OK Corral Shootout: Tombstone History | Arizona Road Trip
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The OK Corral shootout made Tombstone, Arizona, famous—but what actually happened, and what can you still see there today? Scott and Jenn unpack the history of Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and the gunfight, then take you to the historic sites that bring this Old West story to life.
A history-filled Arizona road trip from Talk With History.
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Transcript
You walk into an 18-foot wide dirt lot on a freezing, blustery
Speaker:afternoon in s- the southern Arizona territory in October of 1881.
Speaker:The town of Tombstone is booming with newly discovered silver, packed
Speaker:with saloons, miners, high-stakes gamblers, and a ruthless band of cattle
Speaker:rustlers simply known as the Cowboys.
Speaker:Months of death threats, political feuds, and pistol whippings have
Speaker:brought tensions to a boiling point.
Speaker:Four men in long black coats step into the alley: Town Marshal Virgil
Speaker:Earp, his brothers Morgan and Wyatt, and a gaunt, consumptive
Speaker:dentist-turned-gambler named Doc Holliday.
Speaker:Facing them are four armed Cowboys refusing to surrender their
Speaker:weapons under the town ordinance.
Speaker:In less than a minute, 30 shots ring out in 30 seconds, and when
Speaker:the gun smoke finally clears, three men lie dead in the dirt.
Speaker:Two Earps and Holliday are bleeding, and Wyatt Earp stands untouched.
Speaker:It is the most famous confrontation in frontier history, an event that would
Speaker:be mythologized on paper, celebrated in Hollywood cinema, and remembered
Speaker:forever as the Gunfight at the O.K.
Speaker:Corral.
Speaker:Welcome to Talk With History.
Speaker:One filmmaker, one historian, leading history-inspired world
Speaker:travels for the curious, the history lovers, and the explorer in us all.
Speaker:I'm your host, Scott, here with my wife and historian, Jenn.
Speaker:Hello.
Speaker:If you love Western history or the classic 1993 film Tombstone, this is holy ground.
Speaker:We are standing on the dusty streets of the town too tough to die to
Speaker:separate Hollywood folklore from the actual gritty frontier truth.
Speaker:Today, we are taking you right to the exact lot beside C.S. Fly's photography
Speaker:studio where the bullets flew.
Speaker:We'll show you the boarding house room where Doc Holliday's companion, Big Nose
Speaker:Kate, looked straight out the window and witnessed the gunfight firsthand.
Speaker:We're also breaking down the real lives of these legends, from Doc Holliday's
Speaker:battle with tuberculosis and his real kill count, to the complicated truth
Speaker:behind Wyatt Earp's relationship with Mattie and Josephine, and the
Speaker:truth about the Birdcage Theatre.
Speaker:And of course, we'll talk about the mysterious death of Johnny
Speaker:Ringo and who actually shot him.
Speaker:I'm Scott Benne, so strap on your holster and watch your flanks.
Speaker:We're stepping into the legendary history of Tombstone, Arizona.
Speaker:Okay, Jenn.
Speaker:So we did Route 66.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So if you've been listening to us, those of, those of our regulars, you
Speaker:guys have been listening, we kinda wrapped up our Route 66 series On the
Speaker:way back from California to Tennessee, we took the southern route, so we
Speaker:kind of went south of the 40 a little ways, and we went through Arizo-
Speaker:through the southern part of Arizona.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And of course, we had to hit Tombstone.
Speaker:We wanted to do this for a long time.
Speaker:We have wanted to do this for a very, very long time.
Speaker:You and I have talked about it for forever.
Speaker:And we love this movie.
Speaker:So- Um, so there's two movies, right?
Speaker:There's Tombstone, and then there's Wyatt Earp.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And they're both different takes on it, and different stars are
Speaker:playing Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp.
Speaker:Uh, but the one more people remember is Tombstone with, uh,
Speaker:Kurt Russell as Wyatt Earp and of course Val Kilmer as Doc Holliday.
Speaker:And so much so that Val Kilmer almost takes the starlight away-
Speaker:Yeah … from Wyatt Earp in that.
Speaker:' Cause, 'cause he's amazing in that movie.
Speaker:He is.
Speaker:He plays him very well.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And so that is what people remember when they really think
Speaker:of the shootout at the O.K.
Speaker:Corral, uh, the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Speaker:They're thinking of that movie.
Speaker:And, and we even interviewed, uh, uh, someone who wrote
Speaker:a book about Doc Holliday.
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:I'll link to that in, in our, in our show notes, and I'll,
Speaker:I'll link to it here on YouTube.
Speaker:But we interviewed a guy who wrote a, a whole book about Doc Holliday, so this
Speaker:is something that we've always enjoyed.
Speaker:And we've done Western kind of stuff before, and we've done, you
Speaker:know, Wyoming and things like that, and, like, the lawlessness of the
Speaker:territories at the time, and that's really what you're coming into here.
Speaker:Arizona's not a state.
Speaker:It's a territory.
Speaker:So the law is very, uh, you know, massageable-
Speaker:Yeah … at the time.
