Six-Gun Heroes #47

Wild Bill Hickok arrives in the gold-mining town of Nugget and, bitter about losing his marshal's badge, is drawn into a scheme by saloon owner Ace D'Orsay to exploit the miners using the law itself as their weapon. But Hickok has his own plan, and what looks like a crooked partnership becomes something far different when the votes are counted.

Lash LaRue joins a cattle drive led by Frank Mars, who's betting everything on bringing two thousand head north from Texas to the railhead at Laramie—but rustlers, Indians, storms, and suspicious crew members stand in their way. When the group finally reaches Laramie, a crooked marshal tries to block the sale, and Lash uncovers a conspiracy to cheat Mars out of his herd at bargain prices. It's a grueling test of nerve and gunslinging skill across the frontier.

Annie Oakley arrives in Cottonwood for a rodeo shooting match, confident as ever—until she meets a desperately poor boy named Danny Bowers who faces off against her in the competition and has everything to gain. When Annie realizes Danny needs that prize money far more than she needs another victory, she makes a choice that sets off a chain of events neither she nor the crooked promoter expected. This is the story of how the West's greatest marksman earned a different kind of legend.

A young ranch hand named Selby arrives at the Silver Spur spread and immediately clashes with the tyrannical foreman Rip Murdock, refusing to take orders like the other cowhands. When Murdock tries to force the issue, Selby stands his ground—and the two men find out what they're really made of. Mrs. Borden gets more than she bargained for when she hired this new hand.

When the James Gang rides into town convinced the aging Sheriff Barton is too worn out to stop them, they don't realize he's devised a clever strategy to protect the bank and the townspeople. As Jesse James and his men prepare to strike at the vault, they'll discover that the sheriff's real strength lies not in his gun hand, but in the allies he's quietly put in place.

In "Apache Lore," this nonfiction piece examines the survival skills and desert knowledge that made Apache warriors formidable adversaries to white settlers in the Southeast—from their ability to run down horses on foot to their intimate understanding of desert resources like water-storing cacti and small game. The story contrasts the Apaches' remarkable adaptation to harsh, waterless terrain with the struggles of those fighting them, and explores how their connection to the land's animals and their spiritual practices allowed them to thrive where others merely survived. It's a fascinating look at why the Apaches were so difficult to defeat until circumstances beyond their control finally took their toll.