TV trivia and facts sections Fun Facts Home TV Westerns

Judge Roy Bean TV Series Facts and Trivia

Buy Judge Roy Bean on DVD Volume 2

Judge Roy Bean is a 1956 syndicated half-hour western television series starring Edgar Buchanan (1903-1979) as the legendary Kentucky-born Judge Roy Bean (1825-1903), a justice of the peace known as "The law west of the Pecos". The 39-episode program is set in Langtry in Val Verde County in southwest Texas, where Bean held court in his combination general store and saloon. The 2000 census population of Langtry was fewer than 150 persons, but the unincorporated community is the site of one of the twelve Texas State Tourist Bureau welcoming centers. Jack Buetel (1915-1989), who portrayed Billy the Kid in the film The Outlaw with Jane Russell, appeared in the series as 41-year-old Jeff Taggert, Bean's right-hand man. Jackie Loughery (born 1930), the first Miss USA (chosen 1952), portrays Letty Bean, the judge's 26-year-old niece, and Russell Hayden (1912-1981) stars as Steve, a Texas Ranger. Bean was later the focus of the 1972 Paul Newman film The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean.

Recurring cast members
Tristram Coffin (1909-1990), later star of the syndicated western 26 Men, true stories of the Arizona Rangers, portrayed different characters in six episodes of Judge Roy Bean, including the series premiere, "The Judge of Pecos Valley", in which a train robber is loose in the area, and Bean sets out to capture him. Coffin appears in the third segment, "The Horse Thief", in which a rancher is jailed for stealing a horse, and Bean must keep a mob from getting out of control. Other episodes featuring Coffin are "The Refugee", "Border Raiders", "The Cross Draw Kid", and "The Wedding of Old Sam" in his role of Sam Haskins.Character actor X Brands (1927-2000) appeared in various roles fifteen times on Judge Roy Bean.[3]Myron Healey (1923-2005) appeared four times: as Reno in "Checkmate", as Winters in "The Eyes of Texas", as Hurley in "The Katcina Doll", and as Gorman in "The Travelers".
 

Selected episodes
In "Sunburnt Gold", Bean pursues a gang that steals gold coins, melts them down and turns them into nuggets so that they cannot be identified. In "The Runaway", a boy flees home because he thinks his father is cowardly for not resisting a recalcitrant boss. In "Slightly Prodigal", a woman arrives in Langtry in search of her son, who has turned into an outlaw. In "Black Jack", the judge seeks to return an escaped train robber to prison. In "Judge Declares a Holiday", Bean confronts a con man who arranges horse races but flees with the bet money before the event can be held. In "Citizen Romeo", Bean learns about a plan to smuggle guns and ammunition to Indians, and he encounters an organ grinder with a monkey as he tries to halt the smuggling.

Sammee Tong, later of John Forsythe's Bachelor Father sitcom series, appeared in the title role of the episode "Ah Sid, Cowboy", with Glenn Strange as Fallon. Strange appeared a total of six times on Judge Roy Bean, including the roles of Sampson in "The Hidden Truth", Mason in "The Judge's Dilemma", Tom Holman in "Border Raiders", King Lonagan in "The Cross Draw Kid", and Nolan in "The Referee". Lash La Rue, the cowboy with the bullwhip, appeared seven times on Judge Roy Bean: as John Wesley Hardin in "Gunman's Bargain", as Storts in "The Katcina Doll", as Matt Logan in "Outlaw's Son", as Duke Castle in "The Reformer", as Todd Malone in "Bad Medicine", as Harbon in "The Defense Rests", and as Bass in "Lone Star Killer", the series finale. Other episodes include: "Letty Leaves Home", "Four Ladies from Laredo" (Gloria Winters of Sky King), "Luck O' the Irish", "The Hypnotist" and "Terror Rides the Trail".

Production notes
Unlike most syndicated westerns of the 1950s, which were black and white, Judge Roy Bean was filmed in color by the Barrett Company in Pioneertown, California. The program was not extended for a second season. Six years later, Buchanan became particularly known for his role as the laid-back Uncle Joe Carson on the CBS sitcom, Petticoat Junction with Bea Benaderet.

