In 1898 Stephen Crane (author of The Red Badge of Courage) published a short story named The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky. In it he tells of one Jack Potter getting married in San Antonio and bringing his new wife to the town of Yellow Sky, where he is the town marshal. Upon arriving, bride at his side, he is confronted by a character named Scratchy Wilson and must face him down.

Although it is a work of fiction I must wonder how much of it might have been based on tall tales from, or about, either Jack or Andrew Jackson Potter. There is reference of a saloon being closed up and a "solemn, chapel-like gloom was upon the place". Actually, there are probably many possible references or images that could be worked with. Has anyone else read the story? For an online version of it, courtesy of the University of Virginia Library, click here.

I first ran across this story in an American Literature class at San Diego State back in the 1970's. Someday I'd like to go through the story carefully and try to match pieces from Andrew Jackson's biography and from whatever else I can dig up about Jack Potter. If you want to do it please feel free to do so and send a copy this way.

This is a short biography and several of his short stories. If you can still find it, it is a must read.

Alas, not really much in here about him other than a few anecdotes. A nice quote from the author is:

"Potter's hat was not too big for him. He was a trail boss at eighteen, managed a big outfit in New Mexico for years, ended up writing about range characters and experiences. One time he got me dead drunk on pure foolery."

Not much about the Potters in specific, but a great deal about the settlers of the town of Kenton, Oklahoma, and the kind of lives they led. This book contains the complete text of a book written by Ed Lord (hence the title) as well as elaboration by Ms. Hanners.

I can heartily recommend this book to anyone that wants to learn a little about real life in the West.