BUFFALO BILL'S GREAT WILD WEST SHOW

Walter Havighurst's latest contribution to the American record follows Buffalo Bill's Wild West show at home in the United States and abroad. William Frederick Cody as rendered here is not the Buffalo Bill of Pony Express days. Rather, be emerges as a showman fighting disaster, like the river accident which sank most of his equipment, and financial adversity which plagued him into old age. Cody's burial of his favorite horse at sea, and the almost paternal attitude of Chief Sitting Bull toward Annie Oakley are touching behind-the-scenes glimpses of life with the traveling troupe. Unfortunately, however, the early achievements of Cody's life are omitted almost entirely and the strengths and weaknesses of the man and the showman are not sufficiently crystallized in this interpretation. The strain, the turmoil, the crises and the color of showmanship, which were so ably communicated in Helen Wells' recent biography of Barnum, are not fully realized.