THE BEN LILLY LEGEND.

Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1950. xv,229pp. Index. Sources. Color frontis. of Lilly by Tom Lea. Illustrations by Lea & others. Photographs. Tan cloth with maroon illustrated front cover, marron spine label with title in gilt. First edition. Book is a very good copy. The colorful pictorial dust jacket shows edgewear and chipping to the spine, overall, good+. McMurtry, In a Narrow Grave p. 48: “His [Dobie’s] biography of Ben Lilly…is an excellent book on a man no one but Dobie could have got to.” Benjamin Vernon Lilly was born in 1856 in Alabama and died in New Mexico in 1936. He was, by his account and supported by the record, the greatest bear hunter since Davy Crockett. Lilly followed the bear and panther through Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, and New Mexico. His prowess as a tracker and a hunter were legendary. It is said he could tell an animal’s age, sex, and size from a week-old track. His kills of bears, panthers and other “varmints” number in the thousands. At one time, Lilly was “chief huntsman” for Teddy Roosevelt and there is a good bit of material on him and their relationship in this book. In January 1928, Dobie met Lilly in El Paso at the American National Livestock Association convention. He was intrigued by him and they talked extensively. Later, Lilly invited him to read his unfinished book which Dobie found fascinating. Dobie, after Lilly’s death, would search extensively for his papers. He incorporated this material with information, stories, and legends from others to write this highly entertaining book