an undetermined time when I travel to New Mexico. … And it will be huge, including a lot that I have not announced.

LK and Olivia de Havilland talking about her life, Mr. Flynn, and important subjects that both of us brought up at her home in Paris on 3jul2009. During both of my visits to France our conversations were lively and full of information that also included world events and USA politics. Without hearing her view of Mr. Trump I know exactly what it is. She is a lady, does not use foul words, so if she ever shares it with me it will be printable. (photo © Louis Kraft 2009)

For the record once Errol & Olivia is published the Kraft Collection will also contain research, drafts, correspondence, and other material related to the creation of the book including the Kraft-Olivia de Havilland correspondence over approximately twenty years. Some of OdeH’s letters were hand-written while others were typed, and I assume by her then secretary but signed by her (meaning that I perhaps have more of her autographs than everyone else put together if we don’t count sports stars). During my two visits to Olivia’s home in Paris, France, she had two different secretaries. Both were young American ladies. To learn a little more about Livvie, as Errol Flynn called her, see Olivia de Havilland, a world treasure.

In 2006 the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (Beverly Hills, Calif.) announced that it would honor Olivia that June.

Some people I thought were friends came out of the woodwork and demanded that I obtain tickets to the event for them. I told them that I was not going to ask for tickets for myself and I wouldn’t for them. Whoa baby, did I ever unleash a swarm of hatred directed at me via phone and email. The words were scathing; actually they were much worse. I ignored them, but those relationships didn’t survive. … Oh, there was still some connection with a few of the people but it never revived the past. One Flynn expert, and we had shared a lot of information over the years, became the most venomous toward me when I refused to help him obtain a ticket.

For the record OdeH invited LK to attend her gala, and it was some event.

The Flynn expert succeeded in obtaining a ticket and also attended. Surprisingly we spent a good part of the evening together. We even sat together while Olivia was honored on stage by the late Robert Osborne (former host of Turner Classic Movies). We enjoyed each other’s company that night, but we never spoke again. He died a few years later and his incomplete manuscript was never published (and I have insider information on why; this is something that I’ll never share without permission). No comments here; none whatsoever. He is gone, and so is why he failed so see his Flynn manuscript(s) through to publication.

Back to Tomas Jaehn

Tomas is now Director, Special Collections/CSWR, University of New Mexico Libraries. We see each other whenever he is in LA or I’m in Santa Fe. Always good times. During his last visit to Tujunga House in summer 2018 we talked about a lot of subjects including an upcoming event at UNM.

Standing in front of a cutout of Gary Cooper as former marshal Will Kane in the classic 1952 film, High Noon, Tomas Jaehn holds Editor Elmo Williams’ Oscar for the film. With him is Topiz, a UNM student employee who Tomas “asked to watch the Oscar during the event.” (photo © Tomas Jahen 2018)

Tomas is good at having fun with words. When he sent me the above image he called it an attachment of an ‘Albuwood’ or ‘Hollyquerque’ ‘pic.'” Love it!

The second showing happened on 1nov18, and Tomas had this to say: “Second showing of the Oscar was a blast. Folks loved it and commented on ‘how heavy that thing is.’ (A phrase that I hear every time I watch the Oscar events).”

Tomas also mentioned that UNM has Michael Blake’s papers. Novelist/screenwriter Blake became a good long-distance friend of mine for many years. He won an Oscar for his script Dances with Wolves (1990). This film has been on my film list and it has been off. There is a chance that it might be on again (but at the moment is still off). I need to watch it a few more times, if for nothing else than to enjoy Wes Studi* and Graham Greene’s performances. If yes, I’ll talk about Michael. See the section “Michael Blake, a special person and writer” (the second section) in The Louis Kraft writing world differs from other writers’ worlds for some of my views of him and of our relationship. Damn do I miss him.

* Wes Studi news flash!

On June 4 the Los Angeles Times (Calendar section, pE3) announced that Wes Studi would be awarded a special Oscar for his contribution to film over his career. Wow! The Times mentioned Last of the Mohicans (1992), Geronimo: An American Legend (1993) (see 1st fifth of a Louis Kraft 50-film list), Hostiles (2017), and Dances with Wolves (1990), among some of his other films.

A scene during Hostiles wherein Jonathan Majors is a member of the military detail that is escorting Sioux war chief Wes Studi from the south to the north so that he can see his homeland one final time. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, like the LK/Goodman novel this film’s title is misleading in that you must see the story through to its conclusion to know what the story is really about. LK personal collection.

These awards used to be presented during the live telecast at the beginning of each year but no longer. To save myself time I’m quoting the article: “The Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced Monday that it will present its annual honorary Governors Awards to director David Lynch, actor Wes Studi and director Lina Wertmüller, while actress Geena Davis will receive the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.” The Oscars will be presented at the Governors Awards ceremony on October 27, and although not mentioned I assume at the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences on Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, California.

Finally Mr. Flynn & Ms. de Havilland or more precisely …

I love the art for this magazine cover from January/February 1979 (unfortunately the journal no longer exists). I know who the staff artist is/was but have no contact information. This art would work nicely for the dust jacket of Errol & Olivia. … Research continues. If you know who or what institution/company owns the copyright of this art please contact me.

Errol & Olivia.

For all of you who have been patient, for all of you who have liked my talks and articles that dealt with them, your time of waiting is nearing an end. Although research on Errol & Olivia has been ongoing writing has been almost nonexistent the last half dozen years. I’m sorry but that is just a fact of life as I had to deal with completing Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway to my satisfaction. It will turn a portion of the current literature upside down. … You know what? So will Errol & Olivia. No joke.

You probably think that this is just another LK piece of prose to keep you hanging on. No. Trust me, and I would never say this unless I meant it.

This photo was taken on the same day as the image at the top of this blog. I don’t remember the actress’s name (and unfortunately I didn’t write it on the back of the 8x10s (someday I’ll pull my book of days from the 1982 taxes; I’m certain wrote about her there). We were beginning to rehearse the routines that would be in the swashbuckling one-acts. She was good with the blade and I liked working with her. Alas, she had a conflict with the evenings when we’d rehearse and perform and dropped out soon after this photo was taken (my loss). LK knows the sword, beginning while in junior high school when I studied with U.S. fencing Olympian and film dueling choreographer and stunt double legend Ralph Faulkner at his Hollywood Blvd. studio. I later was asked to join the CSUN fencing team during my first year at the university (I fought competition sabre), and later studied swashbuckling (stage combat), which is always done little protective gear (mainly knee and elbow pads). It is perfectly safe—yeah, right Kraft, as long as you don’t loose an eye. Trust me, it’s safe, for it is just like dance and every offensive movement with the blade has a unique number, while the duelist on defense has a corresponding number to parry (block) the attack. (photo © Louis Kraft 1982)

For those of you who don’t know, the American Classic Film: The Journal of America’s Film Heritage cover art is of EF and OdeH’s first film together, Captain Blood. It became a major hit and turned Flynn into a superstar over night (the term didn’t exist in 1935) and de Havilland into a star.

Captain Blood was the first of nine Flynn swashbucklers; four of which would become classic films and the best four examples of the swashbuckling film genre to this day.

To repeat what I said in the American Classic Screen cover image above:

“If you know who or what institution/company owns
the copyright of this art please contact me.”

If the owner/copyright holder allows me to use the EF & OdeH Captain Blood art by then journal staff artist John Tibbetts (1978), you will receive my eternal gratitude along with a first edition of Errol & Olivia when it is published.

If you supply me with the owner/copyright holder of Mr. Tibbetts’
art and I fail to obtain the required permission I need you
will still receive a first edition of Errol & Olivia.

(For the record I already own the cover art for the second Flynn book.)

The goal is to be back to writing Errol & Olivia full time sometime in early 2020. Heck, that’s just around the corner. As I have a little over 60,000 words and am shooting for 125,000 words, I’m roughly halfway to a first rough draft. I’m not joking about Errol & Olivia being different for it won’t be like any joint biography that you’ve ever read and you can take that to the bank. ‘Course if you bet on this and win a goldmine don’t forget that your ol’ pal Kraft, who gave you insider information, would appreciate some of your winnings.

Three LK “long walks” in 2013 and 2015

These three years represent a sad time for me as I walked away from
what has been a major part of my life for decades.

The end of a big part of my life that wasn’t a loss

LK answering questions after speaking about “Errol Flynn, George Armstrong Custer, and a Lady called Livvie,” before the Custer Battlefield Historical and Museum Association, in a Hardin, Montana, movie theater on 25jun2011. (photo © Louis Kraft 2011)

In 2012 I stopped writing for the software world. It was forced but I was good with what happened (other than the lying manner of the presentation). Don’t get me wrong for I have had a lot of great memories, and have certainly known a lot of wonderful people from all over the world, in a fast-paced industry that took no prisoners. Put simply, you delivered on deadline or you might walk the plank. Heck, that’s not completely true, for sometimes even if you did deliver you might still end up walking the plank.*

* Walking the plank is a piratical term. When a corsair captain and his crew decided to eliminate a member of their brethren or a prisoner, at times the unfortunate person was forced to walk on a plank that extended from the side of the ship until they stepped off it and dropped into the sea or ocean, only to sink into the depths until they met Davy Jones and his locker and became his slave throughout eternity.

This impacted my life in a major way, as I knew it would, for I had made the decision to not rejoin a world wherein I made six figures per year. … It wouldn’t take long before I felt the crunch on my wallet. Still, I refused to do an about-face and rejoin the self-imposed world of slave labor (again, Yahoo! and Oracle were not and never were a part of this equation when I wrote for them).

No longer a cold-hearted gun for hire, I was free. Free at last to spend all my time writing about what was important to me.

2013: Adios cowboy; no more talks
But things would happen. Suddenly, and without warning, I needed to pay half of an operation that I didn’t know about until after the fact. By this time I knew that there would be no more talks. Some talks paid a lot of money and all expenses (and I certainly enjoyed my connection with these organizations) while many groups that I wanted to speak for paid peanuts (meaning that when I spoke for them my loss could be $1,000; no big deal in the past). There were talks I wanted to deliver in 2013 and I gave them regardless of how much it cost. Good times, times that I dearly miss to this day.

