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Shirley Collection

Glenn D. Shirley Western Americana Collection

Glenn D. Shirley Western Americana Collection, 1850-2002 (Bulk 1940-2002)
508 linear feet
Accession #: RC2006.068 & RC2006.067

Biography

Born on a farm northeast of Stillwater in Payne County, Oklahoma, on December 9, 1916, Glenn Dean Shirley, son of Ellis Dean and Effie Teresa (Knorr) Shirley, was one of five children. Shirley graduated from high school in 1935 and worked for a year at the Stillwater Public Library before beginning his career in law enforcement with the Stillwater Police Department answering the telephone. Soon, as a desk sergeant, he began an identification bureau dealing with the methods of fingerprint identification. To enhance his knowledge, Shirley took an 18-month correspondence course from the Institute of Applied Science (IAS) School of Criminology in Chicago and received a diploma on May 28, 1937.

After being appointed as a police officer on December 9, 1937, he enrolled in a correspondence course in American Law and Procedure offered by the La Salle Extension University, and earned his Bachelor of Laws degree on November 5, 1940. He went on to complete courses on scientific crime detection and photography. Shirley joined the army in July 1943 and served in the East Africa and Middle East theaters until 1946. During this time period, he sold his first article.

Upon his discharge from the Army on February 6, 1946, Shirley returned to Stillwater, resumed his peace officer duties, and married Carrie Mabel Jacob. They had two children, Kenneth Ellis and Glenda Lea.

In the spring of 1948, Oklahoma State University (OSU) hired Shirely as an instructional material specialist in the Oklahoma Peace Officers Institute. On May 2, 1949, he was appointed Captain of the Stillwater Police Department. Adding to his credentials, Shirley graduated from the International Criminologist School in Seattle, Washington on July 13, 1948, and the Delehanty Institute in New York on November 25, 1949. In October 1950 he received a diploma from the Oklahoma Institute of Technology at OSU in the basic peace officers’ training course covering 100 hours of instruction. At this time he wrote his first book, Toughest of Them All, a work of mystery and detective fiction published in 1953. Around 1965, he began collecting Western history.

At the Stillwater Police Department, Shirley had risen through the ranks, but he retired in 1957 to focus on his writing, though he became a deputy sheriff and identification officer in the Payne County Sheriff’s Office. In 1959, Shirley became Assistant Chief of Security at OSU, a position he held until 1969. Besides receiving the Oklahoma Literary Endeavor Award in 1960, he wrote six books during this time, in addition to numerous articles and short stories for several periodicals. Between 1969 and 1979, Shirley was employed by the Oklahoma State University Press as a publications specialist and assistant director. The Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame inducted him in 1981. Between 1984 and 1986 he served as an historical consultant and member of the editorial board for Western Publications, Inc., publisher of True West, Old West, and Frontier Times. In 1989, he received the U.S. Marshals Service America’s Star Award in recognition of his career in law enforcement and contributions to the law enforcement profession.

Throughout the 1990s, Shirley continued writing and received the University of Oklahoma’s Professional Writing Award in 1990 and was inducted into the Oklahoma Professional Writers Hall of Fame in 1992 and the Oklahoma Historians Hall of Fame in 1999. From the National Association for Outlaw and Lawman History, Inc., he received the Literary Award for Achievement. Additionally, he was presented the Lifetime Achievement Award for Outstanding Contributions to Outlaw-Lawman History from the Western Outlaw-Lawman History Association. On February 27, 2002, Glenn Shirley died at the age of 85.

Scope & Content Note

The Glenn D. Shirley Western Americana Collection is a collection of documents, photographs, movie memorabilia, books, and magazines collected and created by Glenn D. Shirley from his teenage years until his death in 2002. The collection reflects both his personal and business life. Shirley spent 60 plus years writing about outlaws and western figures while being an active police officer, as well as after he retired. The collection reflects these two aspects, as well as Shirley’s interest in 19th century western fiction, early 20th century western movies, and crime in any century. Since this collection consists of research materials compiled over his lifetime, there are duplicative subjects documented throughout different series. For example, information about Bill Doolin and the Dalton Gang can be found in Oklahoma Territory, Book Research, Magazine Research, and Western Americana Research.

