John Wayne: The Life and Legend (67 page)

At the same time, the studio licensed the picture to television along with ninety-four other UA pictures, for $115 million. The amount allocated for
The Alamo
was fuzzy, although it wouldn’t be surprising if—purely coincidentally, of course—it would have been about $2 million, thereby finally putting the picture decisively into the black. United Artists paid off the debt to McCullough in 1969, just about the time the tool company went into receivership.

That was the end of John Wayne’s financial involvement with
The Alamo
; his emotional involvement was another thing entirely. Ultimately,
The Alamo
went into profit, but not for Wayne and not for Batjac.

The Alamo
was a film that was born only because of John Wayne’s total dedication and will. But it fought him every inch of the way.

1. The original negative was cut to conform to the new 161-minute length, and the trims and deletions were destroyed. For over thirty years, the original version of the film was generally thought lost, until in 1991 a single 70mm print was found in Toronto and used as the master for laser disc and VHS release. Unfortunately, by the time DVDs and Blurays came in, the 70mm print had likewise deteriorated. The masters used for the laser disc and VHS were unsuitable for the increased definition of DVD or Blu-ray, so those obsolete systems remain the only way Wayne’s expansive vision of the film can be seen.

The financial failure of
The Alamo
wasn’t the worst thing that happened to John Wayne in 1960.

Ward Bond had chafed for years at the fact that he wasn’t a star, but he finally realized his dream when
Wagon Train
went on the air in September of 1957. Playing Major Seth Adams, a riff on his portrayal in John Ford’s
Wagon Master
, this showcase for Bond’s avuncular but firm personality granted him what he had always wanted: magazine covers and a star’s salary.

Bond’s late-life success came with a stinger—a highly competitive younger man as a co-star. Robert Horton had heard all about Bond’s strong dislikes. “Ward had many reputations,” remembered Horton, “but his main reputation was being anti-black, anti-Spanish, and of course anti-gay. And maybe anti-democratic. Ward had lots of qualities that weren’t admirable.”

Bond and Horton had an uneasy relationship from the first meeting, even though Horton thought Bond deserved an Oscar for his performance as John L. Sullivan in
Gentleman Jim
and told him so.

Initially, everything was fine. “Ward was very compatible and very warm,” remembered Horton. “Then he said, ‘Let’s go across the street to Dupar’s.’ Well, we went over there and had a bite to eat and we talked and there was no antagonism. But you know how, when you meet somebody, you can tell pretty quickly if you’re going to be long-term friends or not? That’s exactly what happened with Ward. It just wasn’t going to be a friendship.”

In the very first episode of
Wagon Train
, Horton had a scene of conflict with Bond, a scene about two men of equivalent strength working toward the same goal in different ways. But the scene was cut from the pilot before it aired—the first of a long list of Bond’s political power grabs.

“He acted like a despot,” said Horton, “as if
Wagon Train
was his own particular vehicle. In some ways, he had reason to feel that. It was based on a movie he had starred in, and he was starring in the show as well. But he thought he ran the show.”

There was only one instance of overt conflict between Bond and Horton. Horton was directed to do something that he felt would violate his character and he resisted. Bond overheard the exchange and came riding over on his horse. “How dare you tell this man you don’t want to take his direction?” he yelled at Horton.

Other than that, the two men maintained a steely courtesy. But Virgil Vogel, one of the show’s primary directors, told Horton that Bond was doing everything he could to get rid of him. If Horton had a good line, Bond would go to Vogel about cutting it; if Horton had a good scene, Bond would try to have it cut. “It was very petty,” said Horton, “and it never worked.” Bond was also telling the men on the show that Horton was homosexual—which he wasn’t.

As the first year of
Wagon Train
closed out, Bond’s anger grew intense. He wanted the show to be all about him, but Horton had captured the young fans. “He had top billing, but I was getting five thousand fan letters a week and Ward was getting fifty,” said Horton. “That played on him. That said, although I knew we didn’t get along great, there was really no obvious sense of anger between us.”

As the first season ended, Bond told MCA, the producers of
Wagon Train
, that he wouldn’t work with Horton anymore. There was a formal meeting at the producer’s office, where the brass made an introductory speech about how big a hit the show was. We—the studio—can’t afford to let personal views put the show off the air, and that could happen, etc. We all stand to make a lot of money, so let’s let bygones be bygones, etc.

Bond was firm: “I won’t work with him anymore.”

The producer asked Bond what he didn’t like about Horton. “I don’t like the spurs he wears,” said Bond.

“I’ll get rid of them,” said Horton.

“I don’t like his horse either,” said Bond.

Horton said it was fine if Bond didn’t want to work with him; he was going to leave when his contract was up anyway. And then Horton said that he didn’t appreciate Bond spreading rumors that he was homosexual. The meeting broke up in disarray. Both men remained adamant.

At the next production meeting, the brass announced that the two men didn’t have to work together; that Bond would front half the shows and Horton the other half, and scenes between them would be kept to a bare minimum. And for the next couple of years, that was the way it was.

By the end of 1960,
Wagon Train
was in its fourth season and still a top ten show. In some respects, stardom hadn’t changed Bond much; he still lived on twenty-three and three quarters acres in Coldwater Canyon that he had bought in 1946, where he lived with his wife, Mary Lou, surrounded by handmade Early American furniture and a couple of Labradors named Joe and Angus. Mary Lou Bond was generally known as “Maisie,” and had lived with Bond for years before John Ford had enough and told them to get married and be quick about it.

The house contained Bond’s proudest possession, a plaque from the Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge he’d received in 1959. It commended Bond for “steadfastness, courage, and clarity of thought in the face of personal abuse and vilification by advocates of the alien, atheistic doctrine of world socialistic communism.”

