Vitals

James Stewart as Will Lockhart, freight hauler and former cavalry officer

New Mexico, Late 1870s

Film: The Man from Laramie
Release Date: September 20, 1955
Director: Anthony Mann

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Since 2008, the National Day of the Cowboy has been observed on the fourth Saturday in July to recognize the spirit of the pioneering men and women who helped establish the American West. James Stewart’s homespun persona naturally lent itself to Western cinema as the actor’s prolific Western filmography includes Destry Rides Again (1939), Winchester ’73 (1950), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962), and John Wayne’s swan song The Shootist (1976). Among these, Stewart recalled that his favorite Western was his eighth and final collaboration with director Anthony Mann: The Man from Laramie.

Adapted from Thomas T. Flynn’s then-recent serial in The Saturday Evening Post, The Man from Laramie stars Stewart as the titular Will Lockhart, delivering freight from Wyoming to the fictional New Mexico town of Coronado, where he defies the corrupt cattle baron controlling the region while investigating the Apache attack that killed his brother.

The Man from Laramie was one of the first Westerns to be filmed in CinemaScope, wowing audiences with Charles Lang’s cinematography of the vast southwestern landscapes when it premiered in New York City on the last day of August 1955, three weeks before its wider release.

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What’d He Wear?

The centerpiece of James Stewart’s working costume as Will Lockhart is a waist-length jacket made from a mid-brown corduroy, cut like the Levi’s 507XX “Type II” denim jacket introduced in 1953 with its pair of chest pockets and dual knife pleats flanking the five-button front, though Lockhart’s pleats are reinforced with copper rivets rather than the stitched bar tacks on contemporary Levi’s jackets.

Five dark-brown plastic four-hole buttons fasten up the front, matching the single button on each squared cuff. A straight upper chest yoke separates the shoulders from the two chest pockets, which are both plain-woven in a slightly more muted shade of brown—contrasting against the body of the jacket—and covered by matching flaps that each close with a single brass-finished snap. (A faintly discernable “W” stitched over both pockets suggests Wrangler, though I haven’t seen ’50s-era examples of Wrangler jackets like this.) Bi-swing pleats behind the shoulders add a wider range of movement, particularly helpful while on horseback or leveling a Winchester rifle.

Two years later in Budd Boetticher’s Western The Tall T (1957), Richard Boone wore an identical—if not the exact same—jacket; Stewart’s screen-worn jacket from The Man from Laramie sold for $4,561 in 2014, with the RR Auction listing including mention of the Western Costume Co. tag sewn inside the collar (listing the chest size as 41) and an image of Boone in the jacket, reinforcing the thought that he wore the same one.

Lockhart wears the same sweat-stained silverbelly felt Stetson “Rancher” hat that Stewart had worn in all of his Westerns with director Anthony Mann, making its fifth on-screen appearance in The Man from Laramie. The actual hat is favorite exhibit that remains on display at the Jimmy Stewart Museum in Indiana, Pennsylvania.

As unassumingly masculine as Stewart’s on- and off-screen persona, the Stetson Rancher boasts a classic cattleman’s-style crown and curved four-inch brim, detailed with a simple narrow brown leather band.

Lockhart wears the classic red cotton neckerchief with a white paisley print, knotted under his shirt’s open collar to catch sweat but also repurposed as a first-aid tourniquet to treat a gunshot wound to his hand. Lockhart’s usual shirt while riding is gray flannel with double sets of maroon stripes. This popover-style shirt has a long four-button placket, two-button cuffs, and two open-top patch pockets positioned below the horizontal yoke cut straight across the upper chest.

He alternates this with a similarly styled ivory flannel two-pocket popover shirt that he more frequently wears in town. The dark plastic buttons present a deeper contrast against this cloth, fastened up the four-button front placket and with two buttons on each cuff.

While in Coronado, Lockhart frequently swaps out his riding jacket for a fancier waistcoat (vest) made of self-striped taupe velvet. It fastens high with six buttons up from the straight-cut bottom to the short notch lapels flanking the neck, detailed with an ivory backing and two low-slung welted pockets.

Lockhart’s charcoal wool flat-front trousers maintain a neutral iridescence, reflecting either the blue skies or dusty desert based on the scene’s lighting or the trousers’ distress in that situation. They are styled like modern 20th century trousers with slanted front pockets and wide belt loops—even decades before belt loops were widely integrated onto civilians’ trouser waistbands. He holds trousers up with a mid-brown leather belt that closes through a rectangular brass-finished plate buckle.