2013: Adios cowboy; no more research at a great archive
This year also marked the end of my research at the USC Warner Bros. Archives in Los Angeles, California. By this time I was in a position wherein I didn’t need to return to the archives as I had enough primary source material to complete Errol & Olivia. Still, if you know me the research is always ongoing right up until publication (and usually lasts much longer as articles and talks follow). However, this ending was never permanent as I intend to do a lot more writing about Mr. Flynn. … More, I’m always big at going back and checking what I have for accuracy along with seeing if I might have missed anything.

2015: Adios cowboy; no more magazine articles
Another part of my life came to an end two years later. I never lost money here, and often I made additional fees based upon the photos/art/woodcuts I supplied and once in a while earned cash from my rough drafts of maps. This also included reselling photos, woodcuts, and my art to other publications. But the days of pushing these sales also came to a halt with me walking away from writing for magazines.

The reason was simple

Time. I needed time to complete two books.

Cover art and book design for The Discovery © Louis Kraft 2016.

A medical-legal thriller that I partnered with Bob Goodman, one of my physicians, who had a great premise that dipped into the depths of hell. I began the project as a consultant making good money, which quickly paid for the operation. I marked the hell out of his incomplete manuscript, provided edits and instructions on how to fix the text in detailed review copy, and in person during many meetings. My job completed I walked away from the intrusion and returned to the Sand Creek manuscript. My manuscript included finding primary source material while taking multiple types of people, their goals and biases, and merging a miasma of people and attitudes into a story that flowed easily between race and desire and selected actions by key players.

There was one problem, my Sand Creek manuscript suffered from the same malaise as the Goodman manuscript—it was all over the place with no focus, no sense of scope, and worse there was an endless listing of information that was useless in its current state. Honestly, both manuscripts were pieces of crap. … Then Bob Goodman presented a proposal to me that I was going to refuse—become his partner and write the book—until I realized that both manuscripts had the same defect that would destroy them. Simply put: If I could fix the thriller I would have a blueprint on how to fix the Sand Creek manuscript, which, unlike The Discovery that extended over two decades, was well over a century.

Talks, articles, & the USC Warner Bros. Archives are no longer on forced hiatus

Oh yeah, a time of joy is about to return to Tujunga House. I’ve begun to pitch two things that I love but had exiled to “Neverland” and will later this year or early next year I’ll return to a magnificent archive. It will take time to resurrect my past from its long slumber but the process has begun.

Potential Talks
Washita Battlefield NHS (Cheyenne, Oklahoma)
Beginning a little over a year ago I introduced myself to Kevin Mohr, chief of interpretation and operations at the Washita Battlefield NHS. It would be the first of many talks and emails as we discussed the Sand Creek manuscript and Custer’s attack on Black Kettle’s Cheyenne village on the Washita River on 27nov1868 and its impact on the Cheyenne and Arapaho lifeways. I can’t begin to tell you how open and friendly Kevin has been with his input to my needs (if you read the book you’ll know what I’m talking about), but again “mums” the word on what you will see on these blogs before the book is published. I love teasing—just ask Pailin—but I’m not playing Mr. Tease here.

Former Sand Creek Massacre NHS ranger Craig Moore leading a tour of the upper portion of the Washita Battlefield on 6dec2008. I joined it, and to his displeasure spoke up during the tour when he passed certain areas without discussing them. Of major importance was the mound that Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer used as his observation post during the fight, which still partially exists. I refused to accept this silence, halted the moving program and informed everyone of Custer and his actions to protect non-combatants that he viewed as disobedience of his orders. This was not the beginning of a sparkling relationship, still years later Craig kindly attempted to help me locate information that had since been buried by Oklahoma law and blocked from viewing by historians. … This Washita Battlefield NHS extended symposium was a big event for me as I both played Wynkoop on stage and spoke about him during it. (photo by Leroy Livesay and given to Louis Kraft with full permission to use it)

Some of you know a little and some of you know a lot of about the lead-up to that tragic November 27 day, what happened, and the aftermath. Some of you don’t know anything about this time. Whichever camp you’re in I’ve decided that I now want you to read the book with no more giveaways by me. I want you to experience it for the first time and not mumble as you turn pages that Kraft already told me all this.

Without giving too much away this portion of the book is of major importance to the Cheyennes and the Arapahos.

LK and Cheyenne Chief Gordon Yellowman after a day of talks/presentations ended at the Washita Battlefield National Historic Site two-day symposium on 7dec2011. We met in 1999, and since have crossed paths numerous times, the last being this year. With the publication of Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway in 2020 we will be linked throughout time. I can’t begin to tell you how thrilled I am. (photo by Joel Shockley for the National Park Service).

A Ned Wynkoop one-man show has had two performances at the Washita and I’ve given two talks there. Obviously I want to return to this special land. In my opinion it, along with the Sand Creek Massacre NHS (Eads, Colorado) and the Cheyenne-Dog Man-Lakota village site (35 miles west of the Fort Larned NHS, Larned, Kansas), are three key sites in Cheyenne history. There are certainly many others including the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument in Montana; the Battle of Summit Springs (near present-day Sterling, Colorado) where Cheyenne Dog Man Chief Tall Bull died on 11july1869; and the Battle of Beecher Island where the great Cheyenne war leader Roman Nose died on 17sept1868 (the last two sites I’ve not seen). … In May of this year Kevin opened the door to me returning to the Washita to present a talk combined with a book signing. I’ve already mentioned two ideas to him, and for the record I won’t be talking about the battle. Hopefully we can make this happen in 2020.

Tomas Jaehn, University of New Mexico
Those of you who know about my writing/talking history may be familiar with Tomas.

From left: Pailin, LK, and Tomas Jaehn in the Tujunga House dining room on 2aug2018. Good-good times, and I wish that Tomas could have had a longer stay. Regardless of what happens with an LK talk at UNM one thing is certain, I’ll see Tomas and his family in 2020. (photo by Pailin and © Pailin Subanna-Kraft, Tomas Jaehn, & Louis Kraft 2018)

What follows is repetitious, and that’s okay for he’s become a great friend over the years, and one I always enjoy discussing any subject in our worlds. He is responsible for creating the Louis Kraft Collection in 2002. I’ve spoken there twice. Believe it or not we both put a lot of effort into an attempt to bring the Ned Wynkoop one-man play to Santa Fe. I should talk about this sometime, but not here. … Tomas has since moved on to a cool position at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque (see above). Well, I guess you know where this is going. We have been tentatively going back and forth about an LK talk at UNM. Although below it may appear that I’m being too picky on where I want to place a Sand Creek Massacre article, this isn’t the case. The reason is simple: For me to show what happened on those two tragic days I need more words than most publications will allow and I don’t what to shortchange this important subject. … If Tomas and I can agree on what I intend to say (and it will be explicit) along with a date that is good for both of us after the book is published this is a talk that I want to give in Albuquerque.

Articles
Stuart Rosebrook, True West Magazine editor
Stuart and I connected on LinkedIn in 2018 but I don’t know if we’ve ever met. In May we shared a number of emails, which alerted him to the upcoming Sand Creek book publication and of my desire to again write for magazines, which caught his interest. Since then we’ve had a long talk on the phone to discuss this, writing for True West, and we weren’t talking about a one-time article but continuing into the future. Stuart was immediately interested in an article on the Sand Creek Massacre but I told him no, that I needed a lot more words than the 1500 maximum word count for the magazine.

In the coming days we’ll spend more time talking about LK story ideas that might be usable. Trust me, I have plenty of ideas bouncing around in my head. Most are related to the Sand Creek story, but there are others from the other side of my writing world that may grab his interest. Time will tell.


For the record I think that the best place for a Sand Creek Massacre feature might be in American History or MHQ (The Quarterly Journal of Military History). I’ve written for both and have had good experiences in the past. These pitches are in the works.

At right is the cover for the February 2008 issue of American History. The cover story was a comparison of Errol Flynn’s George Armstrong Custer in the Warner Bros. 1941 film, They Died with Their Boots On, and the real George Armstrong Custer. To date I consider it the best article that I’ve ever written. In 2008 it became the best-selling issue of the magazine (I don’t know if this is still true). For the record I campaigned to have Flynn also on the cover. This was one battle I lost, but ended up pleased with the art director’s choice. Here’s a few words to those of you interested in Mr. Flynn, Mr. Custer, or both of them, obtain the magazine (if possible) for the article may be of great interest to you.

Archives
Jonathon Auxier, USC Warner Bros. Archives
Beginning around 1995 the USC Warner Bros. Archives (Los Angeles, California) has been a mandatory destination of mine. I can’t write another word without saying the following: I have researched in a lot of first class archives over the years but none of them have come close to comparing to the USC Warner Bros. Archives. Over this time many have helped me at this magnificent archive, including Randi Hockett (director), Haden Guest (Curator), Noelle Carter (Director), Sandra Joy Lee (Director; I can’t remember her married name), and Jonathon Auxier (Curator). There were others but I can’t remember their names.

Jonathon was day in, day out light years above all of the archivists and directors at the USC Warner Bros. Archives. He always had a positive attitude, was extremely knowledgable and this is an understatement (in an archive that was so large that it had to be overwhelming to everyone that worked there, not to mention the by-appointment only researchers), and even better for I can’t tell you how many times he went the extra mile for me.

This is Jonathon Auxier near the end of our lunch at Le Pain Quotidien on Riverside Drive in Burbank, California, on 26apr2019. Good times as we talked about the past and our futures. A number of years back he left the archives for a terrific position at Warner Bros. (photo © Jonathon Auxier and Louis Kraft 2019)

One example will show just how knowledgeable Jonathon was and how willing he was to go that extra mile. There was a key event in the Errol Flynn-Olivia de Havilland relationship during their time with Warner Bros. I knew it happened but couldn’t find anything related to it at the archive. I explained exactly what I needed to Jonathon. He dug in and within days found the information I coveted. It became the spine for a talk I did about them perhaps 14 years ago or perhaps less as I’m not certain when Jonathan began working at the archives. No matter for the talk was a hit; so much so that I decided never to share this subject again. I immediately added the information to the Errol & Olivia manuscript. While polishing it I carelessly had a draft lying around when a Flynn friend who thought he knew a lot more than he actually did visited. He was a person who bought into whatever he read, proven or not (unless it was negative or debunked) and propagated clichés. While I was preparing dinner he saw it and began to thumb through the printed draft, but luckily asked what he was looking at. This brought me running to the rescue. I brushed it off as me playing with thoughts and words and nothing more. He bought what I said and the subject was closed. Over the years Jonathon has found other pieces of information that I needed but couldn’t find.

