Just over thirty years ago, Dan Kilgore ignited a controversy with his presidential address to the Texas State Historical Association and its subsequent publication in book form,How Did Davy Die? After the 1975 release of the first-ever English translation of eyewitness accounts by Mexican army officer Jose Enrique de la Pena, Kilgore had the audacity to state publicly that historical sources suggested Davy Crockett did not die on the ramparts of the Alamo, swinging the shattered remains of his rifle "Old Betsy." Rather, Kilgore asserted, Mexican forces took Crockett captive and then executed him on Santa Anna's order. Soon after the publication ofHow Did Davy Die?,theLondon Daily Mailassociated Kilgore with "the murder of a myth;" he became the subject of articles inTexas Monthlyand theWall Street Journal;and some who considered his historical argument an affront to a treasured American icon delivered personal insults and threats of violence. Now, in this enlarged, commemorative edition, James E. Crisp, a professional historian and a participant in the debates over the De la Pena diary, reconsiders the heated disputation surroundingHow Did Davy Die?and poses the intriguing follow-up question, ". . . And Why Do We Care So Much?" Crisp reviews the origins and subsequent impact of Kilgore's book, both on the historical hullabaloo and on the author. Along the way, he provides fascinating insights into methods of historical inquiry and the useor non-useof original source materials when seeking the truth of events that happened in past centuries. He further examines two aspects of the debate that Kilgore shied away from: the place and function of myth in culture, and the racial overtones of some of the responses to Kilgore's work.