Delmer Daves was born in 1904 and made his motion picture debut playing a choirboy in a 1915 short silent, Christmas Memories (1915), produced, directed, written by and starring Robert Z. Leonard. By the late 1920s, Daves was working in the industry full time in a range of jobs, one of the earliest being a prop man. Although he earned a law degree from Stanford University, he continued working in movies as an actor, a continuity person, and eventually as a writer in just about every genre Hollywood produced. One of his most unusual tasks was to construct dialogue for the actress Kay Francis to avoid the letter "r" (because of Francis's "Baba Wawa" type of speech impediment). During this assignment, Daves also allegedly had an affair with Francis.

Daves was first given the opportunity to direct on the war film Destination Tokyo (1943), and over the next two decades he made 30 films, also in a range of genres but with Westerns being his most characteristic and the ones for which he received the highest praise.

3:10 to Yuma was Glenn Ford's second film with Daves. The first was the Western Jubal (1956), which also featured his Yuma co-star Felicia Farr. Daves cast Ford in his next film, Cowboy (1958), which co-starred Jack Lemmon, who married Farr a few years later.

Canadian-born Ford began acting on film in 1937 and had early success as a frequent co-star of Rita Hayworth, most notably in Gilda (1946). His first Western was Texas (1941), and he made more than two dozen in his nearly 60-year career, as well as a number of Western television movies and series. As a result, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1978. He was also credited with being the fastest gun in Hollywood, able to draw and fire in less than half a second. That made him faster than such Western entertainment legends as James Arness and John Wayne.

Ford allegedly underwent hypnosis in 1978 and recalled a past life as a Colorado cowboy named Charlie Bill. According to the story, he gave a detailed description on tape of his life as Bill, which was given to the University of California to study.

Writer Halsted Welles made his scripting debut in 1949 but had his earliest successes in television. In a career that lasted through 1976, he did most of his work on the small screen, including writing for the Western series Wagon Train, Bonanza, The Virginian, The Monroes, and Kung Fu.

In his 30-year career (1937-1967), cinematographer Charles Lawton, Jr. made many Westerns, including the three for Delmer Daves that starred Glenn Ford (plus three in other genres for Daves), one for John Ford (and three non-Westerns for Ford), and three for Budd Boetticher (including the Elmore Leonard adaptation The Tall T, 1957). Among his most famous work is the black-and-white photography of Orson Welles's The Lady from Shanghai (1947).

Composer George Duning also wrote the music for Daves's Cowboy and for a total of 10 movies starring Glenn Ford. His work was Oscar®-nominated five times, including his memorable score for Picnic (1955). Among the several scores he wrote for Westerns were John Ford's Two Rode Together (1961) and a TV movie called Yuma (1971), no relation to this story.

Elmore Leonard once said, "All the adaptations of my books all sucked." The only one he liked was the film of Get Shorty (1995). Although 3:10 to Yuma stayed fairly faithful to its story source, Leonard complained that after seeing this film and The Tall T, he was dismayed to realize how Hollywood could foul up a "simple story." Leonard's objection may have been to the fact that the movie version provides more back story and motivation to Dan Evans and his risky act, whereas in his short story Evans was simply a deputy sheriff whose bravery and competence in carrying out the job are left mostly unexplained. "Mr. Leonard tends to like it chilly, though: no warming sentiment, no gassy speeches, just behavior in all its unaccountable variety," noted Terrence Rafferty in a September 2007 article about the release of the remake.

Memorable Quotes from 3:10 TO YUMA

ALICE EVANS (Leora Dana): It seems terrible that something bad can happen and all anybody can do is stand by and watch.
DAN EVANS (Van Heflin): Lots of things happen where all you can do is stand by and watch.

EMMY (Felicia Farr): If it's a killin' I'll have to wake him. It's only robbery he doesn't want to be awakened for.

EMMY: Funny, some men you see every day for ten years and you never notice; some men you see once and they're with you for the rest of your life.

BEN WADE (Glenn Ford): Oh, they'll be easy to catch. That's three big men on three white horses.
ALEX POTTER (Henry Jones): Three white fellas... on three big horses, huh?

MARSHALL (Ford Rainey): Safe! Who knows what's safe? I knew a man dropped dead from lookin' at his wife. My own grandmother fought the Indians for sixty years, then choked to death on lemon pie.

DAN EVANS: The town drunk gave his life because he believed that people should be able to live in decency and peace together. Do you think I can do less?

BEN WADE: What are you squeezin' that watch for? Squeezin' that watch ain't gonna stop time.

DAN EVANS: If you start across this, uh, eight feet between us, I'm gonna pull both triggers at once.

BEN WADE: Now what do you figure you're gonna die for?

Compiled by Rob Nixon