Category: This great Nation & Its People
Buckskin Bill wearing the clothes that gave him his name, along with
a bear fur hat and handmade muzzleloader he built.
I first heard of “Buckskin Bill” from my good friend, Dick Thompson. He told me about hunting in Idaho’s primitive area and stopping at a small crossroads general store to pick up supplies.
On the way, Dick notices someone sleeping under a large wagon. During a conversation with the store’s proprietor, Dick casually mentions the man he saw sleeping under a wagon down the road and wanted to know if someone should check on him.
The proprietor chuckled, saying,” That’s Buckskin Bill, he’s fine. Just resting up to make his trek home. It wasn’t the last time Dick would hear the name, as Buckskin Bill became famous as the last of the true mountain men. Books have been written and TV documentaries filmed about the famous mountain man who wanted to be left alone. His real name was Sylvan Hart.
Four of Buckskin Bill’s handmade muzzleloaders.
The Beginning
Sylvan Hart was born in 1906 in Oklahoma. Hart was restless from a young age, as most boys were back then. He worked on Texas oil rigs during the Great Depression and later attended universities, but dropped out. Hart was highly intelligent, and college bored him. In 1932, after working for the Norden Bombsight Company, Hart headed west, seeking peace and adventure in Idaho’s rugged back country, in search of gold. He fell in love with the area.
Powder horns and possible bag made by Buckskin Bill.
The main branch of the Salmon River, known as the “River of No Return” for its treacherous rapids and isolation, became his sanctuary. The area was rich in natural resources. Besides being abundant in fish and game, minerals were abundant for Hart to use to make his own knives, guns, pots and pans from the raw materials.
He said, “My reaction to the Depression was to find a place with the natural resources to defeat it. I could have found no better place than Salmon River. I spent some $50 a year then for what little I needed to buy.”
Copper kettles, ladles and spoons made form Buckskin Bill from the copper in the mountains.
Hart and his father originally purchased the 50 acres on the Salmon River in 1932 for the sum of one single American dollar. It was a dollar well spent, as he would go on to live off that same land until his death in 1980. Besides some metals, gunpowder, nails, and his favorite Darjeeling tea, almost everything was foraged from the surrounding land.
Bill rifling one of his muzzleloader barrels the old way.
The Name
Hart earned the nickname “Buckskin Bill” for his preference for the clothes he made from hides he tanned himself, using the animal’s brain. His lifestyle was as unique as his attire. He built a compound of crude cabins with names like “Pneumonia Hall” and “Misery Mansion.” By the time of his death, Hart had created a veritable village on the riverbank, including a bomb shelter, a turret, a two-story house, and a blacksmith shop.
He would hunt, fish, and garden for food, while occasionally venturing into nearby towns to trade his furs for supplies. His presence always drew a crowd when spotted. He was loved by locals for his outgoing personality and tall tales, while still fiercely guarding his privacy and the rugged freedom of his chosen lifestyle.
Wearing his bearskin coat, horned helmet while brandishing his broadsword,
all made by Buckskin Bill, you can see he was quite the character.
Lifestyle
In his own words, Hart described his philosophy: “I live on beans and taters. I ain’t never been sick a day in my life … I figure it’s about 99% willpower.” His resourcefulness and ability to thrive in the harsh conditions earned him the respect and sometimes bemusement of both locals and the growing number of rafters venturing down the Salmon River.
Inside view of Bill’s sleeping quarters.
In 1956, the National Forest Service designated the five-mile section of the Salmon, Hart’s home, as a “primitive area,” threatening potential eviction. Hart famously constructed a stone gun tower overlooking the river, a symbol of both his defiance and his fear of losing the life he had built. While he avoided eviction, the incident cemented his reputation as both a defender of the wild and a relic of a bygone era.
The observation tower/gun turret Buckskin Bill built on his property.
While never wealthy, Hart’s stories and lifestyle made him a folk hero.
Panning for gold on the Salmon River wearing his
bearskin Conquistador hat obviously made by Bill.
Hart’s Survival Tips
“When you kill a deer, the first meal should be fried brains, one kidney, liver, heart, sweet bread, and any other odds and ends you might want to eat there. And if you are like me and need a little vitamins or medicine of some kind, it’s in there, and you always feel better after a meal or two like that.”
When speaking of his handmade muzzleloaders, Hart sad, “I don’t complain about anything, but if you had the choice between a flintlock rifle and lots of game, and a lot of modern technology, I would take the older type you see and take my chances.” It was this kind of hearty backwoods resourcefulness that people refer to when calling “Buckskin Bill” the last of the mountain men.