The bulk of the collection dates between the 1940s and 2002, but there are newspaper clippings and photographs from the 1850’s. The collection is divided into five series: Biographical, Correspondence, Publications, Research Materials, and Visual and Audio Materials.

The Biographical series (1900-2001) includes documents, plaques, and photographs pertaining to Glenn Shirley’s personal interests, most notably those concerning his education and family, but also organizations he had joined. Fifteen chronological scrapbooks make up the bulk of the series and include newspaper clippings, greeting cards from family members, membership cards, certificates, letters of appreciation, and memorabilia from festivals, workshops, and book readings. There are also folders of newsletters from several organizations of which Shirley was a member, several correspondence course notebooks in which he acquired training in police procedure, as well as honors and awards he received. Finally, there are some personal photographs.

The Correspondence series (1951-2008) includes incoming and outgoing letters between Shirley and a variety of correspondents. Throughout his life, Mr. Shirley corresponded with many of his writing subjects’ descendants while researching their ancestors, some of whom were famous outlaws and peacekeepers. He also wrote to various authors and fellow researchers with whom he exchanged ideas, research topics, and historical resources. Letters include notes, newspaper clippings, photocopies of articles, and photographs. Shirley retained mail sent to him by his fans and readers of his books and magazine articles. There are also letters from various publishing companies he dealt with during his lengthy writing career, along with correspondence between himself and several magazine and book dealers regarding items Shirley wanted to collect and purchase.

The Publications series (1953-2002) consists of three sub-series, Manuscripts & Galleys; Published Feature Stories; and Book Reviews & Promotional Items. Included in the Manuscripts sub-series are rough drafts, manuscripts, and galleys for most of Glenn Shirley’s book titles. The occasional map and photograph used in his books are also part of the galleys and were retained in the files. Documentation on rights to movie and television scripts is also included. It should be noted that the book Born to Kill was later revised and published as The Mosser Massacre.

Final copies of published articles featured in genre magazines make up the second sub-series, while the Book Reviews and Promotional Items include criticism of his books via newspaper clippings and catalog selections from publishing houses. Shirley compiled most of his book reviews and promotional items in scrapbook format, so fan/reader correspondence also exists on those pages since they could not be removed and included in the Correspondence series.

The Research Materials (1850-2002) series is the largest in the collection and contains the following four subseries: Cowboys and Western Figures; Crime, Law Enforcement, and Punishment; and General Reference. Shirley gathered a large amount of information from books, magazines, and archival repositories while researching his magazine articles and books. This eventually led to his compiling a substantial ready reference system covering subjects such as criminals, law enforcement, peacekeepers, Wild West performers, Native American relations, cowboys, history of Oklahoma and Western states, and finally, Western Americana, including society, literature, and film.

The Cowboys and Western Figures subseries contains materials documenting some of Oklahoma’s most notable personages. The files on Billy McGinty, Buckskin Joe, Otto Gray, and Patrick Sylvester McGeeney (aka Purple Sage) are sizeable and consist of primary sources; however, only photocopied information exists regarding Buffalo Bill and Frank “Pistol Pete” Eaton. Original published manuscripts, written by Purple Sage, are in this subseries and were used as reference for Shirley’s book about the Western peacekeeper and author. Also included are unpublished manuscripts for Purple Sage’s Blood Moon and El Capitan.

The Billy McGinty materials are a result of Glenn Shirley acquiring the materials directly from Billy McGinty and members of his immediate family. He acquired the materials to write the McGinty biography, but the manuscript was never published. McGinty was a soldier with Theodore Roosevelt’s Rough Riders, a member of several Wild West Shows, and a well-known professional cowboy in Oklahoma during the early 20th century. The McGinty documents consist mostly of newspaper clippings and magazine articles, but also correspondence, both personal and business, that describe his life experiences, including his time as a Rough Rider after they returned from Cuba, events with the Rough Rider yearly reunions, Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, and McGinty’s Cowboy band. There is also a variety of photographs portraying cowboy life in Oklahoma and McGinty’s showmanship in assorted Wild West performances, his cowboy band, and his family. In the 1920’s, McGinty became the leader of McGinty’s Oklahoma Cowboy Band, which he quickly sold to Otto Gray, the band manager, who renamed it Otto Gray and his Oklahoma Cowboys, the first nationally famous cowboy band.