Back in those days it used to take me on average of between 20 and 25 research days to get through one box that dealt with a particular film. The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) had two boxes and it felt like forever to get through both boxes.

Jonathon has became a friend, mostly long distance although not many miles separate us, and this year we have made an effort to bring our friendship into the here and now. Good for me, and hopefully for him.

I will continue to use other archives for Flynn/de Havilland and Carson/Indians,
but I see no need to share them at this time.

Just so you know I’m singing an Alan Jackson song as I dance into my future.
Or will it be John Lennon, or Michael Parks, or Patsy Cline, or Rhiannon
Giddens, or Waylon Jennings, or Tex Ritter, or Laura Brannigan,
or John Anderson, or Willie Nelson, or Rihanna, or Elvis
Presley, or Rita Coolidge, or Kris Kristofferson,
or Norah Jones, or Bob Dylan,
or Yoko Ono?

1st sixth of a Louis Kraft 60-film list

1st sixth of a Louis Kraft 60-film list

Posted May 14, 2019

Website & blogs © Louis Kraft 2013-2020

Contact Kraft at writerkraft@gmail.com or comment at the end of the blogs


It is time to move from my Indian wars/race passion
to the world of film, my other passion, and
a blog that I announced in days
long past.

Alas, the long proposed 60-film list has been split
into six installments due to time limitations.

None of the choices made the first sixth of this 60-film list with only one screening.


A major fact

A film must grab and hold my interest from beginning to end. And just as
important I must care about at least one character
and preferably two or more.

This detail of a photo was taken in August 2018 when Pailin shot a series of photos for the University of Oklahoma Press marketing department. I’ve used it elsewhere on social media and like it better than some of the images I delivered to the press last summer. (photo © Louis Kraft and Pailin Subanna-Kraft 2018)

So you know: I study film all the time. Yes, it is for enjoyment, it is when I exercise (or bathe—you snicker and the next time we get together you’ll experience a real evil eye), and it is when I’m looking for something that shows me a way to make a smooth transition in my writing. … It is the perfect medium to see good and bad dialogue, good and bad transitions, and good and bad plots. … I learn as much from the bad as I do from the good. What follows is a living list, and it will grow and change as I move through life. What is here today may not be here tomorrow. This said, and because I’m wordy and time is short this list has been cut into six pieces. The second installment will appear as soon as possible.

LK film lists & opinions that mean nothing

I should tell you up front that I have little respect for most reviews I read. They are opinion, and often they include the reviewer’s bias. I get the Los Angeles Times (the Times was a great newspaper and perhaps will again be so under its new management). Most of my film viewing today is on DVDs or the internet. Currently the paper has two extraordinary film critics (Justin Chang and Kenneth Turan). Even so, I often disagree with them. No big deal, for I often disagree with my view of films. I’m just like everyone else. My view of movies is opinion—nothing more and nothing less. Read it with a grain of salt. Hopefully it may influence you to see some of the films on this list.

Lists change

Certainly my film lists are in constant flux. Sometimes a film or a performance doesn’t hold up over the passage of time. And this is certainly true as films from the Golden Age of Cinema (which will soon become a major focus of future books) have little representation in this list of 50.

I don’t own a TV, and “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,” to quote Clark Gable from Gone with the Wind. (David O. Selznick/MGM 1939). BTW, this film bores me to tears and yet I will be studying it with a fine-toothed comb in the very near future (see Olivia de Havilland celebrates her 100th birthday + an example of bunk if you don’t already know the reason).

From left: Hattie McDaniel, Olivia de Havilland, and Vivien Leigh in Gone with the Wind. All three would receive Oscar nominations. McDaniel and de Havilland for supporting actress, and Leigh for lead actress. Vivien and Hattie won, and Olivia was devastated, although years later she changed her view and was thrilled that Hattie was honored. LK personal collection.

One blazing inclusion will be Olivia de Havilland’s The Snake Pit (20th Century Fox, 1948 ) along with one other guaranteed film (and perhaps two) that didn’t make an LK’s top 13 Errol Flynn films a couple of years back. For years The Snake Pit has been on and then off this list of films. Two reasons stand out: it is a hard film to view for its subject matter takes no prisoners and it is not a feel good story. At the same time it gives us Ms. de Havilland’s best screen performance of all time (no other performance of hers comes close to capturing how magnificent her acting capabilities really were). The film was extraordinary for 1948. If Olivia was thirty-two (her age when the The Snake Pit was released) in 2019 and the film was made today one can only wonder what the final product would have looked like, what she would have exposed to the camera for public viewing, and how you and I would have reacted to her performance. My view, and let me tell you that I disagree with easily 90 percent of the Oscar awards for acting and screenwriting, she was robbed for her performance as Virginia Cunningham was before its time at the end of the 1940s and it still is today.

The last two films in this 60-film list

For films at the bottom fifth of the list there is another problem, and doubly so as they won’t be shared until after four additional film blogs have been posted first. Simply this means that two really good films will never be selected as numbers 59 or 60 are firmly in place, and they’re never going away.*

* Hints: Singing while riding a Harley Davidson motorcycle and the pirate Drake. I had linked two spoilers here but changed my mind. I do love being a tease.

Wonder Woman, other films, & Hollywood kissing itself on its rear end

Wonder Woman? What the (expletive)! Yeah, Wonder Woman. Digest this!

Pailin Subanna-Kraft inside the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood, Calif., just before she saw Errol Flynn’s last A-film The Roots of Heaven (20th Century Fox, 1958) on 15may2014. And … AND … she sat between Errol Flynn fan RF and myself at this screening. She told me that she was able to follow the story, which dealt with the preservation of elephants. (photo © Pailin Subanna-Kraft and Louis Kraft, 2014)

Let’s start with Pailin. … Her English grows with leaps and bounds, and this is on a daily basis. Still, when I show her films on the computer and when we see a movie in a theater I try keep the choices to basically western, action, and thriller (although this changed last year). Reason for these choices: Less dialogue, the action often moves the story to conclusion, and I like the above stated genres.

My gorgeous woman (Pailin) works way too-many hours while I’m chained to my computer working on getting the Sand Creek manuscript published and still punch out a blog now and again. Who knows, but perhaps some day I will return to a time currently gone but something that I dearly miss—writing magazine articles and giving talks. Pailin and I are two busy people, but we need a little R&R once in a while. A couple of years back I proposed seeing Wonder Woman to her, a film genre that I have great distaste for and avoid seeing. My proposal to my lady was based on film hype, no other decent films playing in LA, and the current trailer that I showed her, along with a decent review of the film (which, again didn’t mean much).

Pailin took this closeup image of a lighted (that is not a paper) poster of Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman, which was across the hall from the AMC 16 Burbank Theater screening room where we saw the film.

As is well known, Diana, “Wonder Woman,” was a DC Comics character. I’ve known that this film, directed by Patty Jenkins, was coming, and had for some time.

This book cover dust jacket art is by the late, and great, illustrator, Frank Frazetta (1912: Reprint; 1970 in a bookclub edition of the novel. I’ve liked Frazetta’s work since I discovered him while in junior high school and gobbled up Burroughs’ multitude of books that were then experiencing a mass-market paperback bonanza. … A film, John Carter (2012) was based somewhat on this novel (but unnecessarily updated). It had great production value, and an okay John Carter (Taylor Kitsch), but a lifeless and sexless Dejah Thoris (Lynn Collins), and I’m being kind to the lady here. The novel had a lot of sexuality and nudity; zero in the film, which still should have succeeded. Its advertising murdered it for it didn’t let a potential audience know the story’s roots and where the storyline was headed. Too bad. This film had been on an LK top 60 film list, but was banished over two years ago. Pailin has seen it in the Kraft theater and liked it. I like it too, just not Collins’ Dejah Thoris. Yuk! When you have a major player in a film and they don’t show up you have nothing. Will I ever change my mind about Collins’ dismal portrayal as Dejah Thoris?

I was pulling for Pailin to agree. … She did, and on June 3, 2017, I stole her away to see WW in a movie theater. Yeah, we went out on a date.

Wow! To steal from what I said elsewhere on social media: “All I want to say here is this is a good film. It had a plot, character development, decent characters performed by good actors, acceptable dialog, and you know what—I was on the edge of my seat during the entire film. I laughed, I smiled, I was thrilled, and I actually shed a few tears.” … Wonder Woman had been in the running to make this film list. Although it still is the only super-hero film that I’ve seen and liked it didn’t make the list. Perhaps as I’ve only seen it once,but most likely it’ll never make a Kraft film list.

Know that I am not a fan of pulp fiction, other than Edgar Rice Burroughs’ (of Tarzan fame; Tarzana, a town in Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley, is named after his creation) eleven-book series on John Carter of Mars. The first book in the series hooked me for all time, A Princess of Mars, and her name was Dejah Thoris. A great series, although the last two or three books weren’t as good as the earlier ones.

I also want to mention an extraordinary film, War for the Planet of the Apes (20th Century Fox, 2017). It is science fiction but much more—much-much more.

Andy Serkis as Caesar in War for the Planet of the Apes. LK personal collection.

It is a story of survival and racism, and when we get to the 60 films you’ll see that people of different races play a major role in my choices. This was not pre-set, it just happened when I viewed, then viewed again and again as I studied the films that made this list. I’ve only seen War for the Planet of the Apes once and that was in a movie theater.

Andy Serkis’ work as Caesar, the leader of the apes in their revolt for freedom in War for the Planet of the Apes, was created using CGI. I’m not going to get technical but Serkis and the other ape actors performed while wearing special clothing and had devices attached to them allowing their actions be captured which in turn permitted the special effects team to use their reactions and emotions while turning them into apes. Serkis and the other actors’ work shines and his or one of the other performances should have been recognized during the god-awful four-five months of pure hell time in Los Angeles when money buys awards for films that are stuffed down our throats on a daily basis.

My view on Hollywood kissing itself on its ass for a third of the year every year isn’t printable

Steven Spielberg photo by Patrick T. Fallon for the Los Angeles Times (it appeared in the California section of the paper on 3mar19, pB8).

If those in power used the money that they waste in Los Angeles every year where it was needed there would be no homeless problem (I can give you 30,000 words on this subject). No, instead they buy awards (which is similar to buying elections). Oops! That just popped out.