Speaker:I, it's, it's Western frontier.
Speaker:It's 1880s, right?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, yeah, so they have the Federal Marshals and all that stuff-
Speaker:Yeah … but it's still, like, y- you have to think about that time.
Speaker:There's just no structure out there to have, like, your regular law.
Speaker:Yeah, and it really is, like, might makes right.
Speaker:If there's more bad guys than good guys, uh, they're gonna wanna just…
Speaker:The bad guys will just take control, and, and that's really
Speaker:what kinda happens in this area.
Speaker:Now, the Earps all kinda come together here, and I, we talk about
Speaker:it in the video, because there was silver discovered in Tombstone.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:So this is southern Arizona.
Speaker:So if you're driving through Arizona, it's not too far.
Speaker:It's about an hour from Tucson.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's, it's 30 miles from the Mexican border, so you can really think about,
Speaker:like, it's south- Oh, yeah … in Arizona.
Speaker:Uh, and, and at the time, silver mining had been discovered
Speaker:about a, a year before.
Speaker:Wyatt, Virgil, and James, they actually arrive in Tombstone on December 1st, 1879.
Speaker:So the movie makes it s- feel like they arrive and then the shootout happens.
Speaker:That's not really what happens.
Speaker:They're, they're December 1st, 1879, and- The shootout's gonna
Speaker:happen almost two years later.
Speaker:So they've lived in T- Tombstone for two years.
Speaker:A- and you know what?
Speaker:That kinda makes sense because even, you know, if we're kind of
Speaker:equating this to the movie, 'cause a lot of people know the, the, the
Speaker:'93, you know, Tombstone movie.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:You know, they had enough time to get there because I, I believe,
Speaker:I mean, he actually, you know, the Earps actually established
Speaker:their own kind of gambling place.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And so that doesn't happen overnight.
Speaker:No.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:So, so the, it makes sense, right?
Speaker:The e- but even though they're not specific about it in the movie,
Speaker:it makes sense that in about e- 18 months to two years after that,
Speaker:and they've been in town, they're, they've built their business.
Speaker:I think he had, like, some sort of casino or whatever like that.
Speaker:Um-
Speaker:Yeah, and so, so think about it.
Speaker:So go- so silver's discovered March 1879.
Speaker:There is a statue to that- Sure There's a statue to the prospector
Speaker:that discovered silver there.
Speaker:Yeah, we have that on the video.
Speaker:So they're coming there in December, not even long after,
Speaker:to make their own fortunes.
Speaker:And at the time, Tombstone really had just a population of 100.
Speaker:In those two years, to 1881, it grows to a population of 7,000.
Speaker:Oh, wow.
Speaker:So people hear about this silver.
Speaker:But it includes a lot of Chinese Americans, me- you know, railroad.
Speaker:Mexicans are coming north.
Speaker:Women, children, families.
Speaker:Um, they have four churches by 1881.
Speaker:They have an ice house.
Speaker:They have an opera house.
Speaker:We'll talk a little bit about, uh, the Birdcage.
Speaker:And, um, they have a bank.
Speaker:They have newspapers.
Speaker:They have 110 saloons, 14 gambling halls- Wow … numerous brothels.
Speaker:So in two years, this territory has really skyrocketed, and you can think
Speaker:of what is needed to keep it in control.
Speaker:Yeah, and it makes sense, too, right?
Speaker:So to… I, I, we've talked about it on this podcast all the time,
Speaker:like kind of putting things in a larger historical context.
Speaker:Like in California, the 18- 1849, like the 49ers, the, that whole gold
Speaker:rush, it's very big in California, where I grew up, obviously, right?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Because that, that's w- was a, a big thing.
Speaker:So for the past couple decades, right, this is 1779, that, that was a thing.
Speaker:So people who lived on the East Coast, who grew up in the city, like, and grew up in,
Speaker:in kind of more civilized areas, had heard of the 18- basically the 1850s and '60s,
Speaker:the 49er gold rush, and, "Hey, go make your fortune," when something pops up.
Speaker:So the fact that it grew this quickly, we've seen this time
Speaker:and again throughout history.
Speaker:It happened in Deadwood.
Speaker:It happened, you know, at, down in California with the 49ers.
Speaker:It happened in all sorts of places.
Speaker:And so that was the draw.
Speaker:And so it's not too surprising that here were these semi-established folks, right?
Speaker:Doc Holliday's trying to get, you know, out of where he is 'cause of consumption,
Speaker:and we'll talk about that more.
Speaker:So he's moving south.
Speaker:The Earps, they're moving out there to kind of do the next thing.
Speaker:They don't necessarily… They're not trying to be lawmen anymore.
Speaker:Um- No, they're
Speaker:trying
Speaker:to be silver miners
Speaker:they're trying to be silver miners.
Speaker:And then so they're going out there to make their fortune, so it makes
Speaker:sense that they're going out there.
Speaker:They're there kind of with the boom- Mm-hmm … of Tombstone.
