David Crockett by Michael Wallis Page B

Mystic River in Connecticut and launched in 1853. A profitable ship for forty years, it sailed primarily from New York to San Francisco and New York to Liverpool. (Courtesy of G. W. Blunt White Library at Mystic Seaport Museum, Mystic, Connecticut)
     

     
    “Col. Crockett’s Desperate Fight with the Great Bear,” Almanac illustration, 1835. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac cover, 1836. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac cover, 1836. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac illustration, 1836. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac cover, 1838. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac cover, 1839. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac cover, 1841. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac cover, 1846. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac illustration. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac illustration. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

     
    Almanac illustration with text. (Photograph by Dorothy Sloan, Dorothy Sloan Rare Books)
     

PERSONAL INTRODUCTION
     
    I T’S HARD FOR ANYONE BORN, say, after 1958 to recall the “Davy Crockett” frenzy that swept America in the 1950s. So profound was the cultural inundation that no baby boomer can fail to recall this charismatic American hero’s name. Such recognition, to my way of thinking, is a good thing, but the veritable flood of misinformation about Crockett’s life that resulted—which I became aware of only later in life, and which in part has motivated me to write this book—created a mythology that continues to this day.
    My first exposure to this inimitable American icon came, and I can vividly recall the date, on the frosty night of December 15, 1954, in my hometown of St. Louis. The ABC television network had just aired Davy Crockett, Indian Fighter , the first of three episodes produced by Walt Disney for his studio’s then new series, which had premiered two months earlier. Called simply Disneyland during its first four years, this anthology series, under a variety of other names, including, most commonly, The Wonderful World of Disney , was to become one of the longest-running prime-time programs on American television.
    I was just nine years old that December evening, but I could have predicted the show’s success. I was hooked moments after hearing the theme music, “When You Wish upon a Star,” sung by cartoon insect Jiminy Cricket from the soundtrack of the movie Pinocchio . Longtime Disney announcer Dick Wesson introduced host Walt Disney and, with some visual assistance from a flittering Tinkerbell, Uncle Walt unleashed the legendary frontier character Davy Crockett from the twelve-inch screen of our 1950 table model RCA Victor television set into our living room, as if from a runaway train.
    I was a goner. Within only minutes the larger-than-life Crockett, clad in buckskin and wearing a coonskin cap, had won me over. My fickle nine-year-old heart pounded. The previous summer, at two separate events in a department store parking lot, I had shaken the hand of Hopalong Cassidy and the Cisco Kid, but now they were instantly demoted to lesser status on my list of heroes. Even Stan Musial—“swinging Stan the Man,” the legendary St. Louis Cardinal All-Star slugger, whose name was etched in granite at the top of that list—was in jeopardy of being topped.
    By the time that first episode ended, the image of Crockett, as portrayed by twenty-nine-year-old Fess Parker, was firmly ensconced in my psyche. I did not even consider staying up for Strike It Rich and I Got a Secret . I forgot about the promise of fresh snow and the good sledding sure to follow. Instead I headed straight to my room, where I pored over the