Mr. Spielberg was upset that Roma won three Oscars (it was nominated for 10). As far as he was concerned it streamed on TV, and even though it had the required number of days playing in movie theaters he considered it little more than a TV film. I can’t comment on Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma as I haven’t seen it (I haven’t seen Green Book or any of the other films that were nominated for Best Picture with the lone exception being A Star is Born). BTW, Cuarón won three Oscars for Roma (directing, cinematography, and best foreign film) and previously won two others in 2014 (for directing and editing Gravity). I wonder if Mr. Spielberg is jealous. Jealous or not, my take on him is that perhaps he complains too much. Why not speak out about the millions upon millions of dollars that are wasted every year to win an Oscar (take a look at the amount of money spent, and that includes for Mr. Spielberg’s films over the decades). I guess it’s okay to buy awards, but don’t you dare stream a film while also forking out big bucks as you may have an advantage over the poor-poor-poor film companies that refused to move forward with how films are viewed today. As Jeff Daly (West Hollywood) wrote in a letter to the Times (published  on 10mar19): “As the Academy Awards attempts to stay relevant, he [LK: Spielberg] proposes to constrict, rather than expand, the scope of what constitutes an Oscar-worthy film.” I agree with Mr. Daly.

Andy Serkis deserved to be nominated for his performance. Yes, his performance was that good, and so were some of the other ape characters in the film. … Better, War for the Planet of the Apes was a story of survival, a story of caring and humanity. It was also a story of war, and it is tragic. My first impression: this is a great film. Will it make the list before the other four blogs are posted? I don’t know, but as stated above I need to see it more than once.

A lot of good films aren’t going to make this list.

Lady Gaga and A Star is Born

I don’t know Lady Gaga’s music; don’t think I ever heard her sing until I saw A Star is Born. My lone memory of the lady was at the 2016 Golden Globe awards, which I only saw clips of on the internet. She won an award and while making her way to the stage she bumped Leonardo DiCaprio’s back. He looked around to see who hit him, then turned back to his table with a huge grin on his face. I have no intention of interpreting what went through his mind at that moment, but I can guess and it was priceless.

The young Lady Gaga had posed for what might be considered risqué images but they were artistic and I think not offensive in any way. However, when compared to the painted person who created an ultra-persona that shot to mega-music stardom with her writing and singing is something that this ol’ cowboy missed. Everything: The massive hits, the multitudes of awards, and a celebrity that is extraordinary.

This image of Gaga is from a Los Angeles Times ad section that was devoted to film awards (28dec2018). Lady Gaga, just like my lady, knows how to pose for the camera.

I took Pailin to see Bradley Cooper’s directing debut while playing the jaded and on the downside rock-country star that Kris Kristofferson created in the 1976 Barbra Streisand film of the same name (which was the third reincarnation of the story of an up-and-coming talent who meets and teams with a major star spiraling, for lack of better words, toward the end of life).

I viewed the coming attraction for Cooper’s 2018 A Star is Born way too-many times. The combination of Cooper and Gaga—read the connection between them on film—grabbed me. Pailin was going to see that film if I had to hogtie her. Luckily the preview caught her interest and she readily accompanied me to a movie theater.

There’s only one question that needs to be asked here, has LK seen A Star is Born more than once?

Actually the last two years have been good for film …

I’m being sarcastic and yet I’m not. … A Star is Born was the only film I saw in movie theaters last year. To date, not one film released in 2019 has caught my interest. All I can say here is that if the film industry depended upon my cash It would have been out of business a long time ago.

Four other films that were released in 2017 and 2018 did grab and hold my attention although I didn’t see them during their theatrical runs: Hell or High Water, Wind River, Hostiles, and Juliet, Naked (which has zero nudity). I have Amazon Prime so I study film (and TV shows that have better casts, scripts, and production quality than many of the films released in recent times) that I don’t own. Oh, in case I didn’t mention it, I have not had pay TV since 2007 when I bought a Corvette (yep, the Vette was worth a hell of a lot more to me than being glued to the boob-tube), and that $130 or so monthly cost was wasted bucks that easily moved over to pay for a car that handled like none other I have ever owned.

What follows is totally opinionated and personal

First sixth of LK’s Top 60 films

Most of the films in the top 10 have remained at the top even though this blog has been years in the making (except for the last two as they have special conditions attached to them, and those “special conditions” make them mandatory). … Believe it or not I have been called a racist over the years, for the simple reason that three very important ladies in my life have been Asian. I don’t know what to say about people who say this about me. The following is not defensive, it is simply a fact of my life. When it comes to ladies I love them all. Every race has gorgeous and intelligent and caring women; every race. I am going to state a simple fact that is not self-justifying as all the attacks upon my so-called racism toward women has always come from Anglo-American women. I need to address this. They don’t know what they are talking about and they should keep their damned mouths shut. If they did any research they would know that I have been intimate with more white women than all the other races put together. More important, when a woman enters my life her race means nothing to me. All that matters is who she is.

When I finally complete the entire list of 60 films you’ll see that many actors (male and female) are in numerous films. They are listed not because of their race but because I cherish their performances in these films. Nothing more and nothing less.

  1. Thunderheart, directed by Michael Apted and w/Val Kilmer, Sam Shepard, Graham Greene, Sheila Tousey, Chief Ted Thin Elk, John Trudell, Julius Drum, Fred Ward,and Sarah Brave (1992)
    This film has moved around at the top of the LK’s favorite films since I saw it shortly after it was released.

    One of the DVD covers for the film.

    The reason is simple: Thunderheart has a great plot and screenplay (by John Fusco), deals with a fictional depiction of events that happened on a Lakota reservation in the 1970s, has many characters that grabbed my interest and made me care about them, and shows racism going in both directions. It is a thriller; it is also a tragedy. I can’t spoil the film by telling you what happens, but when it does you’ll cringe and perhaps tear up. I did. I’ve seen Thunderheart at least thirty times (not counting the three screenings for this blog), and each viewing was as alive as when I first saw it. I haven’t talked about the cast, but the leading and most of the supporting players are extraordinary. When I view the film time and again I think to myself that some of them weren’t/aren’t actors—they were/are real people playing roles based upon the tragic reality of their peoples’ lives in modern-time USA. This sentence gives you a hint of what you are going to experience in Thunderheart. It doesn’t matter if this film is number five or number one on my list, for I enjoy it every time I watch it.

    Kilmer is sitting with Chief Ted Thin Elk, who in real life was an elder in the Oglala Lakota tribe. In the film, Thin Elk is also a tribal elder who is at the center of the fictional Sioux reservation. When Kilmer first meets him he is disrespectful but over the course of the film he changes his opinion. LK personal collection.

    There are seven key relationships in this film, and all are of major importance: Kilmer/FBI agent Ray Lavoi (who hates that he is quarter Lakota); Shepard/FBI legend Frank Coutelle; Greene/Tribal police officer Walter Crow Horse; Tousey/Maggie Eagle Bear; Ted Thin Elk/Grandpa Sam Reaches; Trudell/Jimmy Looks Twice; and Brave/Grandma Maisy Blue Legs (Tousey’s name should be above the title, and I can make a case for Thin Elk and Trudell also being above the title). Kilmer must deal with all of them once he is assigned to investigate a murder on the rez (reservation); an assignment he abhors but is stuck with it because of his mixed-blood heritage.

    During Thunderheart there are many keys that unravel what really happened when a tribal member is murdered on the rez at the beginning of the film. For Kilmer’s part it is a journey that could have never happened if he didn’t follow the trail of clues without an open mind. Here he is presenting Tousey with a ticket from an event that he is certain will reveal who the murderer was. Tousey tells him that it is a piece of paper and that she won’t look into it even though she has access to who bought the tickets. LK personal collection.

    Shepard meets Kilmer at the airport and immediately sets Kilmer’s reception and status on the rez in place. “Turn your head to the right,” Shepard drily states. “In the right light you look like Sal Mineo. Did you ever see Arizona Prairie, did you ever see that one?” BTW, this film doesn’t exist and Shepard has delivered a major insult. Mineo was not an American Indian but played one at least twice (in Disney’s Tonka, 1958, and in John Ford’s Cheyenne Autumn, 1964). Still it was enough for Shepard to use him to ridicule Kilmer. It would be worse from the Indian side. Greene calls him out as a “wanna-be Indian,” Tousey dismisses him as the “FBI Indian,” and Drum/Richard Yellow Hawk fries him as the “Washington Redskin.” These relationships are critical to the plot moving forward at an increasing pace until suddenly you are confronted with wolves feasting. It is tragic and gut-wrenching moment, and I love it.

    Kilmer, who has slowly sided with Greene, has the proof he needs and brings the tribal police officer to meet the key to what is going on, but it isn’t as it was when he obtained the information. The modern-day cavalry is about to shoot them as their cars charge forward, which is similar to a dream Kilmer had of being at Wounded Knee when the Seventh U.S. Cavalry massacred the Sioux in December 1890 (Greene claims he had a vision). Their end has arrived, … or has it? LK personal collection.

    Shelia Tousey was, along with Chief Ted Thin Elk, John Trudell (who, in real life, was an activist for Indian rights), Sarah Brave, Julius Drum, and Graham Greene, perfect casting. She played a university-educated school teacher with children who had returned to the reservation to “help” her people, which also included being raped before the film begins. She is pretty, in control, but there wasn’t a forced relationship between her and Kilmer. Still, and although they were at odds and confrontational throughout most of the film, there is a connection. A connection. We’ve all been there, that is we’ve known people who might have been special but the relationship could never move to fruition for whatever reason.

    Best, Thunderheart grabbed me from the moment that Shepard began introducing Kilmer to the reservation. From there it goes in directions that change time and again. This is perhaps the most satisfying film I’m ever seen.

  2. Miami Vice, directed by Michael Mann and w/Colin Farrell, Gong Li, Jamie Foxx, John Ortiz, Naomie Harris, Luis Tosar, Elizabeth Rodriguez, John Hawkes, Barry Shabaka Henley, and Ciarán Hinds (2006)
    I liked the TV series Miami Vice with Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas (1984-89, with an unaired episode in January 1990), so when this film opened I was first in line to see it.

    This photo of Gong Li dates to Miami Vice. This is an LK image with her signature (not shown). LK personal collection.