Speaker:So Virgil was hired as a deputy before he gets there.
Speaker:So he was hired for it.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And then in June of 1881, he's appointed the town marshal.
Speaker:So- Wyatt has already been a lawman.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:He's already done some of that in Texas.
Speaker:This is where he and Doc- He had a
Speaker:reputation.
Speaker:He had a reputation, and for bringing, for taking down bad guys.
Speaker:And Doc Holliday had actually saved his life in Texas.
Speaker:Oh, okay.
Speaker:And that's kinda where their connection really is formed, like brothers, right?
Speaker:Uh, so Wyatt really trusts him, Doc really trusts Wyatt.
Speaker:So that, that's where their connection comes from when Wyatt
Speaker:was kinda building up himself.
Speaker:Um, but the, in the movie it really makes them look like they're on the good side
Speaker:and the cowboys are on the bad side.
Speaker:Now, the Earp brothers tended to protect the interests of the town's business
Speaker:owner and residents, and even more so, like Wyatt Earp protected the outlaw
Speaker:Curly Bill from being lynched after he killed the Tombstone marshal Fred White.
Speaker:So in the movie, you remember Curly Bill kills the marshal.
Speaker:Wyatt's there, remember?
Speaker:And 'cause Curly is drunk, and he, like, stops him, and that kinda
Speaker:was what triggers Wyatt to join the mil- to join the, the marshals.
Speaker:But in reality, Wyatt- helped him
Speaker:So he, so he was at, he was kind of more on the side of the cowboys.
Speaker:He was.
Speaker:Oh, interesting.
Speaker:They were trying, they were trying to protect the interests and the people
Speaker:there and, and not, they weren't as sympathetic to the rural ranchers
Speaker:and the people on the outskirts.
Speaker:That was more like the sheriff was more like that.
Speaker:So the movie's interpretation where it's like, no, this guy has
Speaker:to face the law properly- Mm-hmm
Speaker:that wasn't quite true.
Speaker:Yeah, it wasn't quite true.
Speaker:Interesting.
Speaker:And there's a lot, like we're gonna talk a little bit about Wyatt's character.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:They make him look a little cleaner, uh, in the movie than he actually was.
Speaker:But the shootout at the, um, or the gun fight at the OK Corral, it, it's just,
Speaker:it's gained notoriety through the years when really it was just Wyatt and his
Speaker:brothers who had been deputized were trying to disarm these C- Cochise Cowboys.
Speaker:They, now when I say the Cowboys, you're like, "Everyone's a cowboy."
Speaker:They were kinda known as the, uh, horse thieves and- Yeah, that was like-
Speaker:… Thad- … their gang name.
Speaker:Yes, that was their gang name.
Speaker:So because Wyatt and Virgil and, and Morgan, uh, because they were protecting
Speaker:the town's interest because they were part of the town people, they didn't
Speaker:want these men who were cattle r- r-
Speaker:Thieves
Speaker:rustlers, thieves, coming in with their guns into the town.
Speaker:Gotcha.
Speaker:And intimidating people.
Speaker:And so their job was to disarm them 'cause no one was allowed to bring
Speaker:their guns into town except for them because they were deputized.
Speaker:So you can kinda understand that.
Speaker:So they go to this back alleyway.
Speaker:It's not, it's not really at the OK Corral.
Speaker:There's two main streets in Tombstone, Allen Street and Fremont Street,
Speaker:and they're more on Fremont Street.
Speaker:That's the main street that's not even walkable- Yeah … if you're in Tombstone.
Speaker:That's where cars are driving.
Speaker:You can walk Allen Street, and it's kind of shut down for you to walk and it's
Speaker:kind of looks like an Old West town now.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, and that's, and that's what we show, and then we show it's kind of
Speaker:off of that is the OK Corral, and then off of that is this little alley.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So you, you kind of, you have to, if you wanna see the reenactment,
Speaker:that's the only place you can really see it at, or authentic see it at.
Speaker:And so this was C.S.
Speaker:Fly's- photography studio and his boarding house.
Speaker:So, and if C.S. Fly took some very famous photographs of Geronimo, and
Speaker:they have those photographs there.
Speaker:And you can imagine photography, 1881, is still relatively new.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So he's photog- he's taking photos of all the townspeople, so they
Speaker:have a whole area dedicated to soiled doves, so the prostitutes who
Speaker:were working in the town as well.
Speaker:And this is where you get some, um, photographs of them and the cards the men
Speaker:would carry with them- Yeah … and stuff.
Speaker:And so there's a boarding house there.
Speaker:Now, Wyatt, Virgil, and Morgan were already having trouble with these cowboys.
Speaker:They were already r- having run-ins with them, and they knew this was gonna
Speaker:be an issue when they came into town.
Speaker:So Wyatt, Doc Holliday was close by, in I believe it was Tucson.
Speaker:He was close by in one of the towns, and Wyatt had gone to see him and
Speaker:asked him to come to Tombstone-
Speaker:Oh, okay
Speaker:… to just back them up in this.