Series producer Russell Hayden thereafter released his second syndicated western, 26 Men.


The Real Judge Roy Bean
Roy Bean was born in 1825 in Mason County, Kentucky, the youngest of three sons of Phantley Roy Bean, Sr., and the former Anna Henderson Gore. The family was extremely poor, and at age sixteen Bean left home to ride a flatboat to New Orleans. There, he found himself in trouble and fled to San Antonio, Texas, where his brother Sam was a teamster hauling freight to Mexico.[1] In 1848, the two brothers opened a trading post in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. Soon after, Bean shot and killed a Mexican desperado who had threatened "to kill a gringo". Mexican authorities wished to charge Bean with murder, so he and his brother fled west to Sonora. By the spring of 1849 Bean had moved to San Diego, California, to live with his older brother Joshua, who was elected the first mayor of the city the following year.

Bean was considered young and handsome and competed for the attentions of various local girls. A Scotsman named Collins challenged Bean to a pistol shooting match on horseback. Bean was left to choose the targets, and decided that they would shoot at each other. The duel was fought on February 24, 1852, ending with Collins receiving a wound to his right arm. Both men were arrested and charged with assault with intent to murder. In the two months that he was in jail, Bean received many gifts of flowers, food, wine, and cigars from ladies in San Diego. His final gift included knives encased in tamales, and Bean used the knives to dig through the cell wall. After escaping on April 17, Bean moved to San Gabriel, California, where he became a bartender for his brother's saloon, known as the Headquarters Saloon. After Bean's brother was murdered in November, Bean inherited the saloon.

In 1854, Bean courted a young lady, who was kidnapped and forced to marry a Mexican officer. Bean challenged the groom to a duel and killed him. Six of the dead man's friends put Bean on a horse and tied a noose around his head, then left him to hang. The horse did not bolt, and after the men left, the bride, who had been hiding behind a tree, cut the rope. Bean was left with a permanent rope burn on his neck and a permanent stiff neck.[2] Shortly after that, Bean chose to leave California and left for New Mexico to live with Sam, who had become the first sheriff of the country.

During the Civil War, the Texas army invaded New Mexico. After the Battle of Glorieta Pass in March 1862, the Texans began retreating to San Antonio. After first taking money from his brother's safe, Bean joined the retreating army. For the remainder of the war, he ran the blockade by hauling cotton from San Antonio to British ships off the coast of Matamoros, then returning with supplies.[3] For the next twenty years, Bean lived in San Antonio, working nominally as a teamster. He attempted to run a firewood business, cutting down a neighbor's timber. He then tried to run a dairy business, but was soon caught watering down the milk, and later worked as a butcher, rustling unbranded cattle from other area ranchers.

On October 28, 1866, he married eighteen-year-old Virginia Chavez. Within a year after they were married he was arrested for aggravated assault and threatening his wife's life. Despite the tumultuous marriage, the two had four children together, Roy Jr., Laura, Zulema, and Sam. The family lived in "a poverty-stricken Mexican slum area called Beanville".

By the late 1870s, Bean was operating a saloon in Beanville. Several railroad companies were working to extend the railroads west, and Bean heard that many construction camps were opening.[3] A store owner in Beanville "was so anxious to have this unscrupulous character out of the neighborhood" that she bought all of Bean's possessions for $900 so that he could leave San Antonio. At the time, Bean and his wife were separated Bean left his children with friends as he prepared to go west

Justice of the Peace

With his earnings, Bean purchased a tent, some supplies to sell, and ten 55-gallon barrels of whiskey. By the spring of 1882, he had established a small saloon near the Pecos River in a tent city he named Vinegaroon. Within a 20 mi (32 km) stretch of the tent city were 8,000 railroad workers. The nearest court was 200 mi (321 km) away at Fort Stockton, and there was little means to stop the illegal activity. A Texas Ranger requested that a local law jurisdiction be set up in Vinegaroon, and on August 2, 1882 Bean was appointed the Justice of the Peace for the new Precinct 6 in Pecos County.

One of his first acts as a Justice of the Peace was to "shoot up the saloon shack of a Jewish competitor". Bean then turned his tent saloon into a part-time courtroom and began calling himself the "Law West of the Pecos." As a judge, Bean relied on a single lawbook, the 1879 edition of the Revised Statutes of Texas. If newer lawbooks appeared, Bean used them as kindling.