His russet-brown leather gun-belt features a brass-toned ranger-style buckle in the front, loops around the back, and an anachronistic Buscadero-style holster looped low on the right for a strong-side draw. Although ubiquitous through early 20th century cowboy cinema and beyond, the Buscadero holster wasn’t widely produced until the 1920s, when it became a fixture in the fledgling Western film genre. While versions of it may have existed in the old west, it was far more common for late 19th century gunmen to wear their six-shooters holstered on waist-high rigs like the “Mexican Loop” and pre-Civil War “Slim Jim” styles.

Lockhart wears the straight, plain-hemmed bottoms of his trousers over the tops of his boots, albeit neatly self-cuffed to show the trousers’ beige lining. His black calfskin leather riding boots have smooth calf-high shafts and plain squared toes. His spurs are buckled on via brown leather straps. He also frequently wears tan leather work gloves.

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The Guns

Lockhart arms himself with the requisite classic Western loadout of a holstered Single Action Army six-shooter and a Winchester rifle. A common practice in the old west was for experienced gunmen to favor both weapons in the same caliber, such as .44-40 Winchester center fire (WCF), but this wasn’t always clear on screen.

Whether his is chambered in .44-40 WCF, the more common .45 Long Colt, or one of the other dozens of calibers available for it, Lockhart’s Single Action Army is configured with the 4¾”-long barrel—known alternately as the “Civilian”, “Gunfighter”, or “Quickdraw” model—which was the shortest of the three standard barrel lengths. Colt debuted the Single Action Army in 1873 with the full-length 7½”-long Cavalry barrel, followed the next year with the 5½”-barreled Artillery Model. After some users had gunsmiths shorten their barrels for quicker draws and easier carry, Colt formally introduced a 4¾”-barreled variant in 1879.

Per its name, the Colt Single Action Army is a single-action revolver—meaning that pulling the trigger only performs the single action of firing it, requiring the user to manually pull back (or, less advised, fan) the hammer before each shot. This sturdy and powerful revolver was swiftly adopted by the U.S. Army from 1873 to 1892, when it was replaced by the more modern but less powerful Colt M1892. Though the M1892’s swing-out cylinder and double-action trigger were easier and quicker to operate, the .38 Long Colt cartridge failed as a man-stopper, resulting in the Army returning to its decades-old Single Action Army stocks until a more suitable service pistol—ultimately the M1911—could be adopted.

The Man from Laramie reunited Jimmy Stewart with “The Gun That Won the West”, specifically armed with a Winchester Model 1873 Saddle Ring Carbine as opposed to the full-length and “One of One Thousand” rifles he had fired as Lin McAdam in his first collaboration with Mann, Winchester ’73, which also launched Stewart’s post-World War II Western ubiquity.

As its name tells us, Winchester introduced its iconic lever-action Model 1873 the same year that Colt launched the Single Action Army. It was originally chambered for .44-40 WCF, though—like the SAA—these offerings later expanded to .32-20 and .38-40 WCF cartridges, all fed from a 15-round tube under the barrel. The full-length rifle boasted a 24″ barrel, eventually supplemented by the Saddle Ring Carbine with its more portable 20″ barrel. Over its original fifty-year production timeline, Winchester manufactured more than 700,000 Model 1873 rifles and carbines.

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How to Get the Look

Even with the classic mid-20th century Hollywood Western embellishments like his Buscadero holster and belt loops, James Stewart’s costume as The Man from Laramie is as utilitarian and unfussy as the actor himself; trimming aside the cowboy touches like Jimmy’s favorite hat and the neckerchief leaves a smart template for a modern work-ready outfit.

• Brown corduroy Type II-style work jacket with five-button front, two chest pockets with plain-woven single-snap flaps, dual knife-pleated front, bi-swing shoulder pleats, and single-button cuffs
• Gray and maroon-striped or ivory flannel popover shirt with spread collar, four-button placket, two open-top chest pockets, and two-button cuffs
• Red and white paisley-print cotton neckerchief
• Charcoal wool flat-front trousers with wide belt loops, slanted front pockets, and self-cuffed plain-hemmed bottoms
• Mid-brown leather belt with brass rectangular plate buckle
• Russet-brown leather gun-belt with ranger-style buckle, rear cartridge loops, and right-side Buscadero holster
• Black calfskin leather riding boots
• Spurs with brown leather buckle-on straps
• Silverbelly felt cattleman’s-style Stetson “Rancher” cowboy hat with narrow brown leather band
• Tan leather work gloves

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Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

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The Quote

I guess a man’s got a right to know what he’s gonna die for.