Speaker:So ev- that's even a little bit different than the movie, too.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:'Cause in the movie, obviously he's there because of the boo- He's already there
Speaker:of the boom and the money and all that stuff.
Speaker:And so this was something Wyatt had actually asked him to come.
Speaker:He had actually asked him to come.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And so, uh, Big Nose Kate was always his companion.
Speaker:We'll talk a little bit about her when we talk about, uh, Doc Holliday.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:But they had stayed in that boarding house.
Speaker:That's why they, they weren't established there, right?
Speaker:Like, in the movie it shows, like, they're, he's professionally gambling,
Speaker:they're kind of established in Tombstone.
Speaker:They weren't established in Tombstone.
Speaker:They were coming to help.
Speaker:They a- Wyatt had asked Doc to come.
Speaker:Doc, Big Nose Kate traveled with Doc, so they came together.
Speaker:So they were staying at a boarding house.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Right, which was again, off, kinda off the main street.
Speaker:But it was, like, front- Like, front stage, front row access to what
Speaker:happened because you could… Right out the window of their boarding room
Speaker:is where the shootout takes place.
Speaker:Yeah, so it, it… And I'd encourage you guys to, to watch the video, and
Speaker:it seems to be doing decently well.
Speaker:Because it, it, it really kind of shows you where this is in
Speaker:comparison to the main street.
Speaker:C.S. Fly, so it's his little photography studio, and the photography studio
Speaker:is… I kind of wish we could have done more, more on w- the pictures he took,
Speaker:which was, 'cause they were really cool.
Speaker:'Cause like, like you said, he had pictures of, like, Geronimo, like,
Speaker:the, like, the Geronimo, and some really cool kind of old Western,
Speaker:Western pictures and stuff like that.
Speaker:But then it shows, it has this mannequin, like, standing at the window, and
Speaker:outside of this window is the, like, it's probably, like, 20 by 30 foot
Speaker:area Mm-hmm … maybe 20 by 40 that, that the shootout happens, and they're
Speaker:all standing right there, right?
Speaker:It's just, like, how good is your shot?
Speaker:And they're, they're standing, like, right in front of each other.
Speaker:And you have to imagine too, like, that shootout kind of spilled out
Speaker:on Fremont Street, which is right on the back part of that alleyway.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:' cause one of the Cowboys ran away.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:To Fremont Street, not to Allen Street, to Fremont Street.
Speaker:And because it's such a busy roadway, they can't really open that up- Yeah
Speaker:and do the whole thing.
Speaker:So, so that's the best location you can see.
Speaker:Um, they come into conflict with Frank and Tom McLaury.
Speaker:So I talk about there's three sets of brothers here, right?
Speaker:You got the Earp brothers, and then you got the McLaury brothers, Frank and Tom,
Speaker:and then you got Billy and Ike Clanton.
Speaker:And they run around with Johnny Ringo and Curly Bill, and those are the
Speaker:horse thieves known as the Cowboys.
Speaker:And, uh They kept having run-ins with, uh, the, the Earps at the time.
Speaker:I mean, Ike Clanton threatened the Earp brothers numerous times.
Speaker:They would just get drunk, as you can imagine- And I was…
Speaker:And that's what they portray that in the movie
Speaker:… walkin' the streets.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, and just so you know, a cowboy, a Tombstone resident wrote in his
Speaker:diary, "A cowboy is a rustler at times.
Speaker:A rustler is a synonym for a desperado, a bandit, an outlaw, and a horse thief." So
Speaker:that's why they called them the Cowboys.
Speaker:You w- I don't want that to be romanticized as what we think about when
Speaker:we talk about cowboys today or the Cowboys
Speaker:then.
Speaker:Yeah, in, in this area at that time it was derogatory towards these horse thieves-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:cattle thieves.
Speaker:It was like an illegitimate cattleman.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, uh, they're, that's what they were trying to portray them as.
Speaker:So they're going to disarm these two sets of brothers.
Speaker:So it's four and four.
Speaker:You get Wyatt, Morgan, and Virgil with Doc Holliday, and then you get the two
Speaker:sets of brothers, the, the, the Clanton brothers and the, um, McLaury brothers.
Speaker:And they are- meet them right beside… They, they walk off of Fremont Street.
Speaker:They meet them right beside this boarding house, and that's when they tell 'em to
Speaker:disarm, and the men aren't gonna disarm.
Speaker:They're just gonna shoot, and they tell 'em, "Don't do it," but they do it anyway.
Speaker:Um, and they end up killing three of the brothers.
Speaker:One of them runs away.
Speaker:Ike Clanton will run away, and then, uh, the Earps all get little
Speaker:injuries, a shoulder hit, a calf hit.
Speaker:Uh, Doc will get-
Speaker:Except for Wyatt.
Speaker:I, I thought-
Speaker:Wyatt is unscathed.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Doc gets grazed by a bullet, and Wyatt unscathed.
Speaker:So it's kind of like a legend goes down in history, right?
Speaker:Wyatt Earp with Doc Holliday.