Correspondence, travel diaries, newspaper clippings, song requests, photographs, and some financial records of the band years make up the bulk of documents of the Otto Gray subseries. The band dispersed in 1936, but there are photographs of Gray’s family, his home before he married, and photographs and newspaper clippings documenting his retirement years. Gray had been a farmer and small business owner before he, his wife Florence, aka Mommie, and their son Owen began performing with the Band and he returned to this after the band years.

Buckskin Joe was a member of Pawnee Bill’s Wild West Show and the materials about him span the years 1850 to 1890 and include photographs, cabinet cards, tins, a diary chronicling his time with the Union Army, ephemera, and a few artifacts (clothing was transferred to the collections side of the museum). The photographs document his time with the Wild West Show, its bands, a shoot-out, and Western figures like Annie Oakley. There are also family pictures, and images of the construction of the Palace Hotel in Arkansas City, Kansas, and his time as a miner/prospector in Central America.

The Crime, Law Enforcement, and Punishment subseries consists of reference materials collected by Shirley documenting the history of crime in the Western states, but primarily focuses on the criminal element in Oklahoma from its previous incarnations as Indian Territory up to 2002. Shirley had a passion for law and justice and studied the development of law enforcement, including everything from techniques used to solve crimes, to patterns of criminal behavior. This passion led him to gather facts about what he felt were interesting cases and collect them together in what he labeled Crime Cases.

Crime Cases are the largest set of files within the Crime, Law Enforcement, and Punishment subseries. They are arranged alphabetically by state, then by county name and in chronological order (by case) within that county. Each county has at its beginning a group of escaped convict identification cards followed by the crimes and ending with a grouping of miscellaneous articles from each county dating from the early 1880s until 2002. Of note are the 1979 deaths of Reverend Richard Brooks Douglass and his wife, which later led to the Victims’ Rights Act. Other notorious cases include the hitchhiker murders in 1950 of the Carl Mosser family by Billy Cook, and the Post Office massacre in Edmond in 1986 by Patrick Henry Sherill, which gave the world the term “going postal”. Shirley was very thorough in documenting most of the cases from the date the crime was committed until the sentence was handed down. The files consist mostly of magazine and newspaper articles, though some photographs and court documents are occasionally included. Shirley used much of these articles and documentation when he wrote articles for such magazines as True West and True Detective, among others.

 

Also included within the Crime, Law Enforcement, and Punishment subseries are files about Capital Punishment, Federal Courts and Counties in Indian Territory, Fort Smith, Gangsters, Leavenworth, and the Mummified Outlaw. Most of the items are newspaper clippings and photocopied magazine articles or chapters from books, but there is the occasional transcript from an oral history interview and items sent to him by the families of individuals whose lives were intertwined in these subjects. The Fort Smith materials contain information regarding Indian relations and U.S. Marshals, but focuses primarily on the trials that took place regarding crimes in Indian Territory, and most importantly, Judge Isaac Charles Parker. Also within this series is information about the bombing of the Oklahoma City Federal Building.

This subseries is also where Shirley collected and documented the history of the Oklahoma State Penitentiary (OSP), the Oklahoma Highway Patrol (OHP), and the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (OSBI). These folders contain newspaper articles, portions of the OSBI’s publication, Sentry, and annual reports of the OSBI dating between 1989 and 1997 that contain fiscal information and uniform crime statistics. Also included, are Oklahoma State Trooper newsletters dating between 1941 and 2001 documenting executions and those involved in the execution processes at the OSP. The folders on Stillwater history contain articles from the Stillwater NewsPress from the late 1890s to 2002.

