Ol’ Roy

By Hugh Brooks

The first fingers of sunlight separated the Venetian blinds as Dad woke me up on Saturday mornings. Beams from golden dawns tickled the college pennants over my bed and streamed down my wall like orange blossom honey. Honey? Honey. Oh, yeah! BREAKFAST! Staggering into the den, picking up speed, wiping the last remnants of sleep from my eyes, I headed for the kitchen-turned-concession-stand. A quick pass through the pantry - Sugar Crisp? Life? (Mikey likes it), Frosted Flakes? Where is it...where is it? Bingo! Sugar Pops!

Cradle the tall yellow box in my left hand, stiff-arm my dog Sparky with my right. Back to the den in a headlong rush ending in a textbook hook slide that Mickey Mantle couldn't duplicate. (Actually, he could if the Yankees had worn flannel jammies and the basepaths were linoleum.) Safe at home, literally, I would power up the Zenith color console with the big toe of my right foot just moments before seven a.m.

And there he would be, sure as shootin'.

Leonard Slye. Better known as Roy Rogers…King of the Cowboys.

Two-gun-totin', lasso-ropin', straight-shootin' Roy.

I guess it's safe to say that Roy was my first real hero. I watched his feature films a hundred times, and probably saw every one of the 101 half-hour TV episodes that were filmed between 1951 and 1957. To be honest, the decaffeinated half-hour shows with Pat Brady and Nellybelle just weren't the same as the full-length films, with robust, full-flavored names like, "Heldorado", "The Yellow Rose of Texas," "Roll On Texas Moon," "Lights of Old Santa Fe," and "Heart of the Golden West."

I sat, entranced, as Roy and Dale Evans-- the "Queen of the West"-- found love beneath starry skies, Roy outfoxed the bad guys, and the Sons of the Pioneers harmonized while biscuits browned and beans bubbled over campfires on the prairie. Not just me, mind you, but eighty million little whippersnappers around the world vaulted onto their ottomans, spurred the naugahyde flanks and rode together with Roy and Trigger as our prepubescent posse reeled in runaway stages or overtook fleeing bad guys. Just like Roy’s, our quick draw (practiced hour upon hour before a mirror with plastic Peacemakers from Hubley and Mattel) was too fast to be seen. Just like Roy, we always let the offending outlaw draw first before we mercifully blasted the six-shooter from the varmint's hand without so much as nicking his fingers.

Maybe that's what made Roy a hero. No bloodshed or carnage. No sneering one-liners that are the hallmark of our action heroes today. Roy was always smiling, even winking, like he was in on some private joke. Heck, even Trigger had a sense of humor, playfully nudging a blushing Roy against a purty girl in every other episode. They worked together well. They were faithful companions, buddies, sharing good times.

Good times…

Things were different in those times. A real man always told the truth like Roy. A man's word was his bond, and he would never run out on his friends or his family. A man’s man, Roy wouldn't back down from a fight with a villain, but was quick to rely on his wits rather than his weapons. I think every bad guy in the Old West fell, literally, for Roy's old trick of cutting the saddle cinch on a bad guy’s Cayuse, then tying the no good varmint’s saddle to a nearby tree with his lariat. It was only when push came to shove that Roy's nickel-plated sixguns appeared in his hands as if by magic. Then, sure as shootin’, some black-hatted rascal was going to lose the use of his gun hand for a while. In between, there was always time for a song or two, punctuated by Roy's incredible talent for yodeling.

Think about it. Can you imagine Bronson, Eastwood, or Stallone wearing a kerchief? (That's bandanna to all you naugahyde riders out there). How about yodeling? Yodeling! Can you envision Bruce Willis responding to directions to yodel in "Die Hard - The Western?" ("Yodel-adee-WHO the *#&! do you think I am, Julie Andrews?") Do you think Schwarzenneger is man enough to tuck HIS pants inside the tops of his cowboy boots while wearing a shirt made by a man named Nudie? Roy was. Some people march to a different drummer. Roy allemanded left when the rest of the world sashayed right.

There's been a tremendous revival of interest in ol' Roy as of late. There are hundreds upon hundred of ads in Ebay for lunchboxes, guitars, comic books and trading cards, all of which bear the likeness of Roy, Dale and Trigger. They promote bidding wars and command handsome prices, apparently driven by the purchasing power of eighty million middle-aged yupparoos like me who are searching for the launch codes to their own retrorocket. You can buy boxed sets of Roy's movies at Blockbusters, and I've even seen life-sized cardboard posters of Roy -- guns drawn but smiling -- in those crazy, black-lighted gift shops that sell everything from massage oils to lava lamps. It makes you wonder how many Roys are standing guard in family rooms across the country tonight?

I confess that I maintain my own little shrine. A shadow box on my den wall contains several reproduction trading cards (from the Premium Collectors Set, First Edition), a bandanna, and the box that contained my special edition Roy and Trigger wristwatch made by Fossil. Nothing that I have is old or original, but it reminds me of old times and stirs up original feelings.

