Fort Parker massacre of his life, and most of his fortune, searching for his daughter Rachel, his grandson James, his niece Cynthia, and his nephew John Richard. After many near-death escapes, he finally settled with his family. John Wayne's character Ethan Edwards, in the John Ford Western "The Searchers", was modeled by author Alan Le May after Parker and others affected by child abductions. Former Dallas Morning News columnist Frank X. Tolbert in his book "An Informal History of Texas" entitled one of his book's chapters "Was Uncle James (Parker) The Villain" which expressed an entirely different take on the reverend. James W.
John Wayne Corporation, he appeared mostly in small bit parts. His first leading role came in Raoul Walsh's Western "The Big Trail" (1930), an early widescreen film epic which was a box-office failure. Only leading roles in numerous B movies followed during the 1930s, most of them also Westerns. Wayne's career was rejuvenated with John Ford's "Stagecoach" (1939) making him an instant mainstream star. He starred in 142 motion pictures altogether, including the dozens with his name above the title produced before 1939. Biographer Ronald Davis said, "John Wayne personified for millions the nation's frontier heritage. Eighty-three of his movies were Westerns,