But the age of licensing well known characters from shows was still years off. Instead, toy companies, like Marx, developed western action-figure lines based predominately on fictional characters they themselves created.
However, one real-life character appeared in Marx's first line and has been in very many action-figure lines since:
Gen. George Armstrong Custer starred as a white hat in the very first westernthemed line of figures, Marx's Best of the West series. Only two other real-life characters- Daniel Boone and Geronimo-joined Custer in the series of more than 20 figures. Custer has since been produced dozens of times, by many different companies in many different styles, but one thing has remained the same: he's always a good guy.
Today, of course, we realize that Custer wasn't as pure and innocent as we were led to believe by our grade school history teachers. But the mythos of General Custer as the ultimate military hero-giving his life to defend the West from the “heathen” Indian-stuck with his action figure over the decades.
Why did Custer remain such a popular choice? Certainly there were plenty of other names well known to the average child. A few figures did occasionally get made of these characters. But none has the distinction of being represented as a plastic icon so many times. Custer even showed up when he made little sense in context, for example, in the Legends of the Lone Ranger line of the early 1980s.
Custer's powerful mythos and martyrdom, combined with his easily recognized appearance, make him an ideal choice for an action-figure white hat. His mythos represents everything heroic about the western frontier, and dying a hero's death added extra spice and appeal. His long, flowing blond hair, distinct facial hair, and military uniform allowed manufacturers to produce a figure that children would know on sight as General Custer. He stood out as a marketer's dream, a widely recognizable figure with all the right qualities, and no one left to collect royalties.
Other famous real-life western heroes did make it into plastic. Wild Bill Hickok, Buffalo Bill Cody, Calamity Jane, Belle Starr, Annie Oakley, Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, Davy Crockett, Daniel Boone, Jim Bowie, and others have all been made into toys for children. All were portrayed as the white hats.
By the late 1970s, licensing characters from movies and television shows became the de facto standard. Toys from TV shows and movies like The Legend ofthe Lone Ranger, Butch and Sundance:The Early Years, Wild Wild West, GrizzlyAdams, How the West Was Won, andZorro became the norm, while lines based on generic characters slowly disappeared.
Still, even today the most resilient of the famous western heroes show up occasionally in the toy aisles. Their myth is still strong enough to lure children and companies alike back to the tales of their heroics.
