I don't know who painted the cover on this issue of FAMOUS WESTERN, but some old friends show up on it: a stalwart cowboy in a red shirt, a good-looking redhead who's getting in on the action, and if you look closely, you can see an old codger peering out the jailhouse door. Is he wounded? I'm betting he is, although we can't tell for sure. There are only four stories in this issue. Two of them are by Anthony Rud (better known for mystery, adventure, and weird fiction, but he turned out some Westerns, too) and W.D. Hoffman, a prolific Western pulpster. The other two are credited to Mat Rand and James Rourke, two Columbia Publications house-names. I don't own this issue, but it looks like a pretty good one.
Since Robert E. Howard Days is going on in Cross Plains this weekend, I thought it appropriate to post the cover of one of the Western pulps in which Howard's work appeared. In this case it's the July 1937 issue of COWBOY STORIES, which includes Howard's Buckner J. Grimes story "Knife-River Prodigal". This is one of the stories that sold after Howard's death and appeared almost exactly a year later. I don't know the cover artist, but it's certainly a great example of how red and yellow dominated Western pulp covers. Also in this issue are Samuel Taylor, Bruce Douglas, W.D. Hoffman, and an author billed as Chief Henry Red Eagle, with a story called "Wampum Swamp 'Em", which makes me think it's probably not a serious examination of Indian life in the Old West.
