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The films of the westerner have seldom been sullied with fact. As Historian Joseph Rosa showed in The Gunfighter: Man or Myth? (TIME, May 16), "the so-called 'Western Code' never really existed. Men bent on killing did so in the most efficient and expeditious way they knew how. Jesse James was shot in the back. Billy the Kid died as he entered a darkened room. Wild Bill Hickok was shot from behind while he was playing poker. In each case the victim had no chance to defend himself."
No matter. In the province of the Old West, truth is a dude. The good and bad men who belong are necessary fantasies of the national mind. The public pays to see the Wayne western as a native morality play. The greatest good vanquishes the deepest evil and walks into the gaudiest sunset. The difference between Wayne and his audience is that they leave the illusion behind when they exit from the theater. The Duke has always taken it home with him.
Soldier-Cowpolce
During World War II, the western dwindled in popularity, but the hero could pull more than one trigger. Wayne switched from Colt to M-l and became a screen soldier. He was a bit unsteady out of the saddle, but there was conviction behind his "Let's get the Nips!" rallying cry. Part of it came from his disappointment at missing the action. He was too young for World War I. As father of four, he was draft-exempt during the second. Still, he treasured a notion of himself in officer's garb. "But I would have had to go in as a private," Wayne says. "I took a dim view of that." Nobody took a dim view of Wayne for staying out. In the '50s, General Douglas MacArthur told him, "Young man, you represent the cavalry officer better than any man who wears a uniform."
But by 1948, the rawboned soldier-cowpoke was no longer raw or bony. The eyes had begun to puff, the flesh was settling. The walk away from the camera was a little too distinctive. From the back, the Wayne Levi's sometimes resembled two small boys fighting in a tent. His eleven-year marriage to Texas-born Josephine Saenz had quietly clopped off into the sunset; she got custody of their four children. After a stretch of popularity, Wayne looked less a Duke than a commoner. He was No. 33 on the list of box-office stars.
This time Wayne was rescued by Screenwriter Borden Chase, who created a role that Wayne could play, he predicted, "for the next 20 years." The movie was Red River, a western version of Mutiny on the Bounty with the range as the ocean and John Wayne as a pistoled and Stetsoned Captain Bligh. Wayne was at last allowed to play his age (41). Like a man loosening his belt and taking off his tie after a day in the office, the Duke was relaxed, secure and solid. The kid had gone respectable and become a father. Red River was a critical and popular smash. In 1950 the Duke was on top as No. 1 .
Off-screen he had almost as much clout. It is axiomatic that in order to be a conservative, the individual has to have something to conserve. Wayne had made more money on horseback than Eddie Arcaro. He had property, a big rep and a new wife, Mexican-born Actress Esperanza Baur. He was Hollywood's super-American, whose unswerving motto was "Go West and turn right."