The Have Gun: Will Travel Companion [Paperback]

Martin Grams (Author), Les Rayburn (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2000

Known as the Barrymore on horseback, Richard Boone created a character that television audiences could relate to. For six seasons, audiences were able to tune in each week and watch their latest adventure of "Have Gun - Will Travel," a western that stepped over the boundries, and told stories that viewers today remember vividly. Broadcast over CBS Radio and Television, "Have Gun - Will Travel" is still remembered by fans as one of the best adult westerns ever made. This book documents the history behind the series, the genesis of the program, and why after six seasons, the show left the air. Memories from writers, actors, directors , producers, stuntmen and many more help give insight and a behind-the-scenes look at the making of each and every television and radio episode. Hal Needham, Frank Pierson, Peggy Rea, Andrew V. McLaglen, Sydney Pollack, Shimon Wincelberg, and hundreds of others contributed. Rare photos, over 150 to be exact, are featured - many never before seen! The authors relied on exclusive interviews and production call sheets to make sure that all dates of production as well as broadcast dates, official script titles, and cast credits are all listed. A complete chapter on every HGWT collectable is featured, as well as other surprises. This is the very book you can't live without. Almost 500 pages thick so you can just imagine the wealth of information. Everything you've ever wanted to know about "Have Gun" is here under one cover!

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A must-have for all western fans... a wealth of information... well researched." -- The Delta Star, October 2001

"Detailed... comprehensive." -- Western Mail, June 2002

"Highly recommended" -- Old Time Radio Digest

"I always had a crush on Richard Boone as a little girl. Thank you for such a great book." -- Sally Dumar Comments

I never knew there were so many items related to this show. Your book is a reference for Western collectors. -- Bill Holnstein responded . . .

From the Publisher

This book went under years of research and the co-operation of "Have Gun - Will Travel" fans from all over. We have extensively searched for material such as production call sheets, and exclusive interviews with today's most prolific directors, producers and writers. Most of the photos in this book have never before appeared in print. We consider this the definitive guide to the "Have Gun" series, both broadcast on radio and television. All 106 radio episodes and all 225 television episodes are documented, including pre-emptions and summer reruns.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 505 pages
• Publisher: OTR Pub; 1st edition (October 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0970331002
• ISBN-13: 978-0970331007
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #148,822 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Martin Grams is the author and co-author of more than 20 books, and contributed numerous appendixes and chapters for other books. His book on THE TWILIGHT ZONE was the winner of the 2008 Rondo Award for "Best Book of the Year." His recent book on THE GREEN HORNET has been well-received by critics. Martin is an active member of SPERDVAC, research consultant for a major film magazine and volunteers his time to help the Mid Atlantic Nostalgia Convention held annually in Maryland every September.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

76 of 80 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars The Bad Outweighs the Good..., December 16, 2000

By 

Rory Coker (Austin, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Have Gun: Will Travel Companion (Paperback)

What a disaster! First, the good things: there is a complete and accurate log of the CBS radio broadcasts of HAVE GUN, starring the late, great John Dehner; and, there is a complete and accurate log of the CBS TV programs, starring the late, great Richard Boone. These are the only really usable logs in print anywhere.

Now for the bad news. At least one of the authors is so totally, completely illiterate that he cannot even transcribe proper names correctly. Virtually every sentence contains a garbled word or phrase. In many cases it is nearly completely impossible to decipher what is being talked about. Even the many fragmentary interviews have this problem, since the interviewer clearly did not recognize the words being used by the person interviewed, and puts in either a ludicrous phonetic spelling, or substitutes an entirely different word with no connection to the one spoken by the interviewee.

Where a coherent narrative (i.e., sentence 2 having some connection to sentence 1, sentence 3 having some connection to sentence 2, etc.) is required, the book falls down even further. Consider the several pages devoted to a complex set of lawsuits brought against CBS by an obscure children's birthday party performer who claimed the whole idea for the TV show had been stolen from his birthday party persona. To say that this discussion is completely, totally and utterly incoherent is to put it mildly. There is not a single sentence in the several pages where I had the vaguest concept of what the author was trying to say.

In short, this is a fan book, with all the defects that such books (which used to be mimeographed or xeroxed from an original manuscript, crudely stapled, and sold for $5 apiece at nostalgia conventions) always have. It is tragic that no one cared enough about the material to have someone who could read, write and speak english work over the text. Since the radio and TV broadcast logs are relatively free of typos (apart from some names that are spelled differently every time they appear, even in the same paragraph), it is clear someone did care enough about these to give them a once-over with a blue pencil.