    This thriller moves at lightning speed, has characters that jump off the screen, and it grabbed me from beginning to end. The TV series? Poof! Gone, never to be seen again. I have never been a fan of Farrell, but his performance was decent, tough, edgy, and by the end of the film, human. But the total surprise of the film was the Chinese actress Gong Li. For her English-language films Li learns her lines phonetically, which makes her performances even more amazing. Of her films on this list only one other is in English.

    A drug undercover operation goes bust; agents are killed, and Hawkes/Alonzo Stevens steps in front of big rig in front of Farrell/Sonny Crockett and Foxx/Ricardo Tubbs when he learns that his wife and daughter have been murdered. …

    John Ortiz as Jose Yero in one of his computer rooms watching Gong Li/Isabella dance with Colin Farrell/Sonny in a Cuban club in Havana, Florida. He isn’t pleased with what he sees and his discovery will lead to a big twist in the film. LK personal collection.

    We see Li for the first time when Florida undercover agents Farrell and Foxx pose as drug dealers who can deliver product in Florida, and maneuver to meet the linchpin who runs operation in the field, Ortiz/Jose Yero. Although Ortiz is not the kingpin of the cartel he is in complete control every time he is on camera. He is a master of the internet and the digital world and controls his domain from his computer rooms at his base or elsewhere when necessary (his performance was charismatic while being frightening). Farrell and Foxx appear to be unarmed when they enter a safe house in a very bad neighborhood way south of the border. It is obvious that they will be lucky to survive the encounter. They do, but it has nothing to have to do with luck. They are as focused, as deadly as Ortiz, and they one-up him. … They also get hired by him.

    Li is a silent image sitting in shadow, and the only memory of her is her crossed legs. This was my introduction to an actress who has since become my favorite of all time. Li’s performance was riveting, and I’m terribly understating this here. I could not take my eyes off her whenever she was on camera. This was not because she was beautiful, and she is, but because her natural and yet controlled performance captivated me in every scene.

    The film keeps me on edge while multiple characters are in jeopardy throughout. The dialogue is strong and moves the plot while developing all the characters. Yes, this film is a thriller and yet we are involved with almost every one of them, and it is relationship driven.

    Colin Farrell and Gong Li in the final scene in Miami Vice. They are outside a safe house and waiting for the boat that will remove her from the here and now. The relationship they had is over (but not dead), this is the present, and there is no future. … Been there and totally understand the moment. LK personal collection.

    Again this is a fast moving thriller, sexy beyond belief, but with a multitude of people I liked and cared about—good and evil, and trust me that John Ortiz is the devil incarnate while being so alive that he still resides in a dark area I never want to visit. … Li and Farrell struggle at the climax of the film when he must grab her and yank her to safety or watch her be killed. She is fury on two legs as she lashes out at him. He is stronger and pulls her from the carnage. By the time they reach a deserted building that butts up to a river she has calmed down. Inside the house he turns his back to her and she walks outside. She understands that the reality now controlling her life is inevitable and cannot change. So does he. Great acting. This is my favorite scene on film.

  3. Blood Diamond, directed by Edward Zwick and w/Leonardo DiCaprio, Djimon Hounsou, Jennifer Connelly, David Harewood, Arnold Vosloo, and Kagiso Kuypers (2006)
    This film is absolutely brilliant in oh-so-many ways.

    DVD cover for the widescreen edition of Blood Diamond.

    It deals with the illegal diamond trade in Sierra Leone, Africa, during the 1990s, racism, and the brutal murder of innocent people during a civil war wherein young boys were abducted and forced to become soldiers and trained to kill. It gives DiCaprio/Danny Archer (a white South African) his best part to date as a smuggler who doesn’t care about anyone or anything but himself; Hounsou/Solomon Vandy (a Black Mende fisherman who loves his family and will do anything to protect them); and Connelly/Maddy Bowen (an American reporter who craves a sensational story that would turn the diamond smuggling world on end).

    Without giving too much away, DiCaprio and Hounsou are incarcerated at the beginning of the film.

    As Hounsou and Kuypers race toward their family the worst possible happens. LK personal collection.

    This began after a good day at school for Kuypers/Dia Vandy (who is Hounsou’s son). He is excited at what he just learned as they walk back to their village. Suddenly rebels in trucks appear in the distance and it is obvious what their destination is. Hounsou forces Kuypers to flee (to no avail) as he attempts to save the rest of his family.

    The DiCaprio/Hounsou relationship doesn’t begin well. Worse, war erupts in the city and both run for their lives. LK personal collection.

    DiCaprio works for Vosloo/Colonel Coetzee (a big-time diamond smuggler). Unfortunately his latest gig to smuggle diamonds out of Sierra Leone ends badly. Hounsou’s life also sucks for after his village had been destroyed he became a forced worker for an illicit-diamond mining operation that is overseen by Harewood/Captain Poison. When the mining operation is raided Hounsou ends up in the same jail as DiCaprio. Harewood—now minus an eye—soon joins them. All three are separated in large cages of prisoners but can see each other. When Harewood exposes Hounsou for burying a huge diamond DiCaprio is all ears. DiCaprio is released first. When Djimon is set free DiCaprio is ready to strike for this diamond is his ticket out of Africa.

    But all isn’t as it should be, and this is the spine of the film. By now most of us are aware of how bad race relations have been in the Land of the Free over the centuries. No matter what my or your opinion is of the USA, it has been much worse on the continent of Africa. Some of what goes on during this small time-grab of history not long in the past is both horrifying and hard to watch.

    Hounsou is released from jail but DiCaprio’s forcing a partnership is ill-timed. They are at odds with no common ground. Worse the war has come to them and they must flee or be massacred.

    DiCaprio and Connelly in a private moment as he presents her with the information that will shoot her to the front of the newspaper-reporting world. LK personable collection.

    Enter Connelly, who oozes sex appeal (but not because she wears slinky clothes as she doesn’t). All business she connects with DiCaprio at an outside bar, but her lone goal is to expose the worldwide diamond trade, which in turn will give her credibility and celebrity. He realizes who she is, and says, “You’re a journalist.” “That’s right.” “Piss off, huh?” he replies. They see each other later at the same bar and while they dance she pushes him, finally saying, “Help me out off the record.” “Well, off the record I like to get kissed before I get fucked, huh,” he replies before walking away. A truer statement was never said. These two people never kiss, DeCaprio is harsh on Hounsou throughout the film, but by the end of it all three of them are human beings worth knowing in a shocking world that I have heard about, read about, but have never experienced. This film has been in my top five for years.

  4. Nobody’s Fool, directed by Robert Benton and w/Paul Newman, Pruitt Taylor Vince, Jessica Tandy, Dylan Walsh, Alexander Goodwin, Melanie Griffith, Bruce Willis, and Philip Seymour Hoffman (1994)
    Over time more than one person has declared that Paul Newman always played himself. This wasn’t negative, for these people made it clear that Newman was very good at playing himself. … I know this for a fact. In Nobody’s Fool, Newman/Sully struggles with surviving winter with his son’s family (and he’s not welcome), a lady who is his for the asking (Griffith/Toby Roebuck) who works for his sometime employer (Willis/Carl Roebuck), and a fragile woman who rents him a room (Tandy/Miss Beryl). This picture, probably more than most of the other films on this list, is character driven and the results are extraordinary. I can’t say enough about Newman’s sardonic and yet heartfelt performance of a man who meanders through his world of woe (he had been nominated for an Oscar and he should have won, at least in my view). The ups and downs of not only Newman, but of all the people in his life and this includes grandson Goodwin/Will Sullivan. All of them are a delight to behold regardless of their level of misery. Still I don’t want my life to be like Newman’s cinematic life, and yet I do as it is vibrant, in trouble, taking wrong-turns, caring, disappointed, and in love. No matter how bad it gets (and Newman even gets shot at and arrested for driving his pickup on the sidewalk) it is totally up-lifting. Maybe I should show you why.

    Philip Seymour Hoffman played Officer Raymer. He didn’t like Newman’s Sully and sped his patrol car to a parallel halt in front of Newman as he drove his beat-up pickup on the sidewalk in a residential neighborhood. He’s out of his car in a flash and with his revolver supported by his auto’s roof ordered Newman to stop and get out of the car. When Newman inched toward him, he fired away. The bullets missed Vince/Rub and Newman but shattered the windshield. Newman stopped the truck and walked toward Hoffman, who approached him. You can see what happened, and can guess what followed. LK personal collection.

    Maybe I shouldn’t.

    I’ve had my run-ins with John Law and they should be documented. Forget the streets for the worst was with LA County Sheriff’s Department Officer Libel. She pronounced her name differently than spelled and didn’t like it when I addressed her as Officer Libel (as spelled). This was in the mid-1980s when I quit acting cold turkey. My sister was then an officer in the Sheriff’s Department and she supported me joining her on the force. Officer Libel took offense at me applying for the position and told me, “I’m going to get you.” “Why?” “We don’t want any actors on the force,” and she did get me. When I told my sister that I was going to go after her in print, she said: “Don’t do it.” “Why?” “Don’t do it.” “Why?” “They’ll get you.” “Why?” “Don’t do it,” was all she’d say. I eventually understood her meaning and walked away from a heinous lie. … And I haven’t even mentioned encounters on the streets. All I’ll say here is that I’m not the goodie-two-shoes you think I am.

    Ditto Paul Newman’s Sully. At the same time he’s a giving and caring person (I hope that you’re making the connection here).

    Nobody’s Fool takes place in December. It is cold and dark at times. Here Newman is talking with his hired hand and best friend Pruitt Taylor Vince (as Rub Squeers). The best part of their relationship is that Vince has no fear of voicing what he is unsure or unhappy about. When Newman’s grown up son (Dylan Walsh as Peter Sullivan) enters the picture with his own family problems and Newman turns his back on the past and welcomes his reunion with his son Vince fears for his relationship, and this includes a major piece of jealousy. LK personal collection.

    Every movie—every movie—should be like this! Like Thunderheart, every time I see this film it is a new experience, and affects me in a different way. … It is a piece of life that all of us experience but in different and yet personal ways. I need to say something about Paul Newman here, and it’s a black mark on LK for I’ve mostly ignored his films over the years. Don’t ask why for I don’t know the answer while at the same time seeing some damned-good performances by him.

    I’ve made a point of ignoring the plot for the reason that it is all over the place, and I could never do it justice without giving everything away. I don’t want to do this as this is a film that must be experienced without knowledge of what is coming.