The heavy workload of a weekly hour-long TV show hadn’t stemmed Bond’s drinking. He would start his day in the makeup chair with what he called a coffee royale—coffee and whiskey. On the set in the morning, there were Bloody Marys or screwdrivers, which he referred to as his “daily vitamins.” Lunch would be carried by both red and white wine, and in the afternoon there was a cooler that held a six-pack of beer, which he refused to share with anybody. At 5 P.M., Bond would declare, “Goddamn it, the sun’s going down, it’s time to have a real drink,” which meant whiskey or bourbon.

In most respects, Bond was an open book—his drinking and his politics were all generally known. But Bond also had his secrets. For one, he was epileptic, which is why he hadn’t served in World War II. For another, he was taking Dexamyl tablets—time-released speed—in an effort to keep up with his workload. John Ford knew about the pills, and was deeply concerned.

All this contributed to the fact that Bond seemed much older than his chronological age of fifty-seven—as the fourth season of
Wagon Train
got under way in the fall of 1960, Bond’s hair was turning from gray to white, his gut was even more prominent, and his voice was unusually raspy.

Whatever his failings, Bond’s emotional intelligence made him lend each part a touch of humanity. “He was an excellent actor,” said Horton. “He was instinctive and very, very good. His choices were almost always dead-on. If the director had a different choice for him, he would take it instantly and not argue about it. And he was very professional and well prepared.”

Bond pulled off a considerable coup when he got John Ford to direct an episode of
Wagon Train
in May of 1960. Ford’s show was called
The Colter Craven Story,
and featured a brief appearance by John Wayne as William Tecumseh Sherman. It’s the story of an alcoholic doctor whose will to stay sober is revived by Major Seth Adams (Bond) telling him the story—in flashback—of General U.S. Grant. It’s recognizably a Ford film, with dark-hued photography and a flashback structure that foretells
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
.

In November 1960, Bond made plans to go to Dallas to appear at halftime of a Cowboys football game as a favor to a friend. The night before he went to Dallas, he was in his dressing room, which he shared with co-stars (and former stuntmen) Terry Wilson and Frank McGrath. Robert Horton came in looking for McGrath, but he wasn’t there.

Horton told Bond, “You know, Ward, we’ve had our differences, but we can agree on one thing: this script stinks.” Bond smiled and put his hand on Horton’s shoulder.

“Bobby,” he said, sounding for all the world like Major Seth Adams, “we don’t have any goldarn differences.”

The next day, Bond was taking a shower in his hotel room in Dallas when he was stricken with a heart attack. He collapsed against the bathroom door, and by the time the ambulance crew got there, he was dead.

Terry Wilson broke the bad news to Wayne: “Hold on,” blurted Wilson by phone, “Ward just dropped dead.” Wayne and Wilson both began crying. The funeral was two days later, at John Ford’s Field Photo Farm, where Bond was laid out in an open casket. Among the attendees were Wayne, Gregory Peck, Adolphe Menjou, Jane Darwell, Monte Blue, Harry Carey Jr., Terry Wilson, Frank McGrath, and Robert Horton. John Ford was there but was too upset to speak.

Harry Carey and Ken Curtis sang “He Was There” and “Come, Come Ye Saints.” After the service, Wayne came up to Terry Wilson and asked him what the studio was going to do about the show. Wilson said he didn’t know.

“I’ll tell you what you do,” said Wayne. “You go back tomorrow. You tell those guys if they want me to come in, I’ll make two or three of the shows for them as a guest appearance thing . . . until they can get somebody [else] to do it.”

Wilson relayed the offer to MCA, but they thought that Wayne would unbalance the show; they carried on with the existing cast for some months. In March 1961, they finally cast John McIntire as the leader of the wagon train, without ever explaining what had happened to Major Seth Adams.

After the funeral, Wayne delegated Terry Wilson, Mark Armistead, and Ray Kellogg to spread Bond’s ashes around Catalina. The men loaded up with a bottle of scotch, a bottle of bourbon, a bottle of gin, and a bottle of vodka. Each one of them tossed a handful of Ward into the ocean around Cherry Cove, then took a drink. By the time Ward was dispersed, they were thoroughly lubricated.

The only untoward thing was the fact that Bond had been cremated wearing his stainless steel watch, and there were recognizable pieces of the watch amongst the ashes and bone fragments. Terry Wilson kept the pieces of the watch as a souvenir of his friend. Bond’s 1956 will left most of his property to his wife, but he left Wayne his favorite shotgun—the same gun that Wayne had shot him with years before.

On November 23, Wayne watched the episode of
Wagon Train
that Ford had directed. When it was over, he turned to Pilar and said, “There will never be another Ward Bond. I remember telling him, a hell of a long time ago, that he was too damn ugly to be a movie star. But I was wrong, Pilar. He was beautiful where it counted—inside.” And then he began to cry, his huge body shaking with grief as the tears poured out of him.

It took Wayne a long time to process his grief at Bond’s death. “I had never seen him so preoccupied, so quiet, so depressed,” said Mary St. John. “He lost fifteen pounds . . . because he didn’t want to eat. It was as if someone had cut out his heart.”

Bond’s death got Wayne thinking about his own inevitable end. He came to the conclusion that “funerals are so medieval—I don’t want one. John Ford has a little clubhouse in the valley. Harry Carey, Ward Bond—they were buried out of the chapel there. I will be too.”

In 1959, a candy manufacturer named Robert Welch established the John Birch Society, named after a Baptist missionary murdered by Chinese Communists in 1945. The Birch Society was against taxes, welfare, the United Nations, the fluoridation of water, and Supreme Court chief justice Earl Warren. Above everything else, they were against Communists, who, they believed, were behind all the above. The FBI regarded the Birch Society as a “fanatical right wing” group with “utterly absurd viewpoints.”