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Ripley, Tex. Tex Ripley was created by Joseph B. Ames and appeared in “The Bladed Barrier” (Western Story Magazine, Dec 9 1922-Jan 13 1923); the serial was collected as The Bladed Barrier (1929).

Tex Ripley and his friends Stillman and Cavanaugh are three down-on-their-luck prospectors who are having no luck finding any gold. But when Stillman and Cavanaugh try to help a Mexican who is being attacked by a band of owlhoots, the Mexican gives them an emerald and the directions to a hidden city in Baja California. The hidden city is inhabited by Lost Race Chinese who mingled with the Aztecs centuries ago and adopted their sacrificial ways. Ripley, Stillman, and Cavanaugh manage to escape from the city, but not before a war breaks out between the Yellow Peril civil leader in the city and the hooded priests who are the religious leaders.

* I'm including "The Bladed Barrier" in the Best of the Encyclopedia list because of its imaginative elements. Gold-hunting cowboys + friendliness to Mexican characters + Lost Race Chinese-Aztecs is a formula guaranteed to achieve--not greatness, not in the hands of a Joseph B. Ames--but a certain kind of pulp awesomeness that elevates the story above its mediocre narrative style and into the pulp canon. 

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