Captain Jack Crawford: Buckskin Poet, Scout, and Showman

11. "A Genius in Buckskin"

11 "A GENIUS EM BUCKSKIN" Captain Jack as he appeared on stage in his lateryears. (Courtesy Rio Grande Historical Collections, New Mexico State University Library.) Boston journalist Nixon Waterman labeled Captain Jack "A Genius in Buckskin " soon after his return from the Klondike . In introducing the Poet Scout to his readers, Waterman quoted a line from Shakespeare, "And one man in his time plays many parts," adding that in writing this line the bard of Avon must have had Captain Jack "in his mind's prophetic eye." After describing Crawford'scheckered career, Waterman touched upon a character trait that endeared the Poet Scout to his audiences and closest friends—his unfailing optimism. "He is a perpetual sunshiner," Waterman observed, "looking on the bright side of life with so much of success that those about him find themselves doing the same thing and discovering bits of blue sky while the cynic and pessimist would do nothing but bewail the stormy weather."l Crawford's great optimism, in fact, meshed perfectly with the nation's prevailing mood at the turn of the century. Progressives of that era expressed enormous faith in American potential, for the United States had just completed a victorious war and eco- Chapter 11 nomic prosperity was once again in sight. Because poverty, disease , and the misuse ofpolitical and economic power still plagued the nation, however, reformers spearheaded a broad reform campaign to create a better American society. Between the SpanishAmerican War and World War I, progressives worked for social justice, better education, improved working conditions, and a wide variety of other reforms. Crawford shared with progressives a belief that people could perfect society. And he also shared their ambivalence toward great wealth, seeing it as a force for both good and evil. Above all else, however, Jack believed, like Andrew Carnegie (a man he greatly admired), that wealth carried moral responsibilities and should be used for the betterment of humankind. Crawford 's special concern during this era of reform was the building of character among the nation's young men. He sought wealth, in part, to establish a boys' camp in Michigan and to launch The Boy Heroes of the World, a national organizationhe founded about the time that Boy Scouts of America burst upon the scene. Unfortunately, materials to document fully the last seventeen years of Crawford's life are missing. Duringmost of this time, however, the lecture circuit was the chief source of his income. Clearly, the Poet Scout continued to reach for the stars, laboring to keep his name before the public and to acquire the great wealth that seemed always to elude him. In his quest for success, Crawford rubbed shoulders with many of the nation's rich and famous. In rejoining the lecture circuit, Captain Jack profited from the nation's rising enthusiasm for western subjects. Early twentieth-century magazines catered to eastern appetites for stories about cowboys, Indians, and frontier heroes, while western novels poured off the presses. Owen Wister's The Virginian, published in 1902, rapidly became a best-seller. And Buffalo Bill continued to thrill large audiences both in Europe and the United States with his mock Indian battles, cowboy competitions, and riding-and-shooting exhibitions.2 248 "A Genius inBuckskin" The popularity of the Virginian, Buffalo Bill, CaptainJack, and other western heroes (real and imaginary) stemmed, in part, from the nation's headlong rush to industrialize and to reap material benefits from technological advances. This new world of giant corporations and monopolies seemed to threaten older virtues and life-styles that many Americans wanted to preserve. Many turn-of-the-century reformers, in fact, became disenchanted with eastern cities, viewing them as centers of vice and corruption. To some observers, true Americans resided in the West. Indeed, the West became an "attractive counterimage" to the industrialized East. The rhetoric of progressives like Theodore Roosevelt and conservationist Gifford Pinchot incorporated images recreating an older rural America,a western Arcadia,a land of individualism and egalitarianism. And so across the land, people looking for an alternative to an industrial and urban life-style were strongly attracted to the romanticized vision of the West offered by Wister, Cody, and Crawford.3 Shortly after his return from the Klondike, Captain Jack appeared in Tat;or Edna, The Veteran's Daughter at the Alta Theatre in San Francisco. The play had all the elements that theatergoers desired in a western melodrama: action...