Roy Bean | Biography

During the 1880s, Roy Bean was appointed to serve as an unofficial justice of the peace by the Texas Rangers in a West Texas railroad town. Thus began the legendary legal career of "The Law West of the Pecos." Bean used common sense rather than legal knowledge to uphold the law and apply justice. He was known for his ability to keep the peace and make a profit at the same time. Bean once fined a dead man $40 for carrying a weapon, and he was known for handing out drinks in his saloon, then fining patrons for excessive drunkenness as they left. Criminals often were fined the exact amount of money they found in their pockets in Judge Bean's court.

Born around 1825, Bean was the third son of Kentucky sharecroppers Francis and Anna Bean. He left Kentucky when he was 16 to travel down the Mississippi River taking slaves to market. In 1848, he joined his older brother Sam on a trading trip through the Southwest. The two landed in Chihuahua, Mexico, and set up a trading post, but Roy Bean moved on when he was accused of shooting a man.

Trouble followed Bean during his stay in California and after his return to Mexico. In 1852, while living with his brother Joshua in San Diego, Roy injured a man in a duel. Both men were taken to jail, but Roy was able to escape two months later. Some time later, Bean moved back to Mexico with his brother Sam and was a successful store owner until he lost his business by siding with the South during the Civil War. In 1862, Bean became a blockade runner and by 1865 he had a successful freighting business.

After marrying a Mexican teenager, Bean supported his wife and five children by engaging in shady business dealings such as selling stolen firewood and watered down milk. He eventually left his wife and by the spring of 1882, Bean had moved west of the Pecos River to open a saloon in Eagle's Nest, Texas. When the Texas Rangers brought in a man for trial on aggravated assault on July 25, 1882, Bean acted as unofficial judge. Eight days later the Rangers made Bean Justice of the Peace of Pecos County. Bean moved about Pecos County with the Rangers, setting up court in his saloon.

As Bean had no legal training and little formal education, his rulings were often based on his own whims and prejudices. Bean used his court as a means of self-sustenance, often fining people for any offense he could conceive. Stories, some true, some not, abound about his less than conscientious practices. Bean was notorious for such acts as freeing an Irishman for the murder of a Chinese worker, stating that the law said nothing against killing Chinese, and his manipulations and payoffs to get his son acquitted of a murder that Bean himself had witnessed. Much of Bean's life is clouded by myth and folklore, and dime novels, newspaper stories and a popular 1940 film about Bean did little to put forth the facts. Bean remains one of the West's legendary figures.