Gunfight at the OK corral.
Friday Oct.26 will be the anniversary of the famous 30 second gunfight at the OK corral.
On a related note. Doc Holiday who participated in the gunfight, had a big mouthed, big nosed, trouble making girlfriend called "Big Nosed Kate".
In modern times we'd call her Barbara Strisand.
On a related note. Doc Holiday who participated in the gunfight, had a big mouthed, big nosed, trouble making girlfriend called "Big Nosed Kate".
In modern times we'd call her Barbara Strisand.
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That gunfight sure lasts longer in all the movies and reenactments![:0] It would have been interesting to have witnessed the actual events! 0 -
I'll be your huckaberry...[8D]
With all that lead flying all over the place I wouldn't have wanted to be anywhere near that place.[;)]
Trinity +++0 -
BTW: For those that might be interested.
I've been to Tombstone many times and enjoy it a great deal. While most of what you will see there today is fairly modern (most of the original old west buiding have burned during several fires), it's still a fasinating place where you just feel the history.
But The Birdcage theater is the original building w/original furnishings. And down near the stage you can view the bullet holes in the floor from the famous Holiday/Ringo arguement (as portrayed as in The Oriental Saloon in the movie "Tombstone").
One little known fact is that the pool table that Morgan Earp was playing on, and layed on when he was shot & killed, is also in the Birdcage. Right near the door (not originally there) that you go thru into the theater area from the front bar area. It is covered w/apiece of plywood w/various relic pieces on it and not advertised. This being because they had to protect it from tourists that were destroying it for souvineers.0 -
I'm inclined to think that the movie "Tombstone" for the most part depicted the gunfight as it happened -- the biggest exception being the manner in which Billy Clanton died. He was still trying to thumb cartridges into his revolver, and asking for more ammo, when the gun was taken from his hand and, a few moments later, he expired. This at least is the version I've read, based on the testimony of witnesses.
The reason it takes the movies so much longer to depict an event like this, than the actual time it took for it to happen, is that much of what we see in a series of scenes actually took place simultaneously. I imagine the gunfight at the OK Corral was a fast blaze of noise, motion, and chaos, then -- nothing. In order to have it make some sense, on film, specific actions during the general mayhem have to be shown separately from one another.0 -
Well , Ive also been to tombstone , several times , one of my favorite places...If I could have landed employment there (in L.E.) I would most likely still be there ...Yes its a tourust trap , but I really liked it ...and by the way , one one of the small side streets was a small (hole in the wall) gun shop , bought a couple of items there , really nice owner , and his wife had a small eating place , also great !!! Its a shame that hollywood has done what it has to some events , but , we keep buying them goofy movies ??????
Thanks !!!
d.a.stearns
Gunsmith / LEO
Niota , Tn0 -
sounds like the village where i live....wow!![:D] 0 -
I like to read about that event and the Earps. Several books with different slants are around. Some call the Earps hero lawmen, some call them murdering outlaws with badges. I think it is somewhere in between, men of the times. But all in all I believe the Earps were in the right. Any incident, especially a violent one, can be spun so many ways depending on your politics, prejudices and friendships, just look at how that happens today. But one thing always stood out to me. The Earps and Holliday stood straight up toe to toe with the Clantons and McLaurys and shot it out. The Earps came out on top. After that, all the cowboys did was back shoot and ambush. To me that says more than all the latter day accusers put together. Wyatt made a detailed description of the fight and that is probably the closest anyone will ever get to the truth. Some day I hope to get out there and visit Tombstone. It has been a dream of mine for some time. By the way, as sexy as it sounds, the Gunfight at the OK Corral was actually the Gunfight at the Vacant Lot next to Flys Boarding House and Photography Studio behind the OK Corral. Of course the first movie on the subject that I can remember was titled "My Darling Clementine" but it was about as vacant of reality as the Democrats' platform. 0 -
Why Johnny Ringo, Looks like someone just walked all over your grave..
I don't know to much of the history of Tombstone, and the ok corral.
Just what I've seen in the movies mostly.
I didn't know Johnny Ringo was a real person?
I did like the conflict between Doc Holiday and Ringo in the movie Tombstone.
I'll be your Huckleberry.0 -
John Ringo was real life person.
Most likely died at his own hand.
The Earp vendetta ride was likewise
real.
In fact, most the characters in the "Tombstone" flim
are factual.0 -
"I have not yet begun to defile myself"
Doc Holliday0 -
quote:Originally posted by divebomb
Why Johnny Ringo, Looks like someone just walked all over your grave..
I don't know to much of the history of Tombstone, and the ok corral.
Just what I've seen in the movies mostly.
I didn't know Johnny Ringo was a real person?
I did like the conflict between Doc Holiday and Ringo in the movie Tombstone.
I'll be your Huckleberry.
Johnny Ringo, aka John Ringgold, had before moving on to Arizona participated it the Mason County War, aka Hoodoo War. It was fought over cattle and over a distinct dislike the American born Texas cowboys had for the Germans, and vice versa. Texas being a southern state where the vast majority of the people were Confederates, and the German settlers of Mason County which had caused that county to support the union presented a very serious problem among the populace. Immediatley after the War Between The States, and the next few years more and more Confederate soldiers and their families moved west and this created more bitterness and viloence between the two factions, especially after a long and unjustly harsh occupation period and presence of union troops during reconstruction.