Speaker:A- and, and when you see they've got these kind of like mannequin dummies
Speaker:kind of w- all dressed up outside, right?
Speaker:Standing kind of notionally where they were.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Because I think Wyatt had like drawn, drawn it out at one point,
Speaker:and they have like a picture of the drawing that he, he made.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And they are like right next to each other.
Speaker:It, it's… They could, they could throw their gun and still do
Speaker:damage at the- … at the people.
Speaker:So I mean, the fact that Wyatt didn't get hit and that the, that
Speaker:the, all the Earps and Doc Holliday only got like a stray bullet here
Speaker:and there is pretty incredible.
Speaker:Yeah, and it's, it's- It's amazing, 30 gunshots in 30 seconds, and really
Speaker:they come through with barely any…
Speaker:Like, it w- one brother gets hit in the shoulder, one brother's hit in the calf.
Speaker:Wyatt has nothing, and Doc Holliday gets grazed.
Speaker:And the, uh, three men who actually stood their ground are dead, and one ran away.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So those men are, uh, then put in coffins and buried on Boot Hill.
Speaker:They're young, too, but I think…
Speaker:I want people to remember, too, like, I mean, I'm talking
Speaker:19, y- you know, years old.
Speaker:You're living a lifetime by the time you're 19 years
Speaker:old- Yeah … at this time.
Speaker:So it's a different time.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Uh, but this is what becomes the g- the gunfight at the O.K.
Speaker:Corral, and it goes down in legend.
Speaker:And I say this in the, in the video, when truth becomes legend, you print
Speaker:the legend, or when fact becomes legend, you print the legend because
Speaker:it's just gone down in history.
Speaker:It didn't last long.
Speaker:It wasn't the end of everything.
Speaker:We're gonna talk more about Johnny Ringo.
Speaker:We're gonna talk about Ike Clanton actually getting eventually caught.
Speaker:Uh, one of the, well, one of the Wyatt brothers are gonna be, um, one of the
Speaker:Earp brothers are gonna be killed.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:And so this is not the end of this.
Speaker:And it wasn't the only shootout ever- No … in the West.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:Like, it's, like, it's not like this was… It, it was probably wasn't
Speaker:super common, but it was common enough that people knew to run away and hide.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:So it's just so interesting because I think it's part of the names, part of
Speaker:kind of, like, the lawmen versus the cowboys and, and Tombstone at that time.
Speaker:It, it, like, something about it just kinda kept living, and part of
Speaker:that was, you know, we'll talk about, um, Wyatt Earp in his later years.
Speaker:Part of that was he l- went on to live a pretty long life.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And he eventually was, like… Wasn't he, like, a consultant in Hollywood
Speaker:it's at, like, in its early era?
Speaker:He was, and he, I think even John Wayne met him and stuff.
Speaker:He, I don't think he was ever, like, celebrated in his lifetime.
Speaker:I think he dies pretty destitute and stuff.
Speaker:But, uh, it's after his death that this, more of this legend comes out
Speaker:about Wyatt Earp- Yeah … and stuff.
Speaker:So since we're talking about Wyatt Earp, can, can we talk about, you know,
Speaker:ki- I'll call it the true Wyatt Earp-
Speaker:because we watched the movie Tombstone, and it's, like, fairly romanticized.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:He's there with his wife, which you've told me it was, she was really more of a
Speaker:common law wife, not a- Mm-hmm … true wife, and his, that was actually his
Speaker:second 'cause his first had passed.
Speaker:Yes, in childbirth.
Speaker:But let's, let's talk about kind of the r- the reality of, of that relationship
Speaker:and then him with, uh, was it Daphne or Clementine or whatever it was?
Speaker:Josephine.
Speaker:Josephine.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So- Way off.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I was way off.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, so yeah.
Speaker:That was a guess.
Speaker:So, so tell me a little bit about kinda the, the true Wyatt Earp, the
Speaker:true, his, his true relationships- With Josephine and kind of the- Yeah … we'll
Speaker:call it the soil doves to kind of put it delicately on this podcast.
Speaker:Yeah, I like that soil doves.
Speaker:That's a nice Western way to say it, too.
Speaker:So Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp, Earp, is born March 19th, 1948.
Speaker:Like you said, he'll die January 13th, 1929 in Los Angeles
Speaker:after he's- at 80 years old.
Speaker:Yeah … after he's been consultant on a lot of these
Speaker:Westerns and things like that.
Speaker:Um, he is fourth child of, uh, of his family and again, has all the brothers.
Speaker:He's gonna marry Urla Sutherland.
Speaker:Now, he marries her in 1870, she dies in 1870.
Speaker:She dies in childbirth.
Speaker:That is the only woman he technically ever marries.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Then he's gonna run around with some prostitutes, and the m- and the one in the
Speaker:movie, the famous one, is Mattie Baylock.
Speaker:Um, common law, which means he's spending a lot of time with her in ab-
Speaker:about 1878, brings her to Tombstone, but it's after he meets Josephine
Speaker:there, another soil dove, but also tends to run in some kind of theater.
