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Hidalgo/Frank T. Hopkins
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Posted By:
Bob Schroeck
Nov 24, 2004
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I've been a long-time reader of the Museum site and have enjoyed it greatly. Now finally comes my chance to offer something back! (Assuming, of course, the search mechanism for the forums isn't broken and I'm not repeating someone's earlier suggestion...)
In the wake of renting the 2003 Disney/Touchstone movie "Hidalgo" (billed as a "true story"), I wanted to learn more about Frank Hopkins and his achievements. Google led me right away to the following site:
http://www.thelongridersguild.com/hopkins.htm
A thoroughly documented set of pages and links that show that the "true" story of Frank Hopkins is not just a hoax, but apparently so blatant a fabric of falsehoods that some historians are wondering how or why anyone believes it. Especially telling are the Buffalo Bill museum disclaiming any knowledge of Hopkin's alleged "starring roles" in Cody's Wild West Show, and the Arab historians who not only state authoritatively that the so-called "Ocean of Fire" race Hopkins claims to have won never existed, but also point out that any "3000-mile" race in the Middle East would have to have its finish line somewhere in Eastern Europe...
Looks like a perfect topic to cover in the Museum!
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Comments
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Page 5 of 13 pages ‹ First < 3 4 5 6 7 > Last › |
Bud Rudesill
in North Carolina
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Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2008 | 12:11 PM
One thing is for certain about one of the claims made about Frank--he didn't ride in the Pony Express. That venture died five years before Frank was born.
I have lived in Saudi Arabia and I have been to the Rub al Khali. Read my novel, Expatriate (based on a true story, LOL). The Bedouins are not horse people and never were. They are camel people. A horse wouldn't live three days in that desert, even in winter. The movie is an insult to the Arab people and especially the Bedouins. As for any such race, it couldn't have happened then. There were blood feuds between the various tribes and the area where the race supposedly took place was controlled by the Turks. In the movie, the camels took different trails and made far better time than the horses--that would have been plausible. The horses would have had to circumnavigate the dessert and hit every watering hole (along the escarpment of the Asir mountains). Camels can live on the desert in the winter with occasional trips to water that is too saline for humans or horses to survive on.
The movie is only good if you don't know a damned thing about Arabia and the Arabs (and probably the true story of Frank).
Could a mustang hold up better than an arab in a harsh desert? Probably.
It would be fun to rewrite that story and make it plausible.
Bud Rudesill
www.budrudesill.com |
Bud Rudesill
in North Carolina
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Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2008 | 03:06 PM
DBH
I write historical fiction and my female characters are strong women. I would very much like to hear your story, and I would believe them. I have enough documented material to know that many of the unembellished stories of some of the pioneers seem superhuman, but the human spirit is often greater than the made up stories. Frank was probably a blowhard as was Bill Cody and many of the famous people. I've found well documented stories that make the bullshit look tame.
Bud Rudesill |
virginia
in oklahoma
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 | 08:18 PM
 i just want to say it may not be true but at least it was a good horse movie any way had a lot of good horse riders on it to but i still prfer the mustang though as they have proved they can do any thing a registered horse can do on the rfd channel |
Vickie Ives
in Marshall, Texas
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Posted: Fri May 23, 2008 | 10:46 AM
Folks, This is an old topic, but I just found it with Google so I felt it necessary to post just in case anyone happens on this site again.
At Karma Farms, we are the leading breeder of Colonial Spanish Mustangs in the world. Check out our site at www.karmafarms.com.
We also raise polydactyl cats and have since 1981. Research has now shown that all poly cats with extra hind toes may carry the gene for (and eventually produce) kittens that show the Twisty Kat trait, radial agenesis. We DO NOT breed for this trait but we do not destroy kittens that may show it. We do not market them for profit either. If we get one, we simply keep it and love it or find a home for it where it will be loved. It is a rather rare condition and can occur in any litter of poly cats that has parents with extra hind toes. See www.karmafarms.com/twisty.htm for info one our cats with this trait. Flipper is 11 years old now and her "kittens" are 9. All are neutered.