The General Reference subseries consists of research materials that documents the regional history of Oklahoma Territory and Western Americana. Files contain newspaper clippings, journal articles, maps, and postcards featuring western subjects ranging from towns, legendary figures, and Native American tribes. There are groupings of previously published materials about Western Authors and Artists arranged alphabetically and including folders on Western and mystery writers, Oklahoma authors, biographers, and historians of the West especially Turner, Bolton, and Webb. Two folders contain materials about folklore on the frontier and “what is the Wild West”. The Westerners in Film resources document actors, actresses, directors, and historic film locations through newspaper clippings. Shirley also collected information about artists, photographers, writers, poets, and journalists from the American West. Of note are the Western Publishers files which include the different university and company presses that Shirley used as his own publishers or from where he purchased books, and includes catalogs, pamphlets, brochures, and book signing and sale information.

The Visual and Audio Materials include photographs, western themed postcards and holiday cards, all formats of movie memorabilia, commercial sheet music and song books, 78 rpm vinyl music recordings, player piano song rolls, and 32 Edison wax cylinders. There are also rolls of microfilm Shirley purchased during his research trips, from historical archives around the area, mainly Oklahoma.

The Visual subseries includes film posters, stills, lobby cards, press kits, negatives, postcards, and microfilm. The film material was used in the promotion of feature films made between the years 1898 and 2001. A small portion of the subseries is made up of miscellaneous Western-themed posters, including decorative posters, advertisements for firearms, and promotional materials for local attractions. The rest of the series consists of movie posters; photographic negatives of still images from movies and of publicity materials; publicity photographs of film stars, both human and animals; lobby cards; and a limited number of other photographic materials and of film-related newspaper clippings. Most of the films epitomized in the series belong to the Western genre, though materials from a limited number of films in other genres, such as science fiction and gangster films are also present. A wide variety of production companies are denoted, including 20th Century Fox, Columbia Pictures, Essanay, Pathe, RKO Radio Pictures, United Artists, Universal, Vitagraph, and Warner Brothers. Major motion pictures, made-for-television movies and miniseries, and serial films are all exemplified within this series. Represented in the movie posters and photographs are Western film stars such as Gene Autry, Johnny Mack Brown, Sunset Carson, Gary Cooper, Buster Crabbe, Wild Bill Elliott, Glenn Ford, Hoot Gibson, Charlton Heston, Tim Holt, Buck Jones, Burt Lancaster, Rocky Lane, Joel McCrea, Tom Mix, Roy Rogers, Randolph Scott, Charles Starrett, Bob Steele, Jimmy Stewart, Tom Tyler, and John Wayne. Some posters are organized by movie title, while most posters are organized by actor.

Most of the postcards are blank and include a variety of images. They are arranged by US state, country, holidays, or holiday theme. Included in the series is a set of 100 postcards of Yellowstone National Park by Jack Ellis Haynes. But two sets of cards include correspondence. The series of Porter postcards consists mostly of postcards addressed to Ophie (Porter) Wright, from her uncle, but also contains postcards addressed to other family members. Postcards are arranged in chronological order, and span from 1906-1929. Messages include holiday greetings and notes about everyday happenings. The McGinty postcards span dates between 1906 to 1959. Arranged in chronological order they are addressed to or from, Billy, Mollie, Delmer, Jack, and Clarence McGinty. Within the collection are postcards from William H. Brumley and Royal A. Prentice, fellow soldiers with Roosevelt’s Rough Riders.

During his research trips, Shirley obtained copies of documents on microfilm. Mostly newspapers from Guthrie, Muskogee, and Pawnee, there are also a few theses, and from the National Archives and Records Service, documents of the Territorial Papers: Oklahoma, 1889-1912; 1918. During these trips Shirley also collected photographs, primarily from established archival collections in Oklahoma, but also from fellow researchers and historians, as well as published postcards and copies from books. These photographs generally portray subjects Shirley researched for his writings.