  5. Red Corner, directed by Jon Avnet and w/Richard Gere, Bai Ling, Tsai Chin (Chairman Xu), Jessey Meng, Tzi Ma, and James Hong (1997)
    This film is a nightmare lurking quietly in the dark for any of us who visit foreign countries if you or I make a mistake.


    At the beginning of this century my daughter and I were riding in a Paris subway. The
    car was empty except for two young women who sat across from us near the rear
    exit (two men stayed by the exit and although we couldn’t see them they carried on
    a conversation with the women in French. I had some words, enough to know that
    they were talking about us. “At the next stop,” I quietly said to my daughter, “we’ll wait
    until it’s almost time for the subway to depart. When I tell you, we’re going to rush
    to the front exit and get off.” “Why?” “Just do it.” During the stop the women watched            us and smiled as they chatted with the still unseen men. “Now,” I whispered and we
    dashed to the exit and got off just before the door shut. As the subway pulled away all
    four were
    glaring at us through the windows. …

    This was nothing compared to what Richard Gere is about to experience.

    Businessman Gere/Jack Moore is about to close a major deal with his Chinese partners. Everyone is enjoying themselves in a hotel banquet room, drinking, and watching a fashion show on a ramp. One of the models pointedly makes eye contact with him. He catches her look, and as she is pretty he maintains the contact. After the show has ended Gere notices her glancing at him and drawing something. He excuses himself and crosses to her table and looks at her creation. He points to his nose. “Is that me? My nose?” They’re able to communicate with a few words and gestures.

    Richard Gere and Jesse Meng easily connect, but it won’t go as either of them expect. LK personal collection.

    The conversation flows easily, too easily, and before the evening ends Meng/Hong Ling is in Gere’s hotel room. The night is magical as they enjoy each other’s company.

    Morning arrives early—too early—and Chinese police break the hotel door open and charge into the room. Gere is yanked awake. He’s groggy, unaware what has happened or is about to happen. He quickly learns that horrid screams were reported in the night. Gere appears so drunk that it would have been impossible for him to indulge in sex, much less rape and brutally murder Meng. Still, the room is one-huge murder scene. There is blood and gore everywhere, not to mention Meng’s corpse. Three large and empty bottles of alcohol are just part of the evidence (but none of the police ever question how two people could have drank that much without passing out hours before the crime allegedly happened).

    The case is open and shut and there is no doubt what the final verdict will be. Ling/Shen Yuelin is assigned to defend the evil Jack Moore. This is the last thing in the world she wants. Ditto Gere when he realizes that his defender considers him guilty. We are now at the point where the story begins.

    This is a dramatic scene from the film captured in a German lobby card, and the title translates to Red Corner: Labyrinth Without a Way Out. Gere’s character has been accused of murder in China. Bai Ling (center) is his lawyer, and her performance is right there with Gere as the story progresses to conclusion. Unfortunately I have never seen her in anything else although she has been in a number of other movies that might be considered “B” films. Perhaps it is because she had posed nude elsewhere; if yes, she shouldn’t be punished for this. LK personal collection.

    With Gere’s arrest and being assigned to Ling the plot of Red Corner moves into the world of racism and shows the consequences of might happen when a person is imprisoned in a foreign country, … and it is brutal.

                         Hey, folks, take a look at the USA: How many
                    foreign-born children are going to die in modern-day
                 concentration camps while separated from their parents,
                    or simply disappear never to be reunited with their
                                parents before they are deported?

    The film is a courtroom drama and a thriller and both genres mix easily.

    A free man, Gere is about to board a flight that will return him to the USA. Unfortunately I don’t know the translation of the words. For the record the film never screened in China. LK personal collection.

    Unforeseen circumstances lead to Gere’s eventual freedom. This is not to say that Ling’s Shen Yuelin didn’t do everything she could to win in court but her country controlled what she could and could not do.

    The scene in the poster is at the end of Red Corner. Like other films in this list the leading characters have come to respect each other, have the beginnings of feelings for each other, but there is no where to go as their lives have different life trajectories.

    Perhaps Richard Gere is ignored in the USA and damned in China for something that if you aren’t aware of it you should be: His stance on Tibet and other injustices in our world. KUDOS to him for he dares to speak up about heinous reality. This has not pleased China, and after this film was released he became a persona non grata in both Tibet and China. By the way, the film was shot in the USA.

  6. Quigley Down Under, directed by Simon Wincer and w/Tom Selleck, Laura San Giacomo, Alan Rickman, Steve Dodd (1990)
    This is a western down-under in Australia. Don’t let this fool you for it deals with racism, the butchery of indigent people, and in my opinion contains the best gunfight in all of western film history.

    This image of Tom Selleck was taken as he got off the ship that transported him from the USA to Australia. He is good with guns, especially the rifle, and he answered an ad for a gun for hire. This image is almost iconic, and I love what the production company did to move from color to almost grayscale in the photo. LK personal collection.

    Selleck/Matthew Quigley was/is just one of numerous actors that starred on TV and then moved successfully to film (Steve McQueen, Clint Eastwood, James Garner, and George Clooney were/are four biggies that made this jump).

    Although Laura San Giacomo’s Crazy Cora (left) is tough, a fighter, and a survivor, she is totally in tune with the harsh world that she has been dumped into and reacts to it. Here she is looking at a dead Aboriginal woman that she had connected with. LK personal collection.

    What can I say? Quigley Down Under is little more than an American Indian wars story moved to the Australian Outback. Yeah, right. I need to say a few more words, mainly that this is a storyline that shines beyond belief.

    The wild and unpredictable prostitute San Giacomo/(aptly named) Crazy Cora and the stoic gunman Selleck are a mismatch from the get-go. Their relationship is hilarious and sad at the same time. Their joining is one that can never work, and we know that in the first reel when Selleck protects her from an escort that are little more than thugs with rape on their minds, and whose function is to deliver her and others to their final destination that are days in the future.

    Alan Rickman is perfect as Elliott Marston, a wannabe gunman and all that it entails. LK personal collection.

    Journey’s end is the massive ranch that Rickman/Marston lords over. He is also envious and knowledgeable of the gunfighters of the American West, and especially Wild Bill Hickok whom he desperately wants to become the Australian counterpart and this to the point that he envisions himself walking the streets of Dodge City, Kansas, during its heyday. Worse, he yearns to kill a worthy pistoleer in a gunfight. Selleck had no idea what he hired on to do when he reached Rickman’s ranch. He quickly learns when he dines with his racist employer who traffics in people. Aborigines and women, and the former are the reason for his employment.

    In this scene from the film Laura San Giacomo holds an Aborigine boy who she rescued from a massacre and has since protected with her life. It is one of many in which we get an inside look at her character as well as Tom Selleck’s. LK personal collection.

    Dodd/Kunkurra is Rickman’s token Aborigine man servant and is dressed appropriately for his position. Unfortunately I don’t have any photos of Steve Dodd from the film, and it looks like his acting career and active support of Australian Aborigines was long. He is throughout the film and we get to know him for who he really is despite him performing his duties without a misstep. Actually, we soon see that the entire film focuses on the plight of the Aboriginal people who inhabit the wide open spaces of the never-ending Outback of Australia. Do not doubt that you will see that their lifeway, although on the other side of the world, is similar to the American Indians in that they are looked down upon as less than human and the invading white man would like nothing better than eliminate them. Although there are many Aborigine actors in the film, except for Dodd, their parts are small. At the same time they and what they represent is forever present.

    This is a publicity photo of Laura San Giocomo and Tom Selleck near the end of the film. It is one of several taken at this time and is my favorite. LK personal collection.

    Even though two people struggling to survive in the middle of a desert without anything but themselves, don’t let this fool you. The intended elimination and butchery of the Aborigines is the focus of the film. It is vivid, heart-rending (the only thing missing is the sexual mutilation of dead victims) and it effects me each viewing as much as it does San Giacomo and Selleck.Selleck quickly realizes he made a mistake sailing to Australia, and this quickly puts him and San Giacomo on the run—two outcasts who don’t get along with no chance of survival. This mismatched farce that joins them at the hip gives both of them plenty of room to explore who they are and what they want. Their relationship is always alive and easily worth 20 viewings of the film.

    Although presented upfront the murder of the Aborigines is basically ignored by the British who rule the land as they look down at the Australians and the wild people of the Outback. Racism drips from the screen. Although hinted at but not anticipated a one-on-one gunfight looms—a la Wild Bill Hickok. It is a comin’, and when it happens it does not disappoint. The film stands up fine without a final gunfight, but when Selleck and Rickman face each other it is a classic duel, and my favorite of all time.

  7. Last of the Mohicans, directed by Michael Mann and w/Daniel Day-Lewis, Madeleine Stowe, Wes Studi, Russell Means, Steven Waddington, Eric Schweig, Jodhi May, and Maurice Roeves (1992)
    The first time I saw this film was when my daughter needed to view it for a school assignment and we rented it on video. I was bored to tears and fell asleep.

    Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeleine Stowe are the best film duo in what I consider a western film (and that includes Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland in They Died with Their Boots On, Warner Bros., 1941). I know, I know—heresy! … But this isn’t so as production values and film have changed over those 51 years. If Flynn and de Havilland played George and Livvie Custer in 1992 it might have been a different LK comment here. We’re talking about place and time. LK personal collection.

    A great start (and I’m being sarcastic at myself). … Believe it or not I’ve seen the film many times since then, so I guess that first impressions are not always accurate.

    Wes Studi plays Magua, a Huron chief who has aligned with the French during the French and Indian war with the English (between 1754 and 1763). LK personal collection.

    All I can say is that the scope of this film, the script (adaptions from James Fenimore Cooper’s novel and Philip Dunne’s 1936 screenplay by John L. Balderston, Paul Perez, and Daniel Moore), the dialogue, the grasp of race (and that includes between the British and the colonists) during the French and Indian war, and acting all gel in such a fusion of reality and fiction that every time I see the film it is an experience.

    I need to introduce you to Wes Studi; he’s a great American actor who happens to be a full-blooded Cherokee from Nofire Hollow, Oklahoma. What’s best about the roles he’s played is that he easily moves between being an antagonist and a protagonist. In Last of the Mohicans his Huron Chief Magua is the former as he chose to team with the French. On screen he is focused, intense, totally in control of the moment, dangerous beyond belief, and his character is someone none of us ever want to face when our lives are on the line. This is a terrific portrayal by him and one of numerous performances wherein he brings American Indians to life on screen.

