The Pecan Park Eagle

A FIERY HORSE WITH THE SPEED OF LIGHT, THE CLOUD OF DUST AND A : HEARTY “HI HO SILVER” — THE LONE RANGER – RIDES AGAIN!!

This is the 4th of July – our day of national independence and the celebration of freedom. What better time could there be to seek freedom from one of those little puzzles that some of us have lived with for seven decades or so.

The puzzle: What the heck does Tonto mean when he addresses The Lone Ranger as “Kemosabe”?

Spoiler Alert! If you haven’t yet seen the new Johnny Depp as Tonto version of “The Lone Ranger” movie, you may want to pass on this column until you have seen the film. What I am about to reveal here isn’t the heart of the movie, but it does reveal how The Lone Ranger and Tonto get together in the first place. So, you be your own judge. Some critics have panned the film, but that’s because they fail to get the humor of Johnny Depp and his slant on things. Plus, I do concede, the Lone Ranger character, as played by Armie Hammer, is pretty much of a rigid, uninspired “dufus” who does fulfill by his actions the reasons why he has earned the title of “kemosabe”.

Dan Reid (John Badge Dale) is the head Texas Ranger in a West Texas area that looks a lot more like Monument Valley in Utah. Reid and his deputy younger brother John Reid (Armie Hammer) and five other Rangers strike out as a posse in search of a dangerous and deranged escaped killer named Butch Cavendish (William Fichtner), but they are bushwhacked and left for dead in a canyon gulch by the bad guy and his henchmen while on their way to the service of justice.

Tonto comes along and finds the seven dead Rangers. He knows Dan Reid from his reputation as a brave, courageous and fair man. He also knows younger brother John Reid from personal experience as a tight-minded, inflexible, 19th century anal-type who plays everything by the book with no wiggle room around the way justice gets handled.

After digging seven parallel graves and placing a body in each, a great white spirit horse (Silver) appears at the foot of John Reid’s still uncovered grave and begins making sounds and foot motions that signal one message to Tonto: “The Great Spirit wants this man returned to life with supernatural powers in his pursuit of justice. Tonto takes the horse and moves him down the row to the uncovered grave of older brother Dan Reid. “I think the Great Spirit has this one in mind for that power,” he tells the great horse. The horse breaks away from Tonto and returns to the grave of John Reid, protesting all the louder.

“OK, OK,” Tonto concedes, Who am I to argue with the Great Spirit that he has the wrong brother in mind here?” Tonto then performs the ritual that he apparently already knows and restores John Reid, this time  to an immortal life, and to a new identity as The Lone Ranger.

The action switches into high gear from there, but only if you have a sense of humor for seeing Tonto in the old TV cop role of grizzled veteran who has to protect his naive rookie partner constantly from getting them both killed.

(Here it comes – the whole purpose of this column.)

Late in the movie, The Lone Ranger finally has to ask: “Tonto, I’ve noticed you often refer to me as “kemosabe” when we speak. Would you mind explaining? – What does “kemosabe” mean?

“It means ‘wrong brother’,” Tonto says – without cracking a smile.

Happy 4th of July!

Tags: Lone Ranger, Meaning of Kemosabe

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