The Audio subseries consists of both sheet music and analogue musical recordings. Much of the audio series is made up of sheet music and song books dating from c.1900 to the 1950s, with a smaller number of music instruction books and bound sheet music volumes also present. A variety of genres and publishers are represented in the subseries, as well as sheet music for several instruments, including ukulele, guitar, and piano. In some cases, multiple editions of the same sheet music, with different covers and endorsements from different musicians, are present.

The Published Materials subseries consists of several categories: cataloged books, dime novels, pulp and weeklie magazines, booklets and pamphlets, and Shirley’s personal card catalog. This material is cataloged in the Dickinson Research Center’s online Library Catalog. Most of the collection focuses on Western Fiction, Western Americana, or Movies. His personal card catalog consists of individual records of every book, magazine, photograph, film poster, and film still he owned. It also details different magazines requirements for publication.

Dime Novel was a cheap and generally sensational tale of adventure sold as popular entertainment in the 1800s. The heyday of the dime novel was from the 1860’s to the 1890’s, when their popularity was eclipsed by pulp magazines featuring similar tales of adventure. However, Author Westbrook’s Adventure Series is dated 1907-1910.

The 312 Dime Novels include the following series and/or publishers:
Adventure
Adventure Library
Adventure Series
American Detective Series
American Tales
Bandit Series
Beadle’s Dime Dialogues
Beadle’s New Dime Novels
Black Cat Western Series
Blood and Thunder Library
A Bonded Western
Border Series
Buffalo Bill Border Stories
Buffalo Bill Library
Buffalo Bill Novels
The Campfire Library
Century Western
Comet Books
Cowboy Series
Deadwood Dick Library
A Double-Action Paperback
Early Western Life Series
Far West Library
A Fighting Western Novel
A Flashlight Detective Series
Frank Leslie’s Boys of America
Frank Starr’s American Novels
Gold Star Books
Great Western Library
A Gunfire Western Novel
The Henty Series
Hogarth House Library
Jesse James Detective Series
Medal Library
Morrison’s Sensational Series
Munro’s Ten Cent Novels
The Nat Ridley Series
New Medal Library
The Owl Library
The Pinkerton Detective Series
Pirate Story Series
A Pocket Copyright
Prize Western Novels
Railroad Series
Round the World Library
Saturday Library
Star Books
Ten Cent Novelettes
Theatrical Series
Thrilling Novels
The West in Action
The Western Novel Classic
Western Series
The Western Story Library
Wild West Series
Young Klondike
Nifty Nut Novelty Co.
Henneberry Co.
George Routledge & Sons
I & M Ottenheimer
Shepard Publishing
M.A. Donohue
Whitman Publishing
B.E. Gallagher
Odyssey Press
The Pulp Magazines also focus on generally sensational tales of adventure sold as popular entertainment and include the following series:
10 Story Western Magazine
.44 Western Magazine
5 Western Novels Magazine
Ace-High Magazine
Action Novels
Action-Packed Westerns
Adventure
All Aces Magazine
All-Story Western
All Western Magazine
Argosy
Best Western Magazine
Big-Book Western Magazine
Blazing Guns Western stories Magazine
Blue Book Magazine
Blue Ribbon Western
Classics Illustrated
Complete Cowboy Novels Magazine
Complete Northwest Magazine
Complete Novels Magazine
Complete Western Book Magazine
Conflict
Cowboy Romances
Cowboy Stories
Dime Western Magazine
Double Action Western Magazine
Dynamic Adventures
Exciting Western
Famous Western
Far West
Fifteen Western Tales
Frank Reade Library
Frontier Stories
Giant Western
Greater Western Action Novels Magazine
Gunsmoke Western
Lariat Story Magazine
Leading Western
Long John Latham’s Western Fiction Magazine
Mammoth Western
Masked Rider Western
Max Brand’s Western Magazine
The Midget Story Paper
New Western Magazine
North-West Romances
North-West Stories
Pete Rice Magazine
Popular Western
Quick Trigger Western Novels
Railroad Magazine
Ranch Romances
Range Riders Western
Rangeland Love Stories
Rangeland Story Magazine
Rangeland Romances
Rangeland Stories
Rangeland Sweethearts
Real Western
Real Western Romances
Real Western Stories
Red Seal Western
The Rio Kid Western
Roaring Western Stories
Rodeo Romances
Romantic Range
Romantic West Annual
Short Stories
Six-Gun Western: The Magazine of the Right Calibre
Smashing Western
Speed Western Stories
Star Western
Texas Rangers
Texas Western
Three Western Novels Magazine
Thrilling Ranch Stories
Thrilling Western
Thrilling Western Magazine
Top-Notch Western
Top Western Fiction Annual
Top Western Stories
Treasury of Great Western Stories
Triple Western
Triple-X Western
Two-Gun Western/-Gun Western
Western-Action Books
Western Books
Variety Western
Wagon Train
Walt Coburn’s Western
West
Western Aces
Western Action
Western Action Novels Magazine
Western Adventures
Western Digest
Western Fiction
Western Fiction Magazine
Western Fiction Monthly
Western Magazine
Western Novels and Short Stories
Western Raider
Western Rangers Series
Western Romances
Western Short Stories
Western Story Magazine (Street & Smith)
Western Story Magazine (New Publications)
Western Trails
Western Yarns
Wide World Magazine
Wild West Stories and Complete Novels Magazine
Wild West Weekly
Zane Grey’s Western Magazine
The Weeklies include the following series and publishers:
All Around Weekly
All Sports Library
American Indian Weekly
Beadle’s Boys Library of Sport, Story, and Adventure
Beadle’s Frontier Series
Beadle’s Half Dime Library
Beadle’s New York Dime Library
Beadle’s Pocket Library
Beadle’s Popular Library
Bowery Boy Weekly
Boys’ Best Weekly
Boys of New York Pocket Library
Buffalo Bill Stories
Buffalo Bill Stories (German)
Brave and Bold Weekly
Champion Library
Comrades
Deadwood Dick Library
Dearborn Series
Detective Library
Diamond Dick Jr.
Diamond Dick Library
Do and Dare
Fame and Fortune Weekly
Five Cent Wide Awake Library
James Boys Weekly
Jesse James Stories: Original Narratives of the James Boys
Leisure Hour Library
Liberty Boys of ’76