    These are real people in real situations, and I don’t care if it is Day-Lewis/Hawkeye, the scout who walks between the races with the father who adopted him; Means/Mohican Chief Chingachgook; the white princess Stowe/Cora Munro who has been sheltered from the world by her father Roeves/Colonel Edward Munro of the British army; her younger sister May/Alice, who falls in love with Chingachgook’s son Schweig/Uncas; and finally the British officer Waddington/Major Duncan Heyward who stood firmly for God and country but becomes heinous when Cora refuses to accept his proposal of marriage. It sounds complicated; it isn’t.

    Left: Major Duncan Hayward (Steven Waddington) has offered his life for Hawkeye and his lady’s lives. They run but stop and look back. He is burning at the stake. This cannot be and Hawkeye (Daniel Day-Lewis) ends his life while Cora Munro (Madeleine Stowe) watches. This is not the climax of the film. LK personal collection.

    In this film we walk between race and equality time and again. It is alive, explosive, and, even though I have read James Fenimore Cooper’s great novel several times and know the ending I am on the edge of my seat until this film ends, and the final reel explodes in tragedy.

    Chingachgook (Means) and Hawkeye (Day-Lewis) look into the distance. They have survived, as has Cora (Stowe), but the chief is now the last Mohican. LK personal collection.

    Before walking away from Mr. Means (10nov1939-22oct2012), who was an Oglala Lakota (Sioux), I need to tell you that he played a large role in the creation of the American Indian Movement (AIM), the takeover of the town of Wounded Knee, South Dakota (1973), with Dennis Banks and many others, a standoff with the U.S. government that lasted 71 days (27feb1973–8may1973). Many have cursed Means and those with him during those days that seem a lifetime ago. No! He and AIM were fighting for American Indian rights. This must be praised and not censored.

    Daniel Day-Lewis (left), Michael Mann (director), Madeline Stowe, and Russell Means at a premier of Last of the Mohicans in 1993 (but I don’t know where). LK personal collection.

    Day-Lewis and Stowe are one of the best film duos in the last 40 years. This said, Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland, who played George and Libbie Custer in They Died with Their Boots On (Warner Bros., 1941), are my top film duo for all time, and will forever remain so.

  8. The Birds, directed by Alfred Hitchcock and w/Rod Taylor, Tippi Hedren, Jessica Tandy, Suzanne Pleshette (as Annie Hayworth), and Veronica Cartwright (1963)
    Even though all the advertising pushed Hedren, Alfred Hitchcock’s current “discovery,” this is Rod Taylor’s film.

    Rod Taylor/Mitch Brenner begins a relationship with Tippi Hedren/Melanie Daniels in Bodega Bay shortly after they met in a bird shop in San Francisco, when he enjoyed himself at her expense. It was not a good introduction but—there’s also a “but” when a relationship begins. What I really like about this film is its closeness to the Golden Age of Cinema and the inception of what film would become by the end of the 1960s/beginning of the 1970s. LK personal collection.

    A production shot during filming with the cast listening to Hitchcock. LK personal collection.

    Mr. Taylor’s charms, as almost always, light up the screen from the moment he appears. More, the story is seen through his eyes, and he dominates this decent reinvention of Daphne du Maurier’s short horror story of birds attacking people on a farm in England. His charm, like fellow Australian Errol Flynn’s, is always present in his films after he became a leading man. Although The Time Machine (1960) would turn him into a star, it was The Birds that would be his film for all time.

    Regardless of Tipi Hedren, who was perhaps forced to do things she did not want, being publicized as the lead of the film—she wasn’t. I have heard hints of what most–likely happened between her and director Alfred Hitchcock but have never been privy to this and don’t know the details. Of course I can guess. I met Ms. Hedren once at the end of the 1970s when tigers her from Shambala Preserve, an animal sanctuary created in the early 1970s in Acton, California, were used in a Tom Skerritt TV film, Maneaters [as spelled] are Loose (Mona Productions, 1978), wherein they terrorized a rural community. I had met Tom when I was assigned to work with him on a script he was developing at Theatre West (Studio City, Calif.) in 1969. Before the play went into production he was cast as one of the three leading doctors in MASH (20th Century Fox, 1970), a black comedy about the Vietnam war, and never looked back.

    Rod Taylor and Tippi Hedren in one of their many scenes after the birds begin to attack people. Although featured and pretty to look at starlet Hedren had no chance of upending Taylor’s charm and presence in every frame in which he appeared in The Birds. From beginning until the end his persona and performance drove the film to conclusion. Taylor delivered an easy and yet well-defined performance that was key for one of Hitchcock’s best films to succeed. LK personal collection.

    The film begins simply when lawyer Taylor is in a bird shop in San Francisco to buy a bird for Cartwright/Cathy Brenner, his young sister’s birthday, who lives in the small Northern California community of Bodega Bay with their mother Tandy/Lydia Brenner. Hedren is present and they clash over the identity of lovebirds. Taylor enjoys the confrontation; her less so. On a whim she buys the lovebirds to deliver to his sister in Bodega Bay, a little more than an hour’s drive north of San Francisco on the California coast (for the record a good part of the film was shot on location). This is just the beginning of a film that is filled with charm, caring, and even love before it slowly dives into a horror that could someday happen—a relationship–centric reality that begins on a light note and slowly gets darker and darker and darker …

    The next two films are musts for this list but they shouldn’t be in the number 9 and 10 spots. They are here for one simple reason, and that is
    they have played a major role in my life. To be exact they
    have impacted over 20 years of my life.

  9. Last of the Dogmen, directed by Tab Murphy and w/Tom Berenger, Barbara Hershey, Steve Reevis (1995)
    The story centers on the Cheyenne people (seen or not), and although they are mostly shadows for easily three-fifths of the film they are the focus throughout. This film has been a major part of my life since before 2013 when I finally signed a contract to research and write a book about the Sand Creek massacre. No joke, and I’m as surprised as you, for somewhere around 2010 or 2011 if you asked me if I would write a book about the massacre and mutilation of people who thought they were under the protection of the U.S. government I would have laughed in your face.

    These photos are totally out of order here. Who gives a damn? I don’t. What you see here is Tom Berenger’s fantasy that could never be true; Barbara Hershey’s most magnificent dream becoming reality; and a world of Cheyenne people surviving from 1864 and long into the future undiscovered (Lordy, lordy, … this is a time and place that LK would gladly step into even if he could never return to reality). LK personal collection.

    Do not doubt that I have known this film since the beginning for I saw it twice when it premiered in Los Angeles in 1995. Barbara Hershey was already one of my favorite actresses and in my opinion she and Tom Berenger had the perfect chemistry to make this story work. Better, 18 years later the film influenced my decision to buy into a project with such a huge scope that I knew that it would be years before it saw print. Sand Creek and the Tragic End of a Lifeway will be published in spring 2020. Hershey and Berenger’s performances are delightful and I never saw a false moment in their relationship. At the same time I’ve cursed them for all the years they’ve stolen from my life. If not for them, and the magnificent former editor-in-chief at the University of Oklahoma Press, Chuck Rankin, the Sand Creek manuscript would have never happened. Let’s start with Cheyenne Dog Men surviving the massacre of Sand Creek on November 29, 1864, and living undiscovered into the modern world is a great premise (although totally illogic). For the record there were only a small number Dog Men (white man term for the warrior society: Dog Soldiers) at Sand Creek.

    Tom Berenger and Barbara Hershey are prisoners of Cheyennes lost in time in Last of the Dogmen. LK personal collection.

    The butchery was beyond description and included hacking sexual organs off the dead and using them as ornaments and headbands (this is a fact). Berenger can be evil and he can be charming (I could list a number of his films that didn’t make this list, but could have), … Hershey is one of the best ignored actresses of my time (perhaps because many of her films were B productions, perhaps because she never had a breakout success, perhaps because she did a lot of TV work). I don’t know. This is a lady that I have never met, have no clue to who she really is, and this is disappointing.

    Barbara Hershey in Last of the Dogmen. LK personal collection.

    Years back I fantasized that she was a guest on a major nighttime talk show and I was an add-on due a book being published and she tore into me for my view on history. I challenged her to present proof to backup what she claimed. She challenged me to do the same. The host enjoyed the fireworks and invited us both back to continue our personal war. By the second evening Ms. Hershey had read some of my books and backed away from her less than savory view of me. Alas, nothing could happen for by then our history was already fact and couldn’t be rewritten. … I like my history but at times wonder what could have happened if I had turned right instead of left on that long lonely road we all travel.

    Berenger is a modern-day bounty hunter and has ridden into a mostly unexplored Montana mountain range called the “Outback” with his dog, Zip (who is a scene stealer), to track down three escaped convicts. All he finds are a few pieces of what once were men and an Indian arrow. One night he sees Indians from the mid-nineteenth century riding in and out of the mist. Or did he? After returning to civilization and needing to know the answer he looks for a university professor and Cheyenne Indian expert on a massive excavation site but can’t find him (that is Professor L. D. Sloan). He is pointed one way and then another and always misses his target. Finally he comes upon two college students who are on both sides of a woman. In frustration he blurts out: “Do any of you know where the old fart L. D. Sloan is?” The two students slowly point at the woman (Hershey), who says: “‘L. D.,’ for ‘Lillian Diane.'” Oops!

    One of many photos of Tom Berenger and his horse in the film. He is glaring at Barbara Hershey when she announces that she is joining him in his search for Cheyennes from 1864 living into the present. LK personal collection.

    She isn’t impressed with his suggestion that Indians from the past could have survived into the future undetected. Refusing to leave he shows her the arrow. Hershey confirms that it is a Cheyenne Dog Man arrow. “Well?” he pushes, trying to get her to confirm that Cheyennes from times past are living in the Outback. “$12.95 in any gift shop,” she says, dismissing him.

    Later, and after Berenger has done research in old newspapers (something that LK does often), Hershey agrees to accompany him into the Outback. He thinks one of her male students is going to join him, and is upset when he realizes that she is going with him. After he complains that the trip is no place for a woman, she checks her saddle and mounts. “Let’s get a move on,” she tells him. “As they say, we’re burnin’ daylight.”

