Breaking a leg

[J. Beckert]

That's not a quote from me, Jerry. That was from wsanto, but I know about hearsay and I agree. I've seen it tossed out of court many times. I also agree that if Booth's diary never existed the story of him breaking his leg in the jump would have never surfaced. No one, in contemporary accounts, reported that he appeared injured after his jump.

My point (and I tend to favor the horse theory myself), is that he may have done it in the leap. Maybe a painful fracture that was broken by the horse roll? Could be. Richter speculates that his painful back injury came from his leap. That could very well be. That's a perfect way to herniate some discs. It could also have come from rolling his horse. Who knows? Booth's diary is full of horsefeathers. I just feel with all the variables, we can't say for sure where the break occurred.

You do think outside the box, Jerry, but I ain't fallin' for the lasso story.