Log Cabin Library
Log Cabin Library (Pocket Edition)
Might and Main Library: Stories of Boys Who Succeed
Morrison’s Sensational Series
New Buffalo Bill Weekly
New Nick Carter Weekly
New York Dime Library
New York Five Cent Library
Nick Carter Library
Nickel Library
Old Cap. Collier Library
Old Sleuth Weekly
People’s Handbook Series
Pluck and Luck
Red Raven Library
Red, White, and Blue
Secret Service
Snaps
Three Chums: A Weekly Story of the Adventures of Two Boys and a Girl
Tip Top Weekly: An Ideal Publication for the American Youth
Union Jack
Western Story Magazine
Western Weekly
Wide Awake Library-Special
Wide Awake Weekly
Wild West Weekly
Work and Win
Young Athlete’s Weekly
Young Rough Riders Weekly
Young Rover Library

Notes to Researchers
At its November 2005 meeting in Sedona, Arizona, the Board of Directors of the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum voted to pursue the acquisition of this collection. Between February 13 and 24, 2006, an exhaustive inventory of the collection in Shirley’s four bedroom Stillwater, Oklahoma house was conducted by Research Center staff Chuck Rand, Karen Spilman, and Jennifer Wochner. Staff returned to the house between March 3 and April 4, 2006 to pack the collection, room-by-room, and create box content inventories. On May 30 and 31, 2006 the collection was moved from the house to the Museum and a purchase agreement for the inventoried contents of all rooms, except that of the movie room, was signed by members of the Shirley family on May 31. Guy Logsdon completed his appraisal of the entire collection including the gifted contents of the movie room on October 10, 2006, when the final portion of the materials were transferred to the Museum’s ownership.

Because this was a collection created over decades, original order has sometimes been changed to help the researcher locate files. Titles to folders have been added as needed.