    Other than totally enjoying this film while knowing that it could never have happened, there is one scene in it that grabbed me the first time I saw it and it has never let go. It happened one night in the Outback while Hershey and Berenger relaxed in camp after a long day with zero results hunting for the Cheyenne Dogmen.

    Put another way, her handful of words are the reason why I decided to sign the contract for the Sand Creek manuscript …. “What happened was inevitable,” Hershey tells him. “The way it happened was unconscionable.”

  10. Geronimo: An American Legend, directed by Walter Hill and w/Wes Studi, Jason Patric, Gene Hackman, Kevin Tighe, Matt Damon, Robert Duvall, Steve Reevis (Chato), Stephen McHattie, Rino Thunder, Rodney A. Grant, Lee du Broux, and Pato Hoffman (1993)
    When this film opened in Los Angeles I saw twice in movie theaters. I liked the scope and grandeur, but not the focus which I thought was all over the place. It should have concentrated on Studi/Geronimo but wandered.
    Although this blog isn’t about music I must mention Ry Cooder’s magnificent film score, which was a mix of period music and his original compositions. I have a lot of film scores that I play often, and Mr. Cooder’s soundtrack is my favorite for all time.
    … At the time I saw the film it was touted as factual. I knew nothing about the war leader/mystic Geronimo (although I did like how the mysticism was worked into the story) or the Chiricahua Apaches. I also knew nothing about the whites who had large roles.

    This image is from the beginning of the film when Geronimo and Gatewood hold off a Tucson posse after he returned to the U.S. in February 1884. There are a number of problems with this scene and they are major. 1) When Geronimo returned he was accompanied by 15-16 warriors, some 70 women and children, and a herd of 135 cattle stolen in Mexico. 2) Gatewood wasn’t present although Davis was but he wasn’t a raw recruit right of West Point. 3. There wasn’t a posse (only two government officials, whom Davis and Lt. J. Y.F. Blake got drunk while Geronimo moved northward with his people and stolen cattle). Actually the error list for Geronimo’s return to American soil is extensive. … The above scene shows Studi and Patric scattering the “Tucson” posse and it has decent dialogue and is fun to watch but is little more than pure fiction. LK personal collection.

    This is “The Dreamer” (or medicine man?) at Cibicue (think Hoffman but the credits are confusing). It is a small part but it has always stayed with me as he is sympathetic (perhaps read symbolic) while the U.S. officer in charge is brutal and non-listening and pushing the event to violence, which included three Apache scouts turning on the soldiers they served with and which resulted in them hung as traitors. It is the perfect scene to move the story forward. … Or is it? The Cibicue Apaches were/are one of five bands of Western Apaches, of whom the White Mountains were/are the largest and most aggressive (the other three were/are the San Carlos, Northern Tonto and Southern Tonto). More important. Actually MORE IMPORTANT is that that White Mountains and Chiricahuas did not get along to the point that the former often served as Apache scouts for the U.S. in the wars against the hated Chiricahuas. … The incident at Cibicue happened in 1881—three years before Geronimo returned to American soil in 1884 (see above)—and there were no Chiricahuas present and certainly not Geronimo but this tragic incident has Studi present and it shows just how good Geronimo was at surviving while at war. This is good for it gives us a close-up look at Geronimo, but again the Western Apaches were enemies of the Chiricahuas. But—that is BUT—the film continues with its fiction for the next major sequence in it gives us Geronimo’s final breakout from the reservation (1885 from Turkey Creek, which was some 30-35 miles east southeast of Fort Apache, which was located on the White Mountain Indian Reservation. Lordy-lordy, how many missed opportunities could this film present to a movie-going public that was/is clueless? LK personal collection.

    The film begins when Geronimo returns to the  U.S. from Mexico. Patric’s Gatewood and Damon’s Davis (a raw recruit just out of West Point) travel to the Mexican border to meet him and escort him to the reservation.

    Things are about to get complicated in the string of events and their dating that the film covers right through Geronimo’s final surrender. This said, they are dramatic, exciting, and present culture while supposedly documenting the final years of Geronimo and the Chiricahua Apaches freedom. A few examples will show just how mixed up the script was—and again touted as historically correct—while mixing a string of events that weren’t related and at the same time shoving a number of scenes into the film that are right out of paperback western novels sold in grocery stores that romanticize or demonize the taming of the American West.

    The killing at Cibicue, as intimated above, led to Geronimo and Naiche’s last outbreak from being prisoners of war and living on a reservation (LK: pure baloney). Naiche was the last hereditary Chiricahua chieftain and during those last years while struggling to remain free they often camped and traveled together, and of great importance were together at the final surrender. His absence from the film is huge (and in my opinion the most heinous error in it).

    This scene shows Geronimo (Studi), Nana but called “Old Nana” (Thunder) in the film as the producers probably felt we wouldn’t see his white hair and realize that he was older than Geronimo, and Mangas (Grant) at Turkey Creek. Although not in the film there would be a lot of dissension within the tribe prior to the final breakout and it totally missed the disruption between the Chiricahua leaders and people in regards to if they should flee or not. LK personal collection, and this is my favorite still from the film.

    Soon after the breakout Patric/Gatewood led a patrol of soldiers with a handful of Apache scouts. A Chiricahua war party tailed him. Soon the war leader challenged him to a one-on-one duel. This was nicely shot and exciting. In the image Patric realizes what is happening and knows what he must do. LK personal collection.

    Prior to the 1885 breakout from Turkey Creek Charles Gatewood commanded patrols of 80 Apache scouts when in the field (a subordinate officer and an interpreter were the only other white men on these patrols; sometimes the interpreters were Apaches). In 1885 the real Gatewood was military commandant of the White Mountain Indian Reservation headquartered at Fort Apache in the mountains to the north of the San Carlos Indian Reservation in the valley far below. Although in the field briefly at the beginning of the outbreak he spent the rest of the war overlooking his wards, the White Mountain Apaches. … No matter for in the film Patric/Gatewood is center stage in two of the most dramatic scenes in the film after Geronimo fled the rez for the last time—scenes that never happened in reality (see the above image for the first one).

    As you’ll see directly below I’m not too keen on Bob Duvall’s performance. This image is from the first scene in the film (I have a great shot of him firing away in the Mexican cantina but I didn’t want to use it). LK personal collection.

    In the second scene Patric/Gatewood and his totally fictional escort travel into Mexico looking for Geronimo. They stumble upon a destroyed village and see the remains of Indian men, women, and children who weren’t at war but had been murdered and then hacked to pieces by scalphunters. When Patric and escort enter a cantina he sees McHattie/Schoonover, who craves Reevis/Chato’s scalp. This scene reeks of hatred and violence.

    Before moving forward I need to share a few thoughts. Hackman/General George Crook and Tighe/General Nelson Miles provide good and believable performances while “Bob” Duvall absolutely sucked as scout Al Sieber (those of you who know anything about Sieber can guess why). I hate myself for saying this as I enjoyed a great three-plus months working closely with Bob in 1980. I can’t say enough good words about the man, the human being who was kind and giving, and one of the most iconic actors of my lifetime (more below when I share a few thoughts about Mr. Patric).

    Patric/Gatewood and Studi/Geronimo reach Skeleton Canyon, New Mexico Territory for the final surrender in September 1886 (the actor/characters in the background weren’t present). Unfortunately the entire Geronimo–Gatewood meeting in Sonora, Mexico, that August was total bullshit in the film (the researchers–writers–producers of Geronimo: An American Legend had no clue how dramatic that long one–day meeting between Gatewood, Geronimo, and Naiche was. The film’s loss, our loss, film history’s loss. LK personal collection.

    Wes Studi, even though ten–plus years too young to play Geronimo, is brilliant. I’ve always felt this way about his performance because he humanized the war leader/mystic. Geronimo’s name terrorized people in the American Southwest, but that was/is a totally one–sided view. Let’s simply consider the number of wives, number of children, number of family members he lost over his lifetime and ask one question: Why did he do what he did? I know the answer and it’s never going to change. … Not so with Jason Patric’s performance and since 1995 I’ve ripped his portrayal of Gatewood (mainly because I don’t think he did any research other than knowing that the lieutenant was from Virginia). … There have been three films that have played major impacts on my life: Errol Flynn’s The Sea Hawk (1940), Flynn’s They Died with Their Boots On (1941), and Geronimo: An American Legend. If I can remove/ignore the facts in Mr. Flynn’s films I can do it with Mr. Studi and Mr. Patric’s film. When I do this, and it has taken me over two and a half decades to do so, this is a pretty damned good movie. I just told you my view of Wes Studi’s  performance. Finally after what feels like forever I can accept Jason Patric playing Gatewood heroically (and ditto Mr. Duvall’s racist performance).


    Almost a year and a half after seeing Geronimo: An American Legend I signed Custer and the Cheyenne for Aaron and Ruth Cantor Cohen at Guidon Books in Scottsdale, Arizona. They had always helped me over the years, and on this occasion our conversation turned to western film. Specifically we discussed two films, this one (which did not do well at the box office) and Tombstone (which was a major hit), and how they impacted book sales. Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and the gunfight at the OK Corral saw a major increase in sales whereas Geronimo and the Apache wars did not. I’ve read about Holliday and Earp but I’m never going to write about them. Conversely Gatewood and Geronimo had caught my interest.

    LK with a colorized cutout of a photo of Geronimo taken at Canyon de los Embudos in Sonora, Mexico, in 1886, at the Geronimo exhibit, Arizona Historical Society, Tucson, Arizona, on 12feb2012. (photo by Glen Williams and © Louis Kraft and Glen Williams 2012)

    Ruth told me that the Gatewood Collection was housed at the Arizona Historical Society in Tucson, Arizona. The following month I took a week off from Infonet (where I was a technical writer) wrapped between two weekends and drove to Tucson. Whoa, cowboy! The following month I took two weeks off wrapped between three weekends. At that time I had begun my next Indian wars book (on Ned Wynkoop), but now it went on hold (as it turned out a ten-year hold, although there were Wynkoop talks, articles, and the beginning of Wynkoop one-man plays). I had discovered an amazing man in Charles Gatewood but it wasn’t enough, and I quickly realized that Geronimo would be the perfect companion in dual biography.

    So why is this film on the list?
    No Aaron, no Ruth, and no film, … no two LK books:
    Gatewood & Geronimo (2000) and
    Lt. Charles Gatewood & His Apache Wars Memoir (2005).