Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 482

This issue of Beadle and Adams' Dime Library (October 19, 1886) contains "The Search for the Hidden Cache" by Oll Coomes, a western adventure serial. Chapter I introduces Robert Comstock, a giant twenty-year-old from Minnesota traveling west, who encounters five outlaws—led by Black Bluford, the "Prairie Bandit"—resting beneath a cottonwood tree near the Missouri River. When the outlaws attempt to capture the youth, Comstock reveals extraordinary strength, single-handedly defeating all five men and throwing them into the river, then disabling their weapons and saddles before departing. The outlaws recognize him as "Stonewall Bob," a notorious young giant from the Niobrara. Chapter II opens with atmospheric frontier imagery—moonlight on Dakota plains, a wolf hearing strange sounds—suggesting incoming danger or mystery connected to the hidden cache referenced in the title.