Desperado was polite and kept a smile all the while

Six Shooter Junction – It's a great mystery, whether Tucker Peterson will appear at the Moonlight Music Festival during the singer-songwriter Musicians' Reunion on Sunday, May 27, at Bosque Bottoms Park.

That part of the show is hosted by Casey Kelley and sponsored by Al's Tokio Store.

Here's a story from way back that will give our listeners a chance to make up their own minds about old Tucker. He's a sure enough cowboy - plumb full of stunts, and a gifted writer of cowboy songs that tell a story.

It all happened a long time ago – long ago enough that there was still a prison rodeo at The Walls, Huntsville Penitentiary.

The facts may be a little bit murky, but the truth is the same. It came to pass that a certain cowboy from Norse, Texas – near deepest, darkest Clifton in Bosque County – got to robbing banks with a six gun.

From there, the story takes on a character all its own, and it's one with an ironic twist of cowboy stunts, and all such as that.

When Deputy U.S. Marshal Parnell McNamara came to get Mr. Peterson on a fugitive warrant, he noted that in the report it said the cowboy Tucker Peterson kept a big smile on his face and did nothing threatening to the women in the banks, though he was demanding money in robbery.

In fact, the tellers couldn't get over how polite the cowboy was when he said he wanted the money – pronto. He almost made it sound like a good deal for everyone concerned.

Not long ago, Tucker told The Legendary, “Old Parnell asked me, 'Tucker, what would you have done if that lady said she just wasn't going to give you any money. How about that?'

“I told him, well, Parnell, I would have run for the door about as fast as I could,” remembered Tucker Peterson.

We both cracked up.

It be that way some times. Most days, that is.

It tickled the Marshal, and he told people all about it. When the story got around, it helped Tucker Peterson get a job as a horse wrangler in the penitentiary's rodeo cowboy outfit, where he rode bareback broncs in the show.

That was his job while he was down there - doing his time.

Now, hear this: