Hoot Gibson

Born Edmund Richard Gibson in Tekamah, Nebraska, he learned to ride a horse while still a very young boy. His family moved to California when he was seven years old. As a teenager, he worked with horses on a ranch, which led to competition on bucking broncos at area rodeos.\n', '

Given the nickname "Hoot Owl" by co-workers, the name evolved to just "Hoot". (Michael Wallis\' book, The Real Wild West: The 101 Ranch and the Creation of the American West, says that Gibson "picked up the nickname \'Hoot\' while working as a bicycle messenger for Owl Drug Company." Dan L. Thrapp\'s Encyclopedia of Frontier Biography says that Gibson "is said to have been nicknamed because he once hunted owls in a cave.")\n', '

In 1910, film director Francis Boggs was looking for experienced cowboys to appear in his silent film Pride of the Range. Gibson and Tom Mix, another future star of Western films, were…