The Oklahoma Crime Cases: When Glenn Shirley labeled each folder, he attempted to name the criminal. Not all of the folders contain articles, which would include the trial, or conviction of said “criminal” and unless otherwise noted as “suspect” by Shirley, it is unknown whether these persons were the actual perpetrator. Also, some cases that were unresolved at the time of Shirley’s death in 2002, and it is unknown if the criminal named in the cases, possibly brought to trial, were convicted. There are also a few criminals who were later freed or found not guilty when DNA evidence could be tested. It was not the purpose of this process to determine guilt or innocence of the named criminal and no such guilt should therefore be assumed.

In some instances, under criminal, an “unknown” label was placed. The criminal was not necessarily unknown, but rather that the name was not mentioned in the articles. It might not be a mystery and this information may be found in other materials not included in the folder.

The case files for Oklahoma are the most thorough in the series, presumably because of Glenn Shirley’s close ties to the state and particularly to the Stillwater Police Department. The Oklahoma files are meticulously labeled with type of crime committed, date, victims, and criminals. The subseries is arranged alphabetically by county name, with each county grouping beginning with a collection of escaped convict trading cards, followed by crime case materials and articles from that county, which are arranged chronologically.

Publication series: Most of the manuscripts and galleys are unbound, and those that were bound have been disassembled for preservation purposes.

Glenn Shirley acquired most of the movie posters in this series from a movie theater and later added to them. The organization created by Shirley has largely been retained, and includes by genre, actor, setting, types of characters (e.g. outlaws and desperados), specific historical figures featured, literary adaptations organized by author, or film subjects, such as dog movies or movies featuring singing cowboys. As a single film often fits more than one of the categories thus provided, in some cases multiple folders for the same type of materials from the same film might be found in different categories of a given subseries (for example, a movie in which a famous actor stars as a famous outlaw may be represented in both the folder designated for movies starring that actor and the folder designated for movies about that particular outlaw).

Processing Information

Provenance Statement
On May 31, 2006 part of the collection was purchased from the Shirley family. On October 10, 2006 the movie memorabilia was gifted to Museum.

Container List

All Series

n.d.
I. Biographical
a. Awards & Citations
b. Biographical
c. Education
d. Memberships
e. Photographs & Slides
f. Scrapbooks
II. Correspondence
a. Personal
b. Publications
c. Research
III. Publications
a. Manuscripts & Galleys
b. Published Feature Stories
c. Book Reviews & Promotional Items
IV. Research materials
a. Cowboys and Western Figures
i. Buckskin Joe
ii. Buffalo Bill
iii. Custer, George Armstrong
iv. Eaton, Frank “Pistol Pete”
v. Gray, Otto
vi. Grey, Zane
vii. Haines, Wiley G.
viii. McGeeney, Patrick Sylvester “Purple Sage”
ix. McGinty, Billy
x. McGinty, John
xi. Pawnee Bill
xii. Payne, David
xiii. Will Rogers
xiv. Roosevelt, Theordore
b. Crime, Law Enforcement, and Punishment
i. Capital Punishment
ii. Crime Cases: Arizona, Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas
iii. Federal Courts and Counties in Indian Territory
iv. Fort Smith, et al.
v. Gangsters
vi. Leavenworth
vii. Mummified Outlaw
viii. Oklahoma State Penitentiary (OSP), Oklahoma Highway Patrol (OHP), Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (OSBI)
ix. Outlaws and Lawmen
c. General reference
i. Oklahoma Territory
ii. Western Americana
iii. Western Authors & Artists
1. Poets
2. Dramatists & Playwrights
3. Writers
4. Journalists
5. Artists of the West
6. Photographers
iv. Westerners in Film
1. Actors
2. Actresses
3. Directors
4. Locations
5. Historic Film Studios
6. Making Movies & Television Programs
7. Movie Memorabilia
V. Published Materials
a. Dime Novels
b. Pulp Magazines
c. Weeklies
d. Booklets & Pamphlets
e. Personal Card Catalog

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