American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U. S. Military History

“T
HE 
L
EGEND
”
M
y boys returned from their adventures out east soon afterward.
They greeted me with their usual warmth.
“Oh, we know the Legend’s here,” they said as soon as they
saw me. “All of a sudden we hear there’s two kills at Camp
Ramadi. People are dying up north. We knew the Legend 
was
here. You’re the only 
....
who’s ever killed anyone out

---

there.”
I laughed.
The nickname “the Legend” had started back in Fallujah, around
the time of the beach ball incident, or maybe when I got that really
long shot. Before that, my nickname had been Tex.
Of course, it wasn’t just “Legend.” There was more than a little
mocking that went with it—THE LEGEND. One of my guys—
Dauber, I think it was, even turned it all around and called me THE
MYTH, cutting me down to size.
It was all good-natured, in a way more of an honor than a full-
uniform medal ceremony.
I
really liked Dauber. Even though he was a new guy, he was a
sniper, and a pretty good one. He could hold his own in a firefight
—and trading insults. I had a real soft spot for him, and when it
came time to haze him, I didn’t hit him . . . much.
Even if the guys joked about it, Legend was one of the better
nicknames you could get. Take Dauber. That’s not his real name (at
the moment, he’s doing what we’ll call “government work”). The
nickname came from a character in the television series 
Coach
.
There, Dauber was the typical dumb-jock type. In real life, he’s
actually an intelligent guy, but that fact was of no consideration in his
getting named.
But one of the best nicknames was Ryan Job’s: Biggles.
It was a big, goofy name for a big, goofy guy. Dauber takes

---

credit for it—the word, he claims, was a combination of “big” and
“giggles” that had been invented for one of his relatives.
He mentioned it one day, applying it to Ryan. Someone else on
the team used it, and within seconds, it had stuck.
Biggles.
Ryan hated it, naturally, which certainly helped it stick.
Along the way, someone later found a little purple hippo. Of
course, it had to go to the guy who had the hippo face. And Ryan
became Biggles the Desert Hippo.
Ryan being Ryan, he turned it all around. It wasn’t a joke 
on
him; it was 
his
joke. Biggles the Desert Hippo, best 60 gunner on
the planet.
He carried that hippo everywhere, even into battle. You just had
to love the guy.