I popped in Tombstone this afternoon while I'm doing my taxes. I don't really know the story of Earp very well. The events in Tombstone, are they even loosely based on actual events. The three brothers and their buddy Holiday forced into acting as lawmen and breaking up a ring of outlaws?

I'm going to the library tomorrow, anyone have any suggestions for books on him?

Here is my take on it.

Earp lived to tell the story. The Clanton brothers didn't.

The fight at the OK Corral was real. But I'm not sure who were the good guys. The history as we know it can depend on the historian.

It's just that Earp lived long enough and he did hang out with some Hollywood notables during the earlier part of 20th century.

Earp went to Tombstone to make money like everyone else did.

In the end, Earp lived to tell the story. Therefore, in the eyes of the history, Wyatt is a hero.

Doc Holiday was a dentist from Georgia.

And unlike the movie, Doc died alone.

Doc Holliday died alone in the movie, also. He told Wyatt to get the hell out of the sanitarium he was in, and Wyatt did. Therefore, he lied there alone until he died.

http://www.desertusa.com/mag98/mar/papr/du_earp.html

Wyatt Earp
Desert Lawman & Adventurer

Wyatt Earp is best known as the fearless frontier lawman of Wichita and Dodge City, Kansas, and as principal survivor of the Gunfight at the OK Corral. But the Marshall Earp of legend accounted for only about 5 years of Wyatt's long and eventful life.

Wyatt spent most of his years traveling and living in the deserts of the Southwest with his four brothers Virgil, Morgan, James and Warren, as well as his wife Josie. His lifelong passion for mining, gambling and sports led him from one boomtown to another across the span of the western frontier and into the 20th century.

Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp was born in Monmouth, Illinois on March 19, 1848. In 1864 he moved with his parents to Colton, California near San Bernardino, where he was employed as a teamster and railroad worker. Wyatt returned east and married in 1870, but after the sudden death of his new bride, he drifted the Indian Territory working as a buffalo hunter and stagecoach driver.

In 1875 he arrived in Wichita, Kansas where he joined the police force. In 1876, he moved to Dodge City, Kansas where he became a faro dealer at the at the famous Long Branch Saloon and assistant marshal. It was here he met and became lifelong friends with Bat Masterson and Doc Holliday, as well as establishing his reputation as a notable lawman and gambler.

Leaving Dodge City with his second wife in 1878, Wyatt traveled to New Mexico and California, working for a time as a Wells Fargo agent. In 1879 he assembled with his brothers and their wives in the new silver mining town of Tombstone, Arizona.

Wyatt planned to establish a stage line here, but upon discovering that there were already two in town, he acquired the gambling concession at the Oriental Saloon. His brother Virgil became town marshal, while Morgan took a job with the police department. It was here that Wyatt met his third wife Josie (Josephine Marcus Earp), who remained with him until his death.

On October 26, 1881, a feud that had developed between the Earp brothers and a gang led by Ike Clanton culminated in the most celebrated gunfight in western folklore -- the Gunfight at the OK Corral. Three of the Clanton gang were killed, while Ike and another wounded member escaped. The three Earp brothers -- Virgil, Wyatt and Morgan -- along with Doc Holliday survived. Both Morgan and Virgil were wounded, and Virgil was later terminated as marshal for his role in the homicides.

In March, 1882 Morgan Earp was gunned down by unknown assassins. Wyatt, along with his brother Warren and some friends, embarked on a vendetta during which all four suspects were eventually killed.

After being accused of these murders, Wyatt and Josie fled Arizona to Colorado. then made the rounds of western mining camps over the next few years. They turned up in Coeur d' Alene, Idaho and in 1886, settled briefly in booming San Diego, where Wyatt gambled and invested in real estate and saloons.



In 1897 Wyatt and Josie headed for Nome Alaska where they operated a saloon during the height of the Alaska Gold Rush. They returned to the states in 1901 with an estimated $80,000 and immediately headed for the gold strike in Tonopah, Nevada, where his saloon, gambling and mining interests once again proved profitable.

Thereafter, Wyatt took up prospecting in earnest, staking claims just outside Death Valley and elsewhere in the Mojave Desert. In 1906 he discovered several veins that contained gold and copper near Vidal, California on the Colorado River and filed numerous claims there at the base of the Whipple Mountains.



