7 Plots for Westerns (1960)

In an earlier post I posted about the four types of western stories. I was doing some digging and found this AP article in the May 19, 1960 edition of the Kentucky New Era titled "7 Plots for Westerns" by Cynthia Lowry.

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Frank Gruber, writer of westerns and currently producer of "Shotgun Slade" once made a list of the seven basic plots for westerns.

They are:

The Marshall Story--exploits of the dedicated peace officer.

The Outlaw Story--adventures, sympathetically treated, of the badman (but the badman dies at the end.

The Ranch Story--the adventures of the working cattle-raisers.

The Revenge Story--the hero tracks down the villain or vise-versa.

The Cavalry-and-Indians story--variations of the Custer's Last Stand theme.

The Empire Story--sagas of the cattle barons.

The Union Pacific Story--bringing transportation or communications to the West.

Naturally, nothing new has been added during the last two years.

The Western flavor however, is so standardized that most of us can tell what kind of show it will be just from the title: "Bronco," "Gunsmoke," "Wanted Dead or Alive," "Overland Trail." This season there was "Hotel de Paree," which might have been anything so next year it will be called "Sundance," which is more like it.