I started reading Dutch’s western short stories in the pulp magazines. I was already collecting pulp magazines, a.k.a. pulps, since the mid-1970s, so when I found out Elmore appeared in WESTERN STORY MAGAZINE, DIME WESTERN, ect., I was elated. Elmore supplied the list of magazine appearances when he agreed to an interview with me; it eventually would be published in THE ARMCHAIR DETECTIVE. When it came to the story that did not appear in THE COMPLETE WESTERN STORIES,
“The Treasure of Mungo’s Landing”, it was one of those items that begin to irk the person seeking it out. Only collectors would understand what that feeling is like and, to make it worse, I knew it had been published. I suspected, at first, that it had been designated for an editor’s “slush pile”. That is a situation where a backlog of stories is sold to a publisher who acquires them from another magazine publisher going out of business. Leo Margulies had done this and used these stories in various titles. One title he edited was SHORT STORIES FOR MEN and he had a story by Elmore Leonard that appeared in an issue in 1959 titled ‘Bullring At Blisston”. I thought that there might be a chance that he had aquired “Fury At Four-turnings”, the original title of “Treasure of Mungo’s Landing”, and it appeared in another issue of SHORT STORIES FOR MEN that had not been uncovered. (Try and find an issue of this title. I found mine by accident.) The thing that bothered me most was the original list of stories had it appearing in an issue of ADVENTURE, so when Web Master Gregg told me he was seeking “Fury…” I suggested his looking into the Popular Publications archive at the NYPL; due to finances I could not accomplish this myself. One thing we both wondered about was the cover. ADVENTURE was known to feature cover paintings of Nazis whipping scantily clad women, or a couple, usually a wounded guy lugging around an unconcious woman, being threatened by some group of creatures from the animal kingdon. Gregg expressed concern about a Nazi cover, not so much the threat from nature. It turned out to be a moot point. The cover on TRUE ADVENTURES, a magazine from Popular Publications, actually featured a scene from the story (a first!). The thing I want to know, and probably never will, what editor chose to change the title from ‘Fury At Four-turnings” (great title) to “Treasure of Mungo’s Landing” (really?).
