Three Men in Texas: Bedichek, Webb, Dobie: Essays by Their Friends in the Texas Observer ed. by Ronnie Dugger

Abstract

310 Western American Literature Three Men in Texas: Bedichek, Webb, Dobie: Essays by Their Friends in the Texas Observer. Ronnie Dugger (ed.). Austin: University of Texas Press, 1967. 285 pages, $6.50.) As the title indicates, editor Ronnie Dugger of the Texas Observer, put together essays by friends of Roy Bedichek, Walter Prescott Webb, and J. Frank Dobie. Most of these vignettes appeared first in special issues of the journal dedicated specifically to these famed three Texans; then after their deaths came this appropriate single volume honoring the triumvirate. It is next to impossible for me not to be subjective about reviewing this book. I knew all three men personally a total of 77 years of their aggregate 232 years on earth. I broke bread with them publicly and privately, formally and informally. Dobie helped direct my MA thesis and was an influence in its publication; Webb helped direct my Ph.D. dissertation, a part of which he incorporated into The Great Frontier, and Bedichek served admirably as informal, unofficial counselor on any subject whatever. Of the 43 contributors to this book, I have known 20 personally. I think I knew the three subjects better than some of these, but not so well as others. I suspect that anybody can learn from this book much that he did not already know. It would be difficult to imagine three men in Texas, or anywhere else, so different in personality, yet with so many similar character traits and common interests. Inevitably they were drawn together. Dobie and Webb were born in 1888; Bedichek, in 1878. Much later, within a span of only five years, all three were dead. Bedichek died in his home at 71, waiting for the cornbread to finish cooking. Webb died at 75, of injuries in an automobile accident. Dobie died at 76, in his sleep. All three had humble origins: Webb a farmer, Dobie a rancher, Bedichek a man of the soil if ever there was one —all were the salt of the earth. The works of all three bear evidence that they stayed close to the earth. During their later years their personal friendship and mutual interests became stronger as they traded words of wisdom around the campfire. As Ronnie Dugger says, Bedichek was a naturalist, Webb a historian, and Dobie a chronicler; but each of them was each of these. He dedicates the book “to what they stood for.” Whoever reads this book will know what the phrase means. Whoever knew them personally also knows. Whoever reads their works will also know. One of the writers attempts to catch the phrase most befitting each of the three personalities. Bedichek was the “man of nature,” Webb the man of “massive common sense,” Dobie the man of “ integrity.” But, again, each of them was each of these. Though all three excelled in their writing, each having more than one prize-winning book, it is generally agreed that Bedichek’s Adventures with a Texas Naturalist is his best undertaking. And with Webb, though all his Reviews 311 books excel, the laurel goes to his masterpiece The Great Frontier. With Dobie, the writers do not agree: one will pick Tongues of the Monte, another The Voice of the Coyote, another The Mustangs. Dobie admitted to me once that his books were uneven in quality; somehe felt much better about than others. One thing all these essayists say in common: though all these three men were regional in their interests, they were also universal and never provincial. And all three consistently wrote and spoke out against tyranny over the freedom of men’s minds, all with an integrity that cost them friends and (in Dobie’s case) position. And one other thing. During my 77 years aggregate acquaintance with them, I knew them as men, not angels or demi­ gods. They could bestow praise where it was warranted as well as piercing criticism where it was needed, either tofriend or to foe. If there is one possible fault withthis book, it is the near-sentimentality of some of its eulogies, which amount almost to panegyrics. I am satisfied that none of these three men ever contemplated apotheosis, or ever desired it...