Here is a site regarding the Mason County War and Johnny Ringo:
http://www.johnnyringo.com/jrtexas.html0 -
very interesting kimi, thank you!
I wonder how he really died?0 -
I wish I knew how and where he died divebomb, but I don't. It is interesting that someone made this post today, as I had just received some old pictures of this era of some of my family who lived in the surrounding counties at this time. 0 -
quote:Originally posted by divebomb
very interesting kimi, thank you!
I wonder how he really died?
Ringo was found dead in Cochise Co., Ariz. in July 1882.He was near a road propped against a tree, bullet hole in his head. He had his Colt in his hand, a rifle propped against the tree. His horse was found two miles away. He had rags around his feet, no boots. His gunbelt & holster were buckled on upside down. No one knows what happened.0 -
My vote is for the guy who went to the gunfight with a shotgun! 0 -
Wyatt Earp was quoted as saying that he shot Ringo with a rifle at some distance. The county coroner ruled his death a suicide. If you think of how he was found laying dead at the base of the tree, it is exactly how the movie Tombstone portrays Doc & Wyatt leaving him after Doc shot him. No one today knows for sure how he died, and back then not too many believed even Wyatt Earp's claim ether.
One thing is well documented and that is Wyatt did kill Curly Bill at the creek with a shot gun just as the movie portrays. In fact I find it quite interesting that from his days as a Dodge city Lawman, the OK Coral shoot out, to his vendetta ride, not once was he ever grazed by a bullet. No one can say the man didn't have a pair that were made from brass.[;)]
Trinity +++0 -
There, at the time, was speculation that Ringold (sp?) was killed by a Tombstone bartender named "Buckskin" Frank Leslie, if my memory serves correctly. Leslie was an unsavory character, gambler, who later married a woman with a teenage son, then moved to her ranch. He came home drunk, killed the woman; the kid escaped and testified against him. He served a lengthy term in prison.
Ringold had been drinking heavily the night before they found him, and speculation was he passed out in the desert, awoke the next morning with a terrific hangover (we've all been in that boat, haven't we?) his horse had wandered off, his thirst was terrible and he just said, "the hell with it", and shot himself. Would be great to go back to those times, wouldn't it?0 -
OK, here is a bit of trivia. Big nose Kate later married, and raised several kids. She became quite well known, and it is rumored that the John Wayne movie "Son's of Katy Elder" was loosely based on her and her off spring. However, any children Kate may have had wouldn't have been of adult age until around the 1890's, and buy then the Wild West was for the most part old history.
Trinity +++0 -
some great info Gents.
as you can see by by sig. i am a huge tombstone fan but i have always took it as being "Hollywood"
one thing that i did know was true was a lot of the dialog that Doc Holiday used. if you do some research statements like "your a daisy if you do" and " I'll be your Huckleberry" were actually cooberated by witnesses0 -
quote:any children Kate may have had wouldn't have been of adult age until around the 1890's, and buy (sic) then the Wild West was for the most part old history.
Got that right Trinity. Liver eatin' Johnson, whose name was actually John Johnston, died at the National Soldiers' Home at Santa Monica, Cal., on Sunday, Jan. 22, 1900.
Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp was born on March 19, 1848, in Monmouth, Illinois and died in Los Angeles at the age of 80 on January 13, 1929.
Bat Masterson was born in Illinois in 1855. His real name was William Barclay Masterson. He met a beautiful actress there named Emma Walters. He married her on November 21, 1891. Bat moved to NEW YORK CITY in 1902 where he worked as a editor and comumnist. Bat spent his last years writing his columns and visiting gyms. He was always very active in the fighting business. On October 25, 1921, he went to work as usual. But right in the middle of typing his article, he died of a sudden heart attack.
Of these, only John Henry "Doc" Holiday a dentist, did not live beyond 1890. On November 8, 1887 he died of tuburculosis in the Glenwood Hotel, Gleenwood Springs, Colorado and was buried in the Linwood Cemetery. He did not die with his boots on.
Even John Wesley Hardin lived past 1990. Hardin was shot to death in El Paso on August 19, 1895, by a man he had hired to kill someone else.0 -
I had a strange run-in with OK Corral facts while on an ambulance call.
Us paramedics got called out to a house. The caller said her husband had "gone crazy."
We got to the house, a normal looking middle class house. The patient was a manager at a doctor's office. It was about 7 pm, he ran up to my partner, with wild crazy eyes, and said, "How long did the gunfight at the OK Corral last?"
My partner said to the guy, "Two hours?"
The guy shoved my partner away, said "You don't know anything!"
He ran up to me, grabbed my shoulders, and said, "What was Doc Holliday shooting at the OK Corral?"
I said "A double barrel shotgun."
The guy said, "Right!"
Then he yelled at me, "How long did the gunfight at the OK Corral last?"
I said, "No more than thirty seconds."
He said, "Right!"
The patient let go of my shoulders, and started to calm down a little at that point.
