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George Reeves was a careful man.
His young slave boy, Bass, wanted to learn to read but
Reeves “couldn’t have that,” so he taught Bass to shoot.
Before long, the boy was one of the best sharpshooters
Reeves had ever seen, and he decided to enter Bass in a few
contests.
Nobody thought a slave could win a shooting match, but
that’s exactly what Bass did – over and over again. As he
grew, so did his talent with a gun but though Bass won every
competition, Reeves still treated Bass like a “family pet.”
That continued for many years. Even during the Civil War,
Colonel Reeves took Bass to the front with him as his
personal slave – until Bass escaped.
Not knowing where he was, Bass ran until he was exhausted.
He ran until he couldn’t run any more, until he was rescued
from near-death by a tribe of Native Americans who tended
Bass’s wounds and welcomed them into their village. They
considered him family but Bass remembered how he’d been
enslaved, so he left the village and returned to the
battlefield, where he fought for the Union Army.
After the War was over, Bass married, started a family, and
settled down to farm until, once again, duty called. Because
Bass (who’d taken his former master’s surname) had a good
relationship with the Native Americans in the Territories,
he was hired to be a U.S. Marshal. It didn’t take long
before he was deputized, and he began to make a name for
himself. Word soon spread that a tall, black lawman was
patrolling the territories and that, wherever he went, he
left a silver dollar as a calling card. Bass Reeves was
known to be smart, and he’d do anything to bring a criminal
down.
Even when that criminal was his own son.
Though its back-and-forth timeline can be confusing
sometimes – particularly in latter pages – I liked Bass
Reeves: Tales of the Talented Tenth quite a bit.
Based on little-known but true events, this is a story of
action, honor, and the Wild West. That’s very good, but what
equally appealed to me was the way author Joel Christian
Gill uses his artist’s skills to tell this tale. The
illustrations here are fully half the story; they entertain
as they inform and they’re even a little sassy, with dark
characters and icons as dialogue.
This is a book for teens or adults, including reluctant or
struggling 12-to-17-year-olds for whom reading sometimes
seems inaccessible. For them, or anyone who might like to
try something different, Bass Reeves: Tales of the
Talented Tenth is quite arresting. |
