Tom Mix and Tony

 Tom Mix and Tony  1928

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Tom Mix and Tony.  Or is it?

Does anyone know if that is "Tony's" horse trailer in the background?



The Tom Mix Circus came to winter in El Paso in October 1938 at the Southwestern  Stock Show grounds. At the same time, the circus began selling its equipment.
The circus was on the road for four seasons and performed 216 shows in 1935, 217 in 1936 and only 195 in 1937. The show did not survive the 1938 season.
By March 1939, liquidation of the Tom Mix Circus had begun. The Western movie star was "cited by publication" in a $607 salary suit filed in the El Paso County Courts by Gladstone M. Shaw, former superintendent of the circus.


Karl Goodman, used-car dealer, had purchased and resold most of the show's trucks. Patty Conklin, a Canadian promoter, had purchased the tents, rigging, seats and other show equipment.
Mix was touring in Europe and wasn't expected to return to the United States for at least two years.
Mix was a silent-movie actor whose daredevil stunts captured the public imagination in the 1920s. He starred in more than 300 films and worked and starred in Wild West shows. Although Mix was born Jan. 6, 1880, in Mix Run, his publicity material listed El Paso as his birthplace.
Mix was a friend of El Paso County Sheriff Chris P. Fox, who was interviewed in a Jan. 22, 1976, Herald-Post article. Mix had come to El Paso after finishing his European tour.


"I had a group of El Pasoans for lunch with Tom here at the Del Norte Hotel,' recalls Fox. 'That evening he had dinner at our home and brought gifts for our three children. He showed them his world championship cowboy belt.'
"Fox said he took the star back to his hotel and at 6 a.m. the next day, Mix left, driving west.
"He made a personal appearance in Tucson and visited there with another longtime lawman friend, Sheriff Ed Echols. He left there on the way to Florence, Ariz., and was alone in his custom-built car when he swerved to get around a crew of highway workers. The car went off the road, overturned, and he was apparently killed instantly.
"I had a phone call from Sheriff Echols in Tucson,' said Fox. 'He asked if I had seen him the day before and I said that I had. He said, 'He's dead now, he had an auto accident.'
"The date was Saturday, Oct. 12, 1940. A marker with a riderless pony was erected by the Pinal County Historical Society of Florence to mark the spot where the accident occurred, 'In memory of Tom Mix,' it read, 'whose spirit let his body on this spot and whose characterizations and portrayals in life served to better fix memories of the old west in the minds of living men.' "

Trish Long / El Paso Times