The Pulp Western

The working cowboy would never be found in great abundance in the pulp magazines, or in the dime novels, in hard- or soft-cover books, or something else. A man for all seasons, the cowboy of fiction survives because of the genius of first-rate authors like James Fenimore Cooper and such modern masters of the art as Fred Glidden (Luke Short) and Ernest Haycox, and in spite of the works of hacks like Edward Judson (Ned Buntline). This book covers a generation, the pulp era of the 1920s, 30s, and 40s of pulp fictioneers who cranked out millions, perhaps even hundreds of millions, or words for the several hundred western pulp magazines then active. It also provides a short history of the origins of Western American fiction, plus a brief commentary on the genres evolution into the paperback era.