Legends of True Crime Reporting: Ted P. Yeatman, T.J. Stiles, and the Jesse James Journalism Extravaganza

Note: In the interests of full disclosure, I should say that some people who know me claim that I am a "James-In-Law" -- the term for someone who marries someone who claims kinship to THE James family. At least that's what my mother- and father-in-law insist is the case, based on a generations-old rumor and a musty old family album. (At one point, it was politely suggested that we name our first child Jesse, regardless of gender. We settled on Roger.) Frankly, I had my doubts; aren't these stories a dime apiece? And if I had a nickel for every person I knew that claimed that his great-grandmother was a "full-blooded Chippewa" (or whatever the local tribe), I'd be sipping a margarita on a beach right now. But when you're a James, and you're allegedly a JAMES, the place to go to make a query is a very well done website by Eric James, a bona fide James, which is called Stray Leaves; it contains a genealogy of the James family among other interesting things. After corresponding with Eric James, I learned that my hubby's family legend is probably bunk. That's fine with me, but I think I'll keep the news to myself. My father-in-law worships the outlaw Jesse James as the man "who represented every man who ever felt the boot of The Man on his neck." Anyway...

You'd never want to find yourself in the shoes of Ted P. Yeatman.

Yeatman, a member of the vast fraternity of Jesse James researchers and author of many magazine pieces, knew that the shelves full of books written about Jesse and Frank James were sorely lacking. Decades had passed since anyone wrote a truly definitive book on the James Gang, let alone a work backed by modern research methods. And he set out to write one. He spent years and years in the musty basements of museums and libraries, knee-deep in unarchived materials untouched for generations by human hands, and probably read enough microfilm to delight his optometrist. He uncovered a mountain of previously unpublished material. And he did in fact write a definitive book about the James Gang featuring his new research. He found a publisher--Cumberland House--to print his work in 2001. Yeatman must have known that his book, Frank and Jesse James: The Story Behind the Legend, would be the last and definitive word on its title subjects. When it came out, Yeatman enjoyed the hearty and well-earned congratulations of the many devotees of the James legend for his impressive finds and his accessible, magazine style of reporting.

And then, only a few months later, Yeatman learned that another book was coming out. One that promised to be the last and definitive word on Jesse James. How it must have mightily pained him to be preempted! If he was human, he let out a colorful oath at his luck.

But let's rewind a bit, go back a few years. You wouldn't ever want to find yourself in the shoes of T.J. Stiles, either.

Stiles, who had one young adult book about Jesse James to his credit, knew that many, many books written about Jesse James were sorely lacking. He spent years and years in the musty basements of museums and libraries, knee-deep in unarchived materials untouched for generations by human hands, and probably read enough microfilm to delight his optometrist. He uncovered a mountain of new material on his subject. He started writing what he knew would be a definitive, ground-breaking book on Jesse Woodson James.

And then he learned that someone had beaten him to the punch. Ted Yeatman's book was published. Can you imagine that moment? That awful feeling of fearing that years of your life had been wasted? How nervous he must have been when calling his publisher, Random House, to see if the deal was still on!

But it was. Stiles's book, Jesse James: Last Rebel of the Civil War, was quite different from Yeatman's book, which was encyclopedic in its presentation of facts not only of Jesse James, but of the many other members of the "gang" and of James's immediate family. Stiles's work focused on the hot political winds that blew through the times and presented James in a political context. He also put forth the controversial theory that the outlaw Jesse James had a hand in creating his own legend. Stiles's book came out in 2002, and it was widely hailed as carefully researched and persuasive. The New York Times Review of Books put him on the cover. He was interviewed on NPR. He basked in the well-earned praise of those who lauded his years of effort.

Then the inevitable war of words between the authors began. And who could blame either one of them one bit? The forum was the History News Network. The opening salvo came from Yeatman, who questioned Stiles's key premise that Jesse James promoted himself in letters to the editor of the newspapers of his day. Yeatman pointed out that Stiles's other book about Jesse James--the young adult book published in 1994--stated that the letters in question were probably written by newspaper editor John Newman Edwards, Jesse's great champion, and not Jesse himself. Yeatman had a point. Stiles responded by stating that the young adult book had his name on it, but he contributed only the research, and the actual writing was done by in-house writers at the publisher. The war of words continued, and nothing was resolved. Good grief, gentlemen... not that anyone couldn't thoroughly sympathize by that point...

Speaking for myself, I had some other troubles with Stiles's book. I have spent quite a bit of time researching the life of Jesse Edwards James, a/k/a Jesse James, Jr., only son of the legendary bandit, since he had a connection to Dr. Zeo Zoe Wilkins, my obsession for the past few years (see my essay on Zeo Zoe here) and because I think Jesse, Jr. was interesting all by himself. Jesse, Jr. was the last of Zeo Wilkins's many, many lawyers, and he testified at the inquest into her death. So when I picked up T.J. Stiles's book, I spotted a factual error on the very first page: Jesse, Jr. was six when his father was murdered, not seven as Stiles states. On the last page of his book, Stiles relays that Jesse, Jr. became a lawyer in Los Angeles. Actually, Jesse went to law school in Kansas City, became a lawyer in Kansas City, and practiced law in Missouri for decades before retiring to California. While he did pass the California bar, he didn't really practice in that state; he was in no condition to do so, suffering as he did from emotional troubles. As to everything in the middle, I cannot bear witness. I do have trouble accepting Stiles's hypothesis that Jesse James participated in the creation of his own living legend, knowing that his immediate family members, including his mother Zerelda and his wife Zee, were extremely adverse to publicity of any kind; even when his widow, Zee James, was mired in awful poverty for many years following his death, she flat-out refused to sell her story despite many, many offers from publishers, and she adamantly refused to let her son Jesse, Jr. take up any of these lucrative offers for stage and screen, either. At least while she was alive. Years after she died, Jesse, Jr. would make the disastrous decision to finally portray the family's version of the legend... but that is another story.

Regardless of my nit-picking, I cannot deny these two authors the respect they deserve for their exhaustive research and impressive books as well as the sympathy they deserve for the poor timing of their releases, not the fault of either. The war of words that later erupted has been thoroughly enjoyable--but it's a view best appreciated from the cheap seats. I will never find myself in their shoes, the Good Lord willing and the creek don't rise. 

Comments

[Trench]

Excellent post. I've always been fascinated with the history and alegged geneology of Jesse James.

[Bernie]

"...and the creek don't rise." And the bridges hold!

Good Job!

Il me semble enfin souhaitable que nos élus aillent se...

[Chuck Rabas]

Laura,
Yeatman credited me with some of the research he used. Prior to the release of Stiles' book, he had received two pre-pub copies of it, and sent one to me to evaluate. To Ted's delight, I found a number of factual errors.
Chuck