In 1993, I was traveling by wagon (Chrysler not Conestoga, thank-you) from Los Angeles to Las Vegas when I saw a sign that read, "The Roy Rogers Museum - next exit". Roy Rogers! Well, pardner, I reined that rental up short and found myself standing at the portal to another time. I bought my ticket, and walked inside the building that exhibited the final possessions of an original American hero. Like the first man to enter Tut’s tomb, I stumbled, wide-eyed, from one treasure-filled room to the next. Silver saddles, buscadero belts, well-worn guitars. Even Bullet and Trigger were there. ("More hay, Trigger? No thanks, Roy, I'm stuffed.")

There they were, Roy's guns. Roy's boots. Roy's...BOWLING BALL! ("Step back. I think he's coming around now. Please, just give him some air. No, he was staring at that blue Brunswick in the case when his eyes kinda glazed and he keeled right over".) Bowling trophies, water skis, fishing rods, a Waltham wristwatch...Jumpin' Jehosaphat, Roy wasn't just the King of the Cowboys, he was, well, kinda like my Dad.

Because Roy was one, too.

I spent a long time looking at exhibits dedicated to the memories of those few special children who knew Roy and Dale as Dad and Mom. Tragically, some died young, and I peered through glass cases to read faded birthday cards and view little cowboy hats that tenderly memorialized them. I discovered that there was no shortage of pain in the life of the King of the Cowboys – a man who always encouraged his viewers to "keep smiling, until we meet again".

And then it dawned on me. Then I understood why Roy was a hero. He was a genuine article. Yep, he did his own stunts, sang his own songs, and even rode a golden palomino that performed 200 tricks without special effects. Long before there were blue screens, computer graphics and stunt doubles, Roy was riding his Wonder Horse flat out across the prairie. He really could strum a guitar, carry a tune, call a square dance, and yodel like a Swiss mountaineer. Behind the silver spurs and floral shirts was a love of life that jumped out at the camera, for just below the white hat beat a white heart. He played fair, was polite, and always did what he said he would he would do. He was kind to animals, defended the helpless, and tipped his white Stetson to the ladies. He was dependable, and a man in need could have no greater friend. He was a real man.

Just like my Dad. Like the dad that I want to be.

I walked out of the exhibit into the main entrance. There, a crowd of visitors was admiring a wax likeness of Roy - which suddenly moved and began signing autographs before my very eyes.

R-R-R-Roy!

I grabbed Amanda, my thirteen-year-old daughter, and scrambled over to join the group of admirers who ranged in age from five to fifty. Each was visibly awestruck, and some shared misty memories about a favorite movie or personal appearance that will never be forgotten. The King of the Cowboys took time to talk to each of us, and even posed for a picture with my daughter and me. I told Roy about the time my parents took me to watch him ride Trigger in a New Orleans parade some 37 years ago. Roy smiled like he remembered seeing me in the crowd that day. He said he recalled the event and, pulling back the pearl buttoned cuff of his Western shirt, showed me the watch he had purchased in the French Quarter during his visit in 1961. He told me that he sometimes hankered for a new timepiece, but couldn't bring himself to throw away something that still worked.

Some of us feel the same way. That's why we are here in 1998, standing in line to purchase videotapes of "Come On, Rangers" and "Sunset Serenade" to show our own little whippersnappers. Deep inside, we feel that if we can just get THEM to tell the truth, shoot straight with us, and hold fast to things that still work, like love...and family... and integrity…like character and commitment, their world will be a better place again.

……………………………………………………………………………………………..

The little hand on my Fossil watch tickles Trigger's nose, while the big hand just touches Roy's white hat. Modern quartz crystal accuracy assures me that it's seven o'clock in Dallas, Texas. Somewhere in Apple Valley, California, the seventeen jewel Swiss movement in a 37-year-old wristwatch keeps perfect time in a time when things aren't so perfect. Like it's owner, it reliably indicates not only how much time has gone by, but also how much times have changed. It comforts this yuppiesnapper to know that both are still ticking tonight.

Happy trails, Roy. Keep smilin'. Until we meet again.

Postscript – I wrote this story just three months before Roy passed away on July 6, 1998. Dale went home to be with the Lord, and Roy, in February, 2001. My world is a better place because they shared their lives with mine. When I heard the news about Roy’s passing, I happened to look down at my Fossil watch, as was my habit a hundred times a day. The hands were stopped; it had quit working. Now I’m sure that it was only coincidental that the battery expired the same day that Roy died. And I’m equally certain that a fresh battery would have made the watch work again. But I put the watch bearing a painted likeness of Roy and Trigger in the shadow box on my wall. It’s there as an indication that one day, time runs out for all of us – kings and queens, good guys and bad, white hats and black, fathers and daughters…

Even heroes.

It is how we use that brief time we call life – that two inch dash on the headstone that separates our dates of birth and death -- which distinguishes the heroes and the villains. In his time, Roy’s movies, television series and personal appearances touched the lives of literally hundreds of millions of people throughout the world. His work had a huge influence on my values then, and now. Yours, too, I betcha. But it wasn’t Republic Pictures that Roy was really working for. At least not for the last 50 years of his life. As he explained in his biography, "Happy Trails – Our Life Story":

"Over the years, my trail has been a great one, sometimes bumpy, sometimes stormy, sometimes smooth and beautiful. But when I asked Jesus Christ to be my Savior and Lord in 1948, He took me at my word and has been working out His will for me ever since."

Good work, pardner. I know you’re smiling now. And I’ll meet you up the trail.