Howdy family and friends!  This weeks "memorable character" is Diamond Jim Caravallo, gunslinger turned western icon  (pictured on the right).......Bill

DIAMOND JIM - “Born 150 Years To Late”

We first crossed paths with Jim Caravello, alias Diamond Jim, in Pollardville, a roadside attraction and chicken dinner restaurant near Stockton, CA. Jim lived on the property upstairs over the Saloon prop from the 1957 film “The Big Country”, and where he performed as a wild west gun slinger staging shoot outs and train hold-ups for locals, day trippers and for school groups on history field trips. With the stature and persona of Yosemite Sam, Jim was always in character complete with a drooping mustache, 10 gallon hat and a six shooter at his side. We ran into Jim on a quiet afternoon in the Ghost Town’s waining years of lagging attendance, ignored maintenance and neighbors worried about their property values and eager to have the slowly decaying property dismantled. With the impending end of his home and livelihood, Jim lead us on a nostalgic walk around the fifty year old Pollard family enterprise through back fields overgrown with weeds and brush, past crumbling structures and piles of uncompleted projects. We followed the well worn and wavy train tracks to the decaying Showboat theater where Jim recalled performing in sold out melodramas in the years before highway 99 became a fenced off freeway. Jim had the perfect job and vowed that when the day finally came they would have to drag him down off the iconic “Pollardville” sign. The roadside attraction closed and demolished in 2008.    

We unexpectedly crossed paths once again with this memorable character, this time in northern Nevada where we found Jim in character welcoming guests and answering questions at the Virginia City Convention & Tourism Authority. No longer a gun slinger, Jim had found a new home in the historic Comstock tourist destination and the ideal gig as dapper Diamond Jim, man about town and owner of the Bucket of Blood Saloon.    -Bill