The story that the Deadwood Dick character in this serial was intended to be black but was played by a white actor to "appease" the studio executives is strictly an "urban legend". There was a real-life black cowboy known as Deadwood Dick, but this serial was based on a completely different figure, a fictional pulp hero named Deadwood Dick from turn-of-the-century dime novels. Hence, there was never any question of making the serial's Deadwood Dick black.