“You know, if you can make a really good gun, and do all the work, you don’t worry about breaking it. There’s some satisfaction in having a gun the way you want it. With a flintlock, too, you can shoot a long time without depending upon anybody else. If you’ve got the powder.”
Part of Buckskin Bill’s compound.
Besides hunting and fishing, Hart had a huge garden as a year-round food source, with plenty of root vegetables in it. “I always had a garden, he said, “It was easy to get fruit, and I made moccasins and clothing out of animal skins.”
His isolation gave him time to think and ponder, leading to this statement, “For the city man, life is just a jumble, like the facts in a college freshman’s notebook. But you ask me anything about nearly anything, and I can answer because I’ve had time to think about it.”
It wasn’t the bears or mountain lions that worried Hart, living by himself in the wilds of Idaho. He stated, “I am afraid of one thing … A cold wind. That’ll kill you for nothing. You’ll just die like a damn fool.”
Buckskin Bill’s Blacksmith shop.
The End
Sylvan “Buckskin Bill” Hart died in 1980, and he was buried on his property. After his death, the U.S. Park Service declared his property and compound as the Buckskin Bill Museum, where visitors can glimpse the life of this remarkable mountain man and contemplate the vanishing wilderness lifestyle he embodied. The only way to access this unique piece of history is by rafting down the Main Salmon River or by taking a jetboat tour.
There are several good books and YouTube videos about the life of the last of the mountain men.
Matt Damon is one of the most successful actors in Hollywood. He is 52 years old and has already starred in 85 movies. Google claims his net worth hovers around $170 million.
In general, I like Matt Damon’s movies. Elysium was great, as was, of course, Saving Private Ryan. Interstellar, The Martian, and the Ocean series never get old. And then there was Bourne.
Damon just nailed that one. He played a conflicted amnesiac assassin who, throughout four full-length films, traveled the globe gratuitously killing strangers while trying to discover who he really was. Matt Damon did a superb job of taking Robert Ludlum’s magnificent words and translating them into something we could experience on the big screen. I’ve seen them all several times.
Table of contents
Action Hero
As Jason Bourne, Matt Damon comes across as quite the bad man. His close combat skills both with weapons and without are pretty epic. Heck, he once killed a dude with a rolled-up magazine. Alas, however, that’s all just fake make-believe.
Out here in the real world, action movie star Matt Damon has little use for such stuff as private gun ownership. While interviewing in Australia, he was quoted as having said, “You guys did it here in one fell swoop and I wish that could happen in my country…It’s wonderful what Australia did…And nobody’s rights have been infringed, you guys are all fine.”
Damon’s Idea Of Freedom Smells Fishy
In 1996, Australia enacted sweeping gun control legislation that allowed the government to confiscate 650,000 guns from private citizens, effectively disarming most of the Australian populace. I spent some time in Australia soon thereafter back when I was a soldier. The Aussie gun nerds in uniform with whom I worked were mightily lamenting the irrevocable demise of their liberty.
My point is simply that Matt Damon is pretty typical. Most of those tough Hollywood studs are Big Government anti-freedom Leftists. Damon, for his part, is a committed supporter of the Democratic Party, having personally hosted a fundraiser for Elizabeth Warren. Mark Ruffalo (the Hulk) and Chris Evans (Captain America) are even farther Left. However, it was not always thus.
Origin Story of Sterling Hayden
Sterling Hayden starred in 59 films and 18 television programs. By all accounts, his was a fabulously successful Hollywood career. However, throughout it all, he was quick to explain that acting was just a means to an end for him. Sterling Hayden climbed up onto the big screen just to support his limitless adrenaline addiction. He started young.
Hayden was born Sterling Relyea Walter in 1916 in Upper Montclair, New Jersey. His dad died when he was nine, and his mom remarried. His stepdad, James Hayden, formally adopted him and changed his name to Sterling Hayden.
He dropped out of school at age sixteen to take a job crewing an oceangoing schooner. He traveled all around the Americas from New London, Connecticut, to Newport Beach, California. Along the way he ran a charter yacht and crewed a steamer to Cuba and back eleven different times. His first Captaincy was the square rigger Florence C. Robinson. At age 22 he commanded the Robinson on a 7,700-mile voyage from Gloucester, Massachusetts, to Tahiti.
Newfound Success
Upon his return from Tahiti in 1938, Hayden had his photo fortuitously taken while participating in a Fisherman’s Race. This image ended up on the cover of a magazine and was seen by an executive for Paramount Pictures. That earned him an invitation to screen test for the movies.
Hayden stood 6 feet 5 inches tall and reliably filled a room. He got the part without really trying. Paramount later marketed him as “The Beautiful Blond Viking God.”