My personal life is no one's business except my own but it does NOT include any of the scenerios mentioned here including Satanism or a husband "walking out on me". Enough said.
And what any of this has to do with Hidalgo is beyond me. It only proves that the Internet is any easy tool for those who wish to lie, slander and defame behind pseudonyms. John Fusco wrote a great movie based on a real life figure, Frank Hopkins, but he has always said that it is a fictionalized tale. No one has ever claimed that it was total truth but simply that it was based on a true story.
Check out special features on the the "Hidalgo" DVD. John and Angelique Midthunder's wonderful Animal Planet special "America's First Horse" is a good profile of our historic horse breed. And try not to believe everything one reads in forums like this one. |
Leif
in ...somewhere
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Posted: Wed May 28, 2008 | 05:52 PM
After all this time, she still can't admit the truth. |
Ha.
in ha.
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Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 | 05:56 PM
*My personal life is no one's business except my own but it does NOT include any of the scenerios mentioned here including Satanism or a husband "walking out on me".*
LOL they were taking heat over this twisty cat thing for some time before her husband, uh, stopped sharing her address. |
Lord, no
in ...here
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Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 | 11:30 AM
There ain't nothing true about the "true" story of Frank Hopkins. |
dan
in ...
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Posted: Mon Jun 09, 2008 | 04:45 PM
she's nopt a satanist, she's a...devil-worshiper!!! lol she woirships native american demons. she really does., go out to where she lives and see her in her smokehouse someitme |
Night
in ...
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Posted: Wed Jun 11, 2008 | 09:48 PM
http://www.cfainc.org/comments-twistykats.html
http://www.messybeast.com/twisty.htm
*There ain't nothing true about the "true" story of Frank Hopkins.*
Yeah, watch the movie if you want, but remember... it's pure fiction. |
Christy
in Texas
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Posted: Fri Jun 27, 2008 | 05:53 PM
Jesus loves you, Vickie Ives. Turn away from Satan. Please? Love you! |
Aggie Doucet
in Rayne Louisiana
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Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2008 | 06:18 AM
I have to say that i loved the movie Hidalgo. I can't understand why anyone would want to discredit a wonderful movie like this. As far as i'm concerned i feel like someone has ripped a childhood fantasy from me. I am 52 years old and i loved believing that the story is true. I have loved horses all my life and always wanted one but i lived it town and my family couldn't afford one. I think what Frank Hopkins did to help the Mustangs is wonderful and i guess i relate to Hopkins if i could i would save all horses. Ty you keep up the good work and i'm looking forward to seeing your book. Thanks |
jay
in texas
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Posted: Tue Jul 29, 2008 | 10:02 AM
*I can't understand why anyone would want to discredit a wonderful movie like this.*
lol |
Bud
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Posted: Tue Jul 29, 2008 | 11:51 AM
Because he was a fraud. He lied about his exploits and Disney, Inc. propagates the lies. Since when are we so accepting of liars? Why aren't we lauding the honest cowboys, and settlers who were worthy of our praise?
Simple example-- Calamity Jane is a hero, right? This is what the Deadwood Daily Champion said about the alcoholic derelict circa 1880:
As for her (Calamity Jane) she is a fraud and a dead give away. A hundred waiter girls or mop squeezers are her superior in everything. She strikes out and lays around with a lot of bull whackers or road agents like an Indian squaw....
There is a whole history written down in obscure places that tell a story about the old West that make these wild claims by the frauds look pale in comparison. One doesn |
daymare
in somewhere
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Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 | 08:32 PM
And if you want to know how that long-distance horse race that honored that Wild West horse-abusing creep Francois Autry went, two horses got hit by cars and killed, plus one of the riders got hurt, and it didn't take a rocket scientist to see that coming, since they were going down the highway and everything. But what's a few dead and injured animals and people to Vickie Frankenstein and her crowd? |
A B C
in UK
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Posted: Fri Dec 05, 2008 | 07:38 PM
I'm a massive fan ofthe film,
I've read alot of stuff today nd you know what I really don't think it maters!