Speaker:Like, she tends to dance and stuff like soil doves do in
Speaker:brothels sometimes, you know.
Speaker:Think of a dancer or something.
Speaker:Um, he'll abandon Mattie, and Mattie will get hooked on laudanum.
Speaker:Did I say that right?
Speaker:Laudanum.
Speaker:Laudanum, which is kinda like an opiate.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Once she's abandoned by Wyatt, she'll overdose in it.
Speaker:So they make the movie look a little cleaner- Yeah … that she-
Speaker:She passes before he actually moves on to the next woman
Speaker:… and he couldn't stop her addiction.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:Where he's not the cause of it and you know?
Speaker:But so, so that's kinda what happens with, with Wyatt Earp.
Speaker:When we talk about Doc Holliday, we talked about him and his legend
Speaker:being bigger than who he was as well.
Speaker:So he was a dentist.
Speaker:That's where he gets… And he actually goes to dentist school.
Speaker:He actually is a-
Speaker:So is that, like, how he got tuberculosis?
Speaker:So he gets tuberculosis from his mother.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So at age 20, he earns his degree in dentistry from the Pennsylvania
Speaker:College of Dental Surgery, so yay.
Speaker:Good for him.
Speaker:He's from the South, though.
Speaker:He's from Georgia.
Speaker:He's born in Georgia.
Speaker:Actually, his family will fight in the Confederacy.
Speaker:But his mother has tuberculosis, and his sister also will die of it,
Speaker:and he helps to nurse his mother, and they believe that he acquired
Speaker:tuberculosis from nursing his mother.
Speaker:Yeah, and so one of the things to try and help with tuberculosis symptoms the
Speaker:doctors would tell people would be go south to the desert to help, you know,
Speaker:I guess essentially drier air, right?
Speaker:Southwest.
Speaker:Southwest.
Speaker:Not just south.
Speaker:He, I mean, he's in the South.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:He's in Georgia, but southwest.
Speaker:You want that dry air.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And so you don't want the humidity, right?
Speaker:Because of your lungs 'cause the humidity, it, it's like
Speaker:breathing in a, a, a steam room.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:So if you get out where the dry air is, it should ease your symptoms, and so
Speaker:that's why they, they recommend he go.
Speaker:Um, and he becomes a professional gambler, which is a reputable
Speaker:profession at the time.
Speaker:You gotta think he's educated.
Speaker:He's well-versed.
Speaker:He can… When you're sitting around gambling, he can spout off poetry.
Speaker:He can intimidate others because-
Speaker:And when he, like, I think even in the movie, he's the one playing the piano.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:Like, so a- and Val Kilmer's character plays, plays that well.
Speaker:He does.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:He, he, he portrays that character, that character well.
Speaker:So you can imagine that idea that you're so refined is intimidating to your
Speaker:partners when you play poker because you must be so much smarter than everybody
Speaker:else, and he really plays on that.
Speaker:But gambling is still kind of dangerous, so he does get a
Speaker:reputation also as being a good shot.
Speaker:Now, he'll claim he killed 11, 12 men.
Speaker:Most historians believe it's one to three.
Speaker:Oh, really?
Speaker:But he does have run-ins.
Speaker:But he's more than likely able to- Intimidate the
Speaker:people he has the run-ins with
Speaker:And I mean, I think i- in reality, most people just want to know if it's true-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:if he did the thing where he spun the cup- … and made fun of Johnny Ringo.
Speaker:I-
Speaker:I, I'm sure it's… I'm sure that was very Hollywood.
Speaker:It's very Hollywood.
Speaker:But it shows the way he's using his intelligence to intimidate.
Speaker:Yeah Right?
Speaker:That's what it's showing, that Johnny Ringo's spinning the gun, and
Speaker:even though Doc Holliday probably can't do that, he's gonna make
Speaker:him look stupid by spinning a cup.
Speaker:Yeah Right?
Speaker:So he's ca- again, like you said, he's using his, his smarts.
Speaker:Although an interesting thing about the movie, and I w- I read this, I
Speaker:think, when I was making the actual video, is the actor that portrayed
Speaker:Johnny Ringo- Mm-hmm … actually wanted to, like, learn how to do that.
Speaker:So he's actually doing all of that gun twirling and spinning and all that stuff,
Speaker:and they said that he practiced so much and got so good at it, the director
Speaker:actually ask- had to ask him to slow down.
Speaker:Really?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That's cool.
Speaker:So, so that actor who t- who, who did that- Yeah, plays
Speaker:Reese in Terminator.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, so that actor who did that actually got so good at it that
Speaker:he, that the director said, "Hey, you gotta slow down a little bit."
Speaker:That's cool.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, but just shows how he's, um, you know, very dedicated to his
Speaker:craft, much like Val Kilmer was.
Speaker:Yeah Right?
Speaker:So Val Kilmer looks sick the whole time.
Speaker:Yeah, 'cause he lost a ton of weight for the role, the role and everything.
