Ken Maynard(1895-1973)
- Actor
- Producer
- Writer
Studio publicity incorrectly puts his birthplace at Mission, Texas. Ken
was a trick rider with the Buffalo Bill Wild West Show and later with
Ringling Brothers and was also a champion rodeo rider. His movie debut,
The Man Who Won (1923), was the
first of many for this early cowboy movie superstar. He was famous for
the stunts he could enact with his horse
Tarzan. Maynard was the first singing
cowboy in the movies. During the 1930s, he dropped out of movies and
went back to rodeo work. He did a few more low-budget films in the
early 1940s, and then retired for good except for bit parts. His last
years were miserable; poor and unremembered, he lived alone in a
trailer, an alcoholic who at his death was a victim of serious
malnutrition.