If people wanna be ofended, they;l be offended, If people wanna belve they;l belive. I doubt Frank had any idea his writings would ever be read and written about the way they have been, let alone becoe a movie! and at the end of the day is it really that bad if he did imagine the whole thing, or embelish on the truth!
the longriders guild act like it's a ersonal slate against them... I mean, really?
It's a damn good story and i'd rather stick my head in the sand and belive it's true than be a mierable sod that wants undiniable evidence of every film, book, newspaper report or story i come across!!
at the end of the day the world would be pretty lame if all the ledgends were taken out of it. |
Bud
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Posted: Fri Dec 05, 2008 | 09:45 PM
With all due respect, sir, whether or not someone likes a story isn't the issue. I write fiction and I publish it as fiction. I try to make my historical fiction as true to life as I can. But I do not try to pass it off as non-fiction, and that is what Disney, Inc. has done. It is what our government does. Do you like the logical results of the lies our government has passed off as the truth which have brought the world to a most severe depression? I am sick of lies and liars. To hell with liking a story or not. Like it as fiction or like it as fact, but don't like fiction that is represented as fact. Supporting the lies of liars is as bad as being one. |
A B C
in Uk
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Posted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 | 09:02 AM
So should i be in upraw at Willima Goldman who wrote the princes bride for claiming that it was based on the morgenstern version ?? It adds to the drama and makes it more exciting, if i thought Hildalo was a fiction, yes i would still enjoy it, but it would take away that belief that one day maybe i could do those longdistance rides and have that relationship with my horse.
What annoys me is the fact every one's having a go at frank hopkins! For goodness sake when he was alive they probbaly didn't even have Movies! and a good story teller always says his stories are true and they alaway happend to him because that's what makes a good story!!
If i turned round and said 'this isn;t true but...' I don't think many people would sit and listen! |
ja
in someplace
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Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2008 | 02:32 PM
*What annoys me is the fact every one's having a go at frank hopkins!*
Well, stock up on Maalox, because this liar is going to keep taking it in the mouth. |
Tammy
in Texas
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Posted: Fri Jan 09, 2009 | 01:51 PM
http://www.frankhopkins.com/articles28.html
Interesting update on accusations and proof that he did at least some of what is claimed.
Embellished? of couse, that was the way back then. But a total hoax, NO. |
Fred
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Posted: Fri Jan 09, 2009 | 03:37 PM
I don't know whether Frank T. Hopkins was born in 1865 Wyoming as he claimed.
On the 1900 Laramie Co., Wyoming census, I did find a Frank HOPKINS, born March 1890 Wyoming, living at Ft. Laramie with his grandmother, Annie O'Brien. Is this the Frank T. Hopkins of
"Higaldo" fame? Who knows?
Date: 1900 26 Jun
Type: 1900 Census, Laramie Co., WY, Ft. Laramie Pct., Sup. Dist. #300, E.D. #44, Page #213B, Lines 91-94, Dwelling #255, Family #260, John T. WINDEMEYER, Enumerator
Quality: Excellent
Location: National Archives, Washington, D.C.
91. O'BRIEN, Annie head Oct 1849 50 (wd) Ireland Ireland Ireland (mother of 9 children; 5 still living) emigrated in 1860, resided in US 40 yrs.
92. O'BRIEN, John son Nov 1873 26 KY Ireland Ireland
93. HOPKINS, Julia gdau Jan 1886 14 WY NJ IN
64. HOPKINS, Frank gson Mar 1890 9 WY NJ IN |
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Note: This thread is located in the Old Forum of the Museum of Hoaxes.
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