Bonus FFB on Wednesday: Orphans Preferred: The Twisted Truth and Lasting Legend of the Pony Express -- Christopher Corbett

I grew up hearing stories about the Pony Express and seeing movies about it.  There probably wasn't a lick of truth in any of them.  One reason is that people just wanted to tell a good story, and the truth didn't matter. Another reason is that after 150 years or so, it's hard to separate fact from fiction about something that's been so romanticized almost from the beginning.  Christopher Corbett tries to do some of the separation in this book, and one of the disappointing things he's discovered is that the famous "Orphans Preferred" ad is probably not genuine.  Darn.

Also most likely not true is the story that Buffalo Bill was a pony rider, although his Wild West Show did much to perpetuate the legends.  Mark Twain's famous account of the pony rider in Roughing It also contributed to the legends, but Corbett, who devotes a whole chapter to Twain, finds that the account is mostly true.  At least one of the best stories about the pony riders is all true, according to Corbett, and that's the one about Robert Haslam, known as "Pony Bob," whose 40-hour round-trip ride during the Paiute War, was as thrilling and full of danger as any ride ever depicted in movies or books.

The Pony Express lasted about 18 months before the telegraph made it obsolete, and it was a financial failure, but its place in the lore and legend of the West is secure.  Corbett's meticulously researched book is probably the definitive account of "the Pony" and its history.  Check it out.