As a typical kid growing up in the fifties and sixties like many boys I saw and loved a lot of westerns. So it was to my deep chagrin when watching an interview of an expert on western history he debunked the stories of the fast draw hero (or villain) that was the staple of many western plots.
The historian said that the fast draw duels just about never happened...at least not the way the movies and tv shows depicted them. He made a lot of sense....no law man was going to trust that he could draw his gun faster than some deadly outlaw. When attempting to apprehend some bad guy, the good guy would already have his gun out cocked and ready. The fast draw duels were all an invention of dime store novelists of the period and abetted by the movies and tv.
He also informed his interviewer that no one tried to shoot a gun out of somebody else's hand, another staple of tv good guys. If they shot at someone, they were trying to kill them.