A Moment of Nostalgia

This morning’s USA Today contained a brief article that caught my attention:

“Eminem will return to the big screen in an updated version of the television Western ‘Have Gun, Will Travel.’”

I was instantly transported back to the small living room of my childhood, where I can still see the one television set my family owned.

The political balance of our household was heavily weighted in favor of testosterone. Mom had ceded ownership of the television to my father and three brothers. My single vote was ignored when it came to determining what our family would watch during prime time. Westerns and military dramas dominated our television viewing seven nights a week.

This macho experience left me with an odd talent and a fondness for only two shows. The talent is the ability to sing the theme song for virtually every Western that aired from the time I was a toddler. The fondness was for two shows: “Maverick” and “Have Gun, Will Travel.” In their separate ways, both were anti-Westerns.

Everyone remembers “Maverick,” perhaps because of the 1994 Mel Gibson film. “Maverick” was my first experience with satire. Bret and Bart Maverick were not the typical cowboys. They avoided gunfights whenever possible and gently mocked the stereotype of a Western hero.

“Have Gun, Will Travel” had a single star, Richard Boone, who played a hired gunslinger in the years immediately after the Civil War. A graduate of West Point, his character was extremely literate and lived in a luxurious hotel in San Francisco. His business card displayed a white chess piece--the knight (hence the hero’s name, Paladin) and contained only the words: “Have Gun, Will Travel, Wire Paladin, San Francisco.”

Each week, in exchange for $1,000, Paladin would head out to assist someone in need. In anti-hero style, he dressed all in black except for the white knight chess piece embossed on his holster. He liberally quoted from the classics and sometimes turned on the one who hired him if he discovered his employer was victimizing others.

I was surprised at how complete my memory was for a show forty years old. I suspect that Paladin somehow tapped into my anti-authority streak, which was very well developed before I even hit first grade.

All I can say is that I hope Eminem doesn’t screw the film up.

Have Gun, Will Travel reads the card of a man.
A knight without armor in a savage land.

His fast gun for hire heeds the calling wind.
A soldier of fortune is the man called Paladin.

Paladin, Paladin, Where do you roam?
Paladin, Paladin, Far, far from home.

Postscript: A reader emailed me to point out that I forgot to mention Roger Moore as Beau Maverick.

Moore only joined the show after James Garner walked out in a contract dispute years later so I viewed him as a supporting character, not a star.

A funny thing about the theme song for "Maverick." The chorus goes:

Riverboat ring your bell
Fare-thee-well, Annabelle,
Luck is the lady that he loves the best.
Natchez to New Orleans,
Living on jacks and queens
Maverick is the legend of the West.

I was a small child living in New York at the time and assumed that the fifth line referred to the neighborhoods I knew: Jackson [Heights] and Queens. For YEARS, I assumed the Maverick brothers originally came from New York.