My parter looked at me and said, "You are attending on this one."
And so all the way to the hospital, in the back of the ambulance, we discussed trivia of the Gunfight at the OK Corral. The only way you could communicate with the guy was by discussing the facts of this gunfight.
His wife told us that at about 6:00 he had just started jabbering about Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday, she didn't know what was wrong.
ER tests showed that the guy was not drunk, tested negative for drugs, no history of mental problems, and he had not had a stroke. He was only 37 years old.
This was a few years before "Tombstone" and "Wyatt Earp" were released, so I don't know what set this guy off on this subject.
He calmed down after several hours in the ER, and was released to go home.
I think someone slipped some LSD into his iced tea at work before he went home.
We never had another call quite like that one.0 -
In the two and one half years that the Earps were in Tombstone they managed to eliminate the following Cowboy outlaws: "Old Man" Clanton, Billy Clanton, Frank McLaury, Tom McLaury, Frank Stilwell, Indian Charlie, Dixie Gray, Curly Bill Brocius, Johnny Barnes, Jim Crane, Harry Head, Bill Leonard, Joe Hill, Luther King, Charley Snow, Billy Lang, Zwing Hunt, Billy Grounds, and Hank Swilling. Pete Spencer was thrown in the Yuma Territorial Prison.
Now that is some track record. Notice Johnny Ringo (Ringold) is not included, and I always thought Old Man Clanton was killed stealing mexican cattle.
I found this on Wikipedia about Big Nose Kate:
Mary Katharine Horony (November 7, 1850-November 2, 1940), better known as "Big Nose Kate", and also known by aliases Kate Fisher, Kate Elder, and Mary Katherine Cummings was the long-time companion/common law wife of gunfighter Doc Holliday in the American Old West. Although no proof exists, many historians and biographers continually label Kate as a prostitute.
Trinity +++0 -
John Wesley was killed by John Selman a constable
in El paso Texas.
Killin was over a prositute that Hardin defended...he had
become an attorney after his prison release.(no place but Texas)
Selman in turn was killed by US Marshall G.Scarbough(sp)
this gunfight took place because Selman had killed a Texas Ranger
a couple years prior.
The North camp where I hunt in East Texas was an old homesite
of some of Hardins kinfolks.
Legend has it is stayed at that very spot hiding from lawmen
before his arrest.0 -
The "Gunfight at the OK Corral" was really the Gunfight behind Fly's Photographic Shop and lasted maybe 30 seconds.
Big nose Kate, Mary Catherine Haroney, has been quoted as saying she "worked the business because she liked it." She is listed as working in sporting houses in several locations, including in Wichita, Kansas in 1874 where she was working for Nellie Bessie Earp the wife of James Earp. She was also recorded as working in a sporting house in Fort Griffin, Texas where she met Doc Holliday.0 -
Talk about a small world.
Fort Griffin Texas was also where Doc first met Wyatt Earp, and where both met John Selman, who as Twodogs states later shot & killed John Wesley "Hardin" in El Paso.
Trinity +++0 -
quote:Originally posted by TwoDogs
John Wesley was killed by John Selman a constable
in El paso Texas.
Killin was over a prositute that Hardin defended...he had
become an attorney after his prison release.(no place but Texas)
Selman in turn was killed by US Marshall G.Scarbough(sp)
this gunfight took place because Selman had killed a Texas Ranger
a couple years prior.
The North camp where I hunt in East Texas was an old homesite
of some of Hardins kinfolks.
Legend has it is stayed at that very spot hiding from lawmen
before his arrest.
John Wesley Hardin is from East Texas. Most, if not all, of the Hardins in that neck of the woods were and are his folks. He is credited by most all historical accounts as having no equal in terms of being the fastest gun of the old west. I think he was creditied with having killed more men in gunfights than any other man, too, outlaw or lawman.
Most of the Earp families came out of North Carolina, including Wyatt's family, before they moved north into Kentucky, Illinois, and Iowa.0 -
Kimi,
You are correct about Hardin being so deadly of a gun fighter. He was known as "The forty something killer", alluding to having killed over 40 people. In fact John Selman feared him so much he had to sneak up on him and shoot him in the back of the head. Selman was mad because Hardin's girlfriend had pistol whipped him. However, Hardin was born North of Dallas in 1853 in Bonham, Fannin County (not East Texas), and died in 1895 in El Paso Texas.
Trinity +++0 -
That's right. And, he is by most all historical accounts, the fastest gun of the old west. No other man has the distinction that Hardin has when the discussion of fast guns comes to mind. Selman, who was by the way, like He Dog pointed out in his post, one of Hardin's hired hands, committed a cowardly act like the dirty little coward that killed Mr. Howard.
Here's an interesting little link on America's fastest gunslinger:
http://www.rootsweb.com/~txnavarr/biographies/h/hardin_john_wesley/index.htm0 -
Wow, we have gone full circle. From the OK Coral to Jesse James.[:D]
Most of Hardin's kin folk such as his father, James G. Hardin a Methodist preacher and circuit rider eventually settled in Sumpter, Texas, in Trinity County.
Trinity +++0 -
Fun, huh? [:D] 0
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