I remember the excitement I felt at age 8 or 9 when I first read ACROSS THE CIMARRON and George Bolds' supposed memories of Wyatt and Bat. I believe it was within a couple of years that I read something debunking Bolds as an authentic source.

One example of his super memory is referred to by William Shillingberg in his footnotes to his WYAT EARP AND THE BUNTLINE SPECIAL MYTH:

"The author is aware of two accounts, one given by George Bolds and the other written by George Earp, one of Wyatt's cousins, in which both claim to have seen Earp with the Buntline Special in Dodge City in the late 1870's. -- James D. Horan, Across the Cimarron (New York, Crown Publishers, Inc. 1956), p. 76, based on interviews with George Bolds; and George W. Earp, "I Rode With Wyatt Earp," Reader's Digest, Pleasantville, N. Y., v. 73, no. 440 (December, 1958), p. 182. Both accounts were published after the appearance of Frontier Marshal. A close examination of each reveals they are so garbled as to render themselves of little or no value as historical sources. They instead appear to be more an example of acquired information mentally substituted for an event claimed to have been experienced decades before."