One of the great stars of early American Westerns. McCoy was the son of an Irish soldier who later became police chief of Saginaw, Michigan, where McCoy was born. He attended St. Ignatius College in Chicago and after seeing a Wild West show there, left school and found work on a Wyoming ranch. He became an expert horseman and roper and developed a ...
[about fellow western actor Buck Jones] Buck Jones was a very fine fellow. They sort of wondered when they teamed Buck and I, who'd been rivals, they might have expected a lot of fireworks, you know, that we'd be fighting one another on the set [of the "Rough Riders" western series] all the time. Instead of that, it worked out to be the most amiable association two actors could have. Buck and I got along beautifully and never got in each other's way. In fact, we were always helping one another. I think the Rough Riders was one of the best B-western series that's been made. Even though I was in it, I don't hesitate to say that. But then the war [World War II] came on and I quit to go back in the army.
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I've never been sentimental about my horse. The horse doesn't give a damn about you. If you want to know the truth - horses are dumb.
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Fact
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During World War I, he served as an artillery officer in the US Army in France.
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In addition to making his home in Los Angeles, McCoy maintained a ranch in Wyoming for many years during his career.
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Inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1973.
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Hosted local TV (Los Angeles) with The Tim McCoy Show (1952) for children on weekday afternoons and Saturdays in which he provided authentic history lessons on the Old West. He won a local Emmy but wasn't there to pick it up. He was competing against "Webster Webfoot" in the "Best Children's Show" category and refused to show up saying, "I'll be damned if I'm going to sit there and get beaten by a talking duck!"
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In real life McCoy was a sharpshooter and famed for his fast draw. A film editor once timed it on 35mm film with 24 frames per second. It took exactly six frames from the blur of his hand to the smoke issuing from the end of his gun.
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Rode several horses with different names during his long career. In his earlier films he rode a snow-white horse named "Pal". In the "Rough Riders" series he mounted a black stallion called "Baron" and (later) "Ace".
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Not only an expert on the Old West, but an authority on Indian folklore. One of the few white men still alive who could converse in Indian sign language.
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The Arapahoe Indians adopted Tim as a brother and called him "High Eagle."
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