THE GUNFIGHTER by Joseph G. Rosa. 229 pages. University of Oklahoma Press. $5.95.
The strong, silent stereotype of the Western gunfighter has been shot full of holes by a hard-eyed generation of frontier historians. To hear the debunkers tell it, the fastest guns in the West were for the most part dirty, drunken, vicious, stupid, syphilitic delinquents who seldom drew anything more dangerous than a one-eyed jack, and hardly had the cojones to face a tranquilized prairie dog in a fair fight.
To hear Author Joseph G. Rosa tell it, though, the debunkers have gone...