Speaker:The real Doc Holliday, if you see pictures of the real Doc Holliday,
Speaker:he looks gaunt- Yeah … and skinny.
Speaker:He doesn't look big and intimidating.
Speaker:Uh, so you definitely can tell he's probably using his mind.
Speaker:Um, he saved Wyatt Earp's life during a saloon confrontation in Texas, and
Speaker:that's where they become friends.
Speaker:Uh, and then in 1879, he's gonna join Earp in Las Vegas, New Mexico, and then
Speaker:he's gonna ride to Prescott, Arizona.
Speaker:And that's when he's in Arizona, Prescott, that's when Earp will
Speaker:come to him and ask him to come to Tombstone to help back him up.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Um, now while he's in Tombstone- He is the one who kinda instigates a
Speaker:lot of this run-ins with the Cowboys.
Speaker:So he's the one kinda, kinda start, you know, kind of just poking the bear.
Speaker:And you can even s- There is the morning of the gunfight at the OK
Speaker:Corral, it's really Doc Holliday who's having the confrontation with Ike.
Speaker:Oh, okay.
Speaker:And Ike's like, "I'm gonna get you," and Doc Holliday's just,
Speaker:"Tell me where to show up," right?
Speaker:So it's really Doc Holliday who's instigating a lot of this, 'cause if you
Speaker:can imagine, he's gambling professionally.
Speaker:So he's having the conversations with these guys.
Speaker:You gotta think Wyatt, Virgil, and, and, uh, Morgan are, A, working.
Speaker:They're sitting in the marshal's office.
Speaker:Yeah, they're trying to keep the peace.
Speaker:And they're, they're working.
Speaker:They're not having these conv- Where Doc Holliday's having these conversations
Speaker:with the Cowboys and- Yeah … run-ins.
Speaker:And, and so that, I think they depict that in the movie too,
Speaker:and that is actually more true.
Speaker:Um, he's deputized by Virgil October 26th, 1881 in the morning when they attempt to
Speaker:disarm the cow- the, the Cowboys as well.
Speaker:So when they walk up to that gunfight at the OK Corral, all four of them are
Speaker:deputized, so there is legitimacy to them having their weapons and trying
Speaker:to take them away from the Cowboys.
Speaker:Now, one of the cool things if you're gonna go visit Tombstone is they,
Speaker:they, they do a live reenactment of the shootout over in the OK Corral
Speaker:area, and you'll see signs and all that stuff when you get there.
Speaker:Um, they do a live reenactment a couple times a day.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And so we went and watched it, and it was fun, right?
Speaker:The, the, usually the, the guy's playing the bad guy, he's playing
Speaker:one of the Clantons, I think.
Speaker:Um, he tried to kinda ham it up, so he, he made it funny, and he interacted with the
Speaker:crowd, and then obviously the good guys.
Speaker:And they had someone playing Doc Holliday.
Speaker:The guy who played, was playing Wyatt Earp looked a lot like, um,
Speaker:you know, the Wyatt Earp y- that you see in pictures and stuff like that.
Speaker:And the gunshot, uh, the, the, the gunshots were loud and very realistic
Speaker:and, um, but it was, it was fun.
Speaker:It was, was s- definitely something you should go see if you go to Tombstone.
Speaker:Yeah, and, uh, they have- The areas there, like where the Grand Hotel
Speaker:was is now Big Nose Kate's Saloon.
Speaker:We ate there.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Super fun.
Speaker:The, they have a Doc Holliday Bar, right?
Speaker:And so it's really great when you walk down to kind of look at all these places.
Speaker:They kind of pay homage to these characters of the
Speaker:gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Speaker:Uh, and really, really touristy.
Speaker:They want you to be there.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:They want you to ask questions.
Speaker:You can go see the silver mines.
Speaker:That's one thing we didn't do.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So you can actually do, do a tour to go see the silver mines of where
Speaker:they were mining and stuff like that.
Speaker:So there's a lot to do there.
Speaker:It's very kid-friendly, right?
Speaker:The Birdcage Theatre, we didn't spend too much time in there, although I've, I had
Speaker:some people commented on our video that they actually, like, were able to sit down
Speaker:in the Birdcage Theatre, and I th- I don't know if it's, like, a bar or a restaurant
Speaker:or something like that typically.
Speaker:Yeah, it's, I, they have a tour that you can do, and I think
Speaker:they do do theater shows there.
Speaker:What's interesting about the Birdcage Theatre, it's very
Speaker:m- it's depicted in the movie.
Speaker:It doesn't really open until December of 1881.
Speaker:So the shootout, the gunfight takes place in October of 1881.
Speaker:This would've opened after, but it's one of the oldest, most famous landmarks
Speaker:'cause it still exists, the original one.
Speaker:There was a fire that took place in 1882 and really, like, burned everything
Speaker:in Tombstone, but the Birdcage existed, so that's what's cool to see
Speaker:something that existed from the time.
Speaker:Uh, you do have to pay.
Speaker:You don't have to pay to go in the lobby, so we went in the lobby and looked
Speaker:around and talked to the owner there.
