In a December 1954 Harper's essay on the Western, Bernard DeVoto claimed that Ernest Haycox “came closer than anyone else to making good novels” in the cowboy genre and left a significant mark on the style and content of the Western. Such writers of Westerns as Luke Short, Frank Gruber, Wayne Overholser, Nelson Nye, D. B. Newton, and Richard S. Wheeler have expressed similar tributes. Writing in the November 1965 issue of Roundup, Newton asserted that “Haycox very nearly succeeded, singlehanded, in doing for the standard Western what Hammett and Chandler did for the private eye detective story—made it respectable.” In recognition of his influence on the genre, the Western Writers of America for some years after Haycox's death in 1950 called their annual award the “Erny” (later changed to the “Spur”).

Zane Grey, Max Brand, and Louis L'Amour may be more famous, but Haycox is generally considered a better...