Bean did not allow hung juries or appeals, and jurors, who were chosen from his best bar customers, were expected to buy a drink during every court recess. Bean was known for his crazy rulings. In one case, an Irishman named Paddy O'Rourke shot a Chinese laborer. A mob of 200 angry Irishmen surrounded the courtroom and threatened to lynch Bean if O'Rourke was not freed. After looking through his law book, Bean ruled that "homicide was the killing of a human being; however, he could find no law against killing a Chinamen". Bean dismissed the case.

By December 1882, railroad construction had moved further westward, so Bean moved his courtroom and saloon 70 mi (108 km) to Strawbridge. A competitor who was already established in the area laced Bean's whiskey stores with kerosene. Unable to attract customers, Bean left the area and went to Eagle's Nest, 20 mi (31 km) west of the Pecos River. The site was soon renamed Langtry. The original owner of the land, who ran a saloon, had sold 640 acres (2.59 km2) to the railroad on the condition that no part of the land could be sold or leased to Bean. O'Rourke, the Irishman Bean had previously acquitted, told Bean to use the railroad right-of-way, which was not covered by the contract. For the next 20 years, Bean squatted on land he had no legal right to claim. Bean named his new saloon The Jersey Lilly in honor of Lillie Langtry  , who recounted how she visited the area following the death of Roy Bean in her autobiography. He sent for his children to live with him at the saloon, with youngest son Sam forced to sleep on a pool table.

Langtry did not have a jail, so all cases were settled by fines. Bean refused to send the state any part of the fines, but instead kept all of the money. In most cases, the fines were made for the exact amount in the accused's pockets. Bean is known to have sentenced only two men to hang, one of whom escaped. Horse thieves, who were often sentenced to death in other jurisdictions, were always let go if the horses were returned. Although only district courts were legally allowed to grant divorces, Bean did so anyway, pocketing $10 per divorce. He charged only $5 for a wedding, and ended all wedding ceremonies with "and may God have mercy on your souls" (traditionally the end of a death sentence).

Bean won re-election to his post in 1884, but was defeated in 1886. The following year, the commissioner's court created a new precinct in the county and appointed Bean the new justice of the peace. He continued to be elected until 1896. Even after that defeat, he "refused to surrender his seal and law book and continued to try all cases north of the tracks".

In 1890, Bean received word that Jay Gould was planning to pass through Langtry on a special train. Bean flagged down the train with the danger signal; thinking the bridge was out, the train engineer stopped. Bean invited Gould and his daughter to visit the saloon as his guests. The Goulds visited for two hours causing a brief panic on the New York Stock Exchange when it was reported that Gould had been killed in a train crash.

In 1896, Bean organized a world championship boxing title bout between Bob Fitzsimmons and Peter Maher on an island in the Rio Grande because boxing matches were illegal in both Texas and Mexico. The fight lasted only 1 minute, 35 seconds, but the resulting sport reports spread his fame throughout the United States.

As he aged, Bean spent much of his profits to help the poor of the area, and always made sure that the schoolhouse had free firewood in winter. He died March 16, 1903, peacefully in his bed, after a bout of heavy drinking in San Antonio over the building of a new power plant. He and a son were buried at the Whitehead Memorial Museum in Del Rio.
 

Films and television

* The Westerner (1940), features Roy Bean, played by Walter Brennan, as one of the main characters.

* The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972) is a heavily fictionalized biopic of the judge starring Paul Newman in the title role.

* Edgar Buchanan (1903-1979), a former dentist, portrayed Bean in a fictionalized 1956 syndicated television series entitled Judge Roy Bean (TV series). Jackie Loughery co-starred as Bean's niece, Letty. Jack Buetel, who had played Billy the Kid in the film The Outlaw, appeared as Jeff Taggert, and series producer Russell Hayden appeared as Steve, a Texas Ranger. Ironically, Buchanan was born only four days after Bean's death.

* Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction, in the 16th episode of the series, featuring a segment inspired by an actual event where the ghost of Judge Bean and his dog clean out a cheater's money.