Speaker:But if you wanna go inside the Birdcage and see the stage and see
Speaker:the little, uh, birdcages on the side where you can sit and pay, uh, you
Speaker:had to pay for that, and we didn't.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, but they do tours there.
Speaker:They do ghost tours there as well.
Speaker:What was also neat, we stayed out in town in a regular hotel 'cause
Speaker:we had the family with us, but there were a ton of little Airbnbs and
Speaker:little places you could rent and stay in right along the main streets.
Speaker:Like, just places you could stay if you wanted to, uh, sleep
Speaker:right there on Allen Street.
Speaker:Not so much Fremont Street, but Allen Street, so that's kinda cool,
Speaker:too, if you're looking to have the real Tombstone experience.
Speaker:Yeah, it was, it was super fun.
Speaker:It was one of those ones that we had always wanted to do.
Speaker:We were glad to take the kids.
Speaker:It's worth every bit of effort, uh, you could take, and if you wanna use History
Speaker:or Drive to find your way there, we can, you can go to historyordrive.com.
Speaker:We, there's other characters that we talk about.
Speaker:Johnny Ringo, he has a bigger presence in the movie than he does
Speaker:in the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Speaker:Uh, he's, he loose- he was an outlaw, and he loosely ran with the Cochise Cowboys.
Speaker:Um, but he, they believe he was a part of, uh, the attempted murder of Virgil
Speaker:Earp and the murder of his brother,
Speaker:Morgan.
Speaker:Well, well, Wyatt just is, I think he basically believed or knew, quote-unquote,
Speaker:that he's the one who killed his brother.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:They believe he killed his brother.
Speaker:And so he's found dead with a bullet wound to his temple, and it's ruled a suicide.
Speaker:Uh, and in the movie they have Doc Holliday kill him because they
Speaker:had that interaction with the cup.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And so it's kind of like the comeuppance.
Speaker:Who's,
Speaker:who's the fastest?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:And, you know, Doc Holliday, he's, like, living on borrowed
Speaker:time, so he doesn't care.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:In reality, Wy- Wyatt Earp claims that he killed him.
Speaker:He actually draws a crude map of what happened, and that's a, like
Speaker:a, like another map that he drew of the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Speaker:No one knows for sure who- Really killed him.
Speaker:There's a couple of theories, but, um, he is killed July 13th, 1882.
Speaker:Uh, and but it's ruled a suicide, so that's also in the movie.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So that, that was the one thing that I was referencing early on that, uh,
Speaker:who actually killed Johnny Ringo.
Speaker:So, uh, we, we, we do know it wasn't Doc Holliday.
Speaker:People suspect and Wyatt Earp claims that it was him.
Speaker:Uh, so, uh, just another, another fact or fiction thing for, for the audience here.
Speaker:So it was super cool, and then don't forget to go up on Boothill, uh, where
Speaker:three of those cowboys are buried.
Speaker:That is where Kurt Russell bought Val Kilmer a plot, uh,
Speaker:at the end of the movie as well.
Speaker:Uh, but it's super cool.
Speaker:That's all a part of Tombstone, and, uh, it was super neat to go there and, uh,
Speaker:and to see where the legend took place.
Speaker:Yeah, it was awesome.
Speaker:Um, and rather than my typical outro, the one thing I will ask, if you have
Speaker:listened to this podcast and you are interested in traveling to the places
Speaker:that we have traveled, historyordrive.com.
Speaker:Don't forget about this app, this website that we've built.
Speaker:We've got literally thousands of places that you can go and visit, from
Speaker:National Park Services to every single location that we've ever been, mapped
Speaker:with an easy one-click directions.
Speaker:You click on get directions, and it'll give you a Google Maps.
Speaker:It'll open the a- the Google Maps app for you.
Speaker:You can drive straight there, as well as other history content creators.
Speaker:So that's historyordrive.com, and it is… You can work s- with a b- web browser,
Speaker:or you can save it as a shortcut on your home screen, kind of like an app, and
Speaker:it works just, works ju- just like that.
Speaker:So historyordrive.com.
Speaker:You can get out there and travel to the places that we've traveled.
Speaker:Please go check it out.
Speaker:Yeah, and Christmas is coming around, so think of something for
Speaker:the history lovers in your life.
Speaker:We have a great gift shop.
Speaker:The History, uh, Walk With History gift shop has great T-shirts, especially
Speaker:like the T-shirt I'm wearing here, and, uh, you could also buy the app
Speaker:for those history lovers in your life.
Speaker:So, uh, just, uh, celebrate our, our American history and, uh,
Speaker:and thank you for joining us at the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Speaker:We'll talk to you next time.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:This has been a Walk With History production.
Speaker:Talk With History is created and hosted by me, Scott Bennie.
Speaker:Episode researched by Jennifer Bennie.
Speaker:Check out the show notes for links and references mentioned in this episode.
Speaker:Make sure you hit that follow button in that podcast player,
Speaker:and we'll talk to you next time.