What the luckless performers and crewmembers interviewed here, who now see their words minced into gibberish when they finally see print, might think of this pathetic book, I'd like to hear.

Worth buying for the logs, which take up about half the text, but don't expect anything else and you won't be disappointed.

54 of 59 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars HAVE FUN--WILL BABBLE..........., October 31, 2000

By 

PALADIN - See all my reviews

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This review is from: The Have Gun: Will Travel Companion (Paperback)

This is an excellent,if flawed work.
The strong points include the invaluable ( and definitive )episode guide,which corrects many a past mistake;the radio show coverage--which would seem to be untouched material until this book;and the overall scope of the contents. There are no wasted pages here.
The weaker aspects are chiefly in the areas of the editing/proofreading--which is in many instances abysmal (names are mis-spelled,simple terms are totally out of context..example: the use of the word Calvary =Christ on the Cross, where the proper term would be Cavalry = as in Custer and the Troops ...Someone is relying far too much on a Spell-Checker Function and not enough on their own intelligence. Very sloppy proofreading/editing.)
The book also has far too much of a re-hash of prior-published material on Richard Boone`s background--which was gone over just 6 months ago in another book.
Other than that,the chief flaws in the execution involve the numerous photos that were touted to be included. They are there--problem is,many of them are reduced to the size of a postage stamp and are so dark--in their black-n-white "glory"--that you can barely make out what the photo is. This is particularly annoying to myself,for I contributed to this book. I spent 3 hours late one night at Kinko`s scanning and emailing beautiful,Full-Color Vintage Comic Book covers--with excellent COLOR photos of Richard Boone--only to see them converted in this book to small,dark,indistinct postage stamps.
Further along the lines of my own experience is the treatment of Alfonso and Omar Pineda,of "Alfonso`s Of Hollywood",who contributed to the making of the Original Paladin Gunbelt. I pointed the authors to Omar Pineda for an interview....which IS in the book...under the name "Pindea". How hard would it have been to get the man`s last name correctly spelled? Omar`s father--who has passed away--must be rolling in his grave. His First AND Last name are mispelled thru-out. "Alfonso Pineda" becomes "Alfonzo Pindea"...a small difference,possibly--but it demonstrates a certain lack of concern on Somebody`s part.

To sum up, this book IS a valuable reference, and a better work than has yet been done on this Classic Western--but it`s just sad that more attention was not given in the execution of such a good idea.

-----UPDATE (Sept.17,2006) :
I reviewed "The Have Gun -Will Travel Companion" back when it came out in October of 2000.

Now, regrettably; I must update that review with an extremely negative additional observation.

The cheap glue of the paperback binding is rapidly deteriorating.

My last few looks at the book have turned into irritating sessions with a bottle of Rubber Cement in hand and increasingly-strained patience as I try to put the pages BACK into the book as they fall out one by one.

Had I known I was merely RENTING this until it self-destructed, I would never have paid full price for the whole book....after all, it seems more intended to be viewed IN PIECES.

I would buy a new copy, but frankly I believe I wasted enough money the first time.

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Have Gun -- Will Travel Companion, March 8, 2006

By 

Donald D. Ensign (Green Valley, AZ) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Have Gun: Will Travel Companion (Paperback)

For those interested in the behind the scene issues
involving the production of the Have Gun Will Travel
TV Series (1957-1963) this book is a good resource.

The authors have conducted interviews with many
important individuals who were connected to this
classic western. It starts out with a biography
of Richard Boone (Paladin) that traces his life from
his birth in Los Angeles with sections on the TV shows
Medic, The Richard Boone Show, Hec Ramsey as well as Have
Gun with information on his feature films and theatrical
performances. It also has an extensive plot summary
section on each Have Gun episode, a section on the short
lived Have Gun Radio program and other material of interest.

The weaknesses of the book are these. There are numerous
spelling mistakes, wrong word choices, dangling/unfinished
sentences and other typographical errors. The numerous
photos are poorly scanned and/or lack proper halftones. A
good editor/proof reader was needed on this book. For
this reader these are irritating though not enough to
disquality the book entirely.

More important was the lack of critical evaluation of the content of the program itself. If you are looking for a book that provides an in depth analysis into the personality of the Paladin character you will need to look elsewhere. Richard Boone and the writers and producers of Have Gun Will Travel created a wonderfully complex hero in this "Knight without Armor in a Savage Land." (Plot summaries are not character analysis). This book only scratches the surface of that complexity.

If you saw this program as a child as I did and have fond memories of it this book is valuable to read in
conjunction with viewing the Video/DVD Have Gun Will Travel collections.