Roy Bean: Law West of the Pecos

by C. L. Sonnichsen

Overview

Phantly Roy Bean, Jr. (1825-1903), self-styled “Law West of the Pecos,” was an eccentric American saloon-keeper and Justice of the Peace in Val Verde County, Texas. According to legend, he held court in his saloon along the Rio Grande on a desolate stretch of the Chihuahuan Desert of southwest Texas.

Southwestern historian and folklorist, C. L. Sonnichsen, lived near Judge Bean’s house for several years and decided to pen this biography, first published in 1943, owing to his belief that it was “high time for somebody to look into his history and see how a Roy Bean ever came to be at all.” Roy Bean: Law West of the Pecos examines Judge Bean’s legendary, as well as factual background and makes for a fascinating read.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781789123913
Publisher:	Borodino Books
Publication date:	01/13/2019
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	179
Sales rank:	694,338
File size:	6 MB

About the Author

Charles Leland Sonnichsen (September 20, 1901 - June 29, 1991) was a Benedict Professor of English at the University of Texas, El Paso. In addition to being a noted Southwestern historian and folklorist, he was a prolific author and screenwriter. He was the 23rd president of the Western Historical Association.

Born in Fonda, Iowa, Sonnichsen’s family later moved to Minnesota where he attended public school in Wadena, Minnesota. He received his B.A. from the University of Minnesota in 1924 and then went on to graduate study at Harvard University, where he received his Ph.D. in 1931.

Sonnichsen first held teaching positions St. James School in Faribault, Minnesota, and Carnegie Institute of Technology before relocating to El Paso, Texas and taking a role as associate professor of English at the Texas College of Mines and Metallurgy (later The University of Texas at El Paso). He rose through teaching and administrative ranks to professor, chairman of the English Department (a post he held for 27 years), dean of the graduate school, and H. Y. Benedict Professor of English. He retired from the University in 1972 after a 41-year career there and moved to Tucson, Arizona, where he was editor of the Journal of Arizona History from 1972-1977 and continued to write and edit books.

Sonnichsen authored thirty-four books, including Billy King’s Tombstone (1942), Cowboys and Cattle Kings (1950), I’ll Die Before I’ll Run (1951), Alias Billy the Kid (1955), Ten Texas Feuds (1957), The Mescalero Apaches (1958), Tularosa: Last of the Frontier West (1960), Outlaw: Bill Mitchell, Alias Baldy Russell (1964), Pass of the North: Four Centuries on the Rio Grande (two volumes, 1968, 1980), Colonel Greene and the Copper Skyrocket (1974) and From Hopalong to Hud: Thoughts on Western Fiction (1978).

Sonnichsen received the Spur Award for Best Short Subject, the Spur Award for Best Nonfiction, and the Spur Award for Best Short Fiction.