Hayden had this to say about his newfound success, “I was completely lost, ignorant, nervous. But the next thing I knew, Paramount made me a seven-year contract beginning at $250 a week, which was astronomical. I got my lovely old mother and bought a car, and we drove to California…I was so lost then I didn’t think to analyze it. I said, ‘This is nuts, but, damned, it’s pleasant.’ I had only one plan in mind: to get $5,000. I knew where there was a schooner, and then I’d haul ass.”
Sterling Hayden Goes To War
And then the world came unglued. With World War 2 looming large, Sterling Hayden abandoned Hollywood and enlisted in the Army. He was deployed to Scotland for training but suffered a severe ankle fracture and was medically separated from the military. He then returned home and tried to buy a schooner. However, he was unable to raise the cash.
Many guys who had been legitimately injured in military service might have just called it a day. However, that’s not the way Sterling Hayden was rigged. Once his ankle healed, he enlisted in the Marine Corps under an alias, apparently to avoid being tied to his previous injury.
A Strange Promotion
Hayden actually thrived at Parris Island and went straight from boot camp to Officer Candidate School. Once he was commissioned a Second Lieutenant, Hayden got a curious call from Colonel William “Wild Bill” Donovan. At the time, Donovan carried the misleading title, “Coordinator of Information.” With FDR’s backing, Donovan eventually birthed the OSS (Office of Strategic Services). The OSS was the precursor to today’s CIA. Sterling Hayden had just become a spy.
Still operating under the nondescript alias “John Hamilton,” Sterling Hayden–ship’s captain, shadow warrior, and movie star–was deployed to the Mediterranean to take the fight to the Nazis. And this he did…for the next three years.
Hayden lived and worked in enemy-held territory. He captained a motor launch running weapons, supplies, and ammunition to Yugoslavian partisans serving under Tito. Hayden parachuted covertly into Croatia to help organize resistance cells. He fought the Germans and Italians during the Naples-Foggia campaign and organized partisans into rescue teams to repatriate downed Allied fliers. By the end of the war, Hayden was a Captain.
American Silver Star
Now appreciate what that meant. This towering 6 foot 5 inch giant of a man masqueraded as a fisherman, running guns under the noses of the Nazis for years. He didn’t wear a uniform. At any moment he could have been discovered, captured, tortured, and killed. He earned the Bronze Arrowhead Device for parachuting behind enemy lines in combat. Josip Broz Tito recognized him with the Order of Merit for exceptional valor in action. He earned the American Silver Star for gallantry. The citation for the award read in part, “Lt. Hamilton displayed great courage in making hazardous sea voyages in enemy-infested waters and reconnaissance through enemy-held areas.” Wow. What a stud.
After the war, like so many millions of American veterans, Sterling Hayden came home. His wartime service overseas left him with a deep love and appreciation for his country. During one press conference, he said, “I feel a real obligation to make this a better country – and I believe the movies are the place to do it.”
Short Stint As A Communist
After having served so long alongside communist partisans in combat, Hayden came home with a bit of a soft spot for the Reds. In the late 1940’s and early 1950’s, this was an unpopular place to be politically. He briefly joined the American Communist Party but soon became disillusioned and left. He eventually testified before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, this time as a reformed communist. He later said, “The FBI made it very clear to me that, if I became an ‘unfriendly witness’, I could damn well forget the custody of my children. I didn’t want to go to jail, that was the other thing.”
Hayden found plenty of work in Hollywood. Some of his movies were better than others. In 1956, he starred in The Killing directed by Stanley Kubrick. This low-budget outing became a respected classic and eventually landed him a big part in Dr. Strangelove as the warmongering Air Force General Jack D. Ripper who tries to end the world. Throughout it all, however, Hayden acted just to pay the bills. 
Sterling Hayden Traveled The World
He eventually landed that schooner, The Wanderer, and used it to travel the world on the proceeds from his movies. After a particularly acrimonious divorce wherein he was awarded custody of his children, Hayden scooped up his four kids and struck out for Tahiti, defying a court order in the process. Eventually, he remarried and fathered another two sons.
Like most folks who hit it big, Hayden grew introspective later in life. He eschewed Hollywood, for the most part. He came out of retirement to do Dr. Strangelove as a favor for Kubrick. Whenever he described himself in his later years he claimed to be a sailor or writer rather than an actor.
The End For Sterling Hayden
Eventually, Sterling Hayden developed prostate cancer. That’s an eminently treatable condition today, but back in the early 1980’s, we did not have nearly so many good tools. He ultimately succumbed to the disease in 1986 at age 70.
Sterling Hayden was married to three different women. He traveled the world, faced death countless times, and then channeled a little bit of that extraordinarily manly life into his many movies. The Beautiful Blond Viking God was a Renaissance Man indeed.