Wyatt spent the winters of his final years working these claims in the Mojave Desert and living with Josie in their Vidal cottage. He and Josie summered in Los Angeles, where they befriended early Hollywood actors and lived off real estate and mining investments.

On Jan. 13, 1929 Wyatt Earp died in Los Angeles at the age of 80. Cowboy actors Tom Mix and William S. Hart were among his pallbearers. Wyatt's cremated ashes were buried in Josie's family plot in Colma, California, just south of San Francisco. When Josie died in 1944 at the age of 75, she was buried there beside him.

Among his enduring legacies as frontiersman, lawman, gambler and prospector, a post office near his Mojave Desert mining claims along the Colorado River on Route 62 bears the name -- "Earp, California 92242."

On a recent trip to Earp, California, DesertUSA staff was accompanied by Ken Cilch, author of the recently published book, "Wyatt Earp: The Missing Years." With Ken's help we found one of Wyatt's old mining claims, some rusty old nails and some interesting rocks. We also visited the Earp Post Office, which had many pictures and displays of Wyatt Earp. Here are a few photos from the trip.

-- Bob Katz

Watch the movie Wyatt Earp if you want to know more. It shows more of his life , not just his time in Tombstone.

my grandma tells me that wyatt earp is one of our distant relatives. there are a fair amount of wyatt's in our family though the years.

i have no idea if it's true or not.

Powers Booth played a bada** Curly Bill...

I was reading some info on Tombstone a few months back and ran across a website by a decendant of the Clanton Family and he is trying to get the "other" side of the story made into a movie.

http://clantongang.com/oldwest/movie1.htm

I had a roommate at A&M who's friend was apparently a relative of Wyatt. His last name coincidentally was Earp.

Wyatt Earp was overated.

My last paper at A&M for History of the American West was actually about Wyatt Earp.

The man shot several people in the back.

Routinely cheated on his wife and wives with hookers.

His last wife was a hooker.

He's the one that initiated the fights with the Clantons. He kept pushing for it and pushing for it, and they would always tell him to take it easy, and he bullied them around because he had powerful friends.

Doc Holliday is actually the one that went around starting trouble and robbing banks.

And something that will likely never be confirmed but hot and heavy on the rumour circuit is that Earp himself on many occasions went out with Holliday and robbed the Wells Fargo train/coaches.........and placed blame on the Clantons for it.

Although I love Tombsone the movie, Earp is the biggest fake in American History. People love him like a hero, but he was anything but.

Well, this is all so interesting!

Try finding a Book By Josephine Sarah Marcus Earp, written with Glen Boyer, one of the most noted Wyatt Earp Historians.

Titled: "I Married Wyatt Earp".

Wyatts first wife was Urila Sutherland and died in Lamar, Mo. She is buried in Howell Cemetary in Milford, Mo. Along with My Great Grandmother Lee.When Urilla died, he sold the house. My late Aunt Reba Young Earp was also a noted local historian of her time. She had a copy of the Deed of sale.

In spite of Kevin Costners I would to be the first to write a factual story about Wyatt Earp, he was full of crap!

1. Wyatt did not burn the house down. It was not out in the country as depicted but 4 doors off of the SE corner of the town square. His Father was a Justice of the Peace in Lamar and Wyatt had his first Peace Officers job there. His Father and Mother are Buried in Sheldon Cemetary noth of Lamar and South of Neveda on 71 hwy.

2. Not all of his wives were *****s. Urilla came from a strong willed local family in Lamar.

Celia (Mattie) Ann yes was as there is no proof that they were ever married. Remember, These were the times then.

Josie was from a well to do Jewish Family in San Francisco. Not your typical ***** I would say! They also never showed a marriage license.

Wyatt wanted to be a business man and while not the oldest, He was the one who held the family together. It seemed that the family always ended up in some form of Law enforcement. The Earp clan had a Father who was a Lawyer and Judge so I dont think they would really stray to far from that teaching.

Find writings of John Clum who was the Tombestone Editor and along with other Town Stalwarts of Tombstone backers of the Earps opposed to the Clantons. They were found not guilty of THE MURDER of The CLANTONS in a court of Law.

Yes, in later years, Wyatt and Josie as the Family calls Her, never owned a house and did travel, Wyatt had Race Horses that he ran in Cal., KC.Mo, and Chicago, Ill. for some. They went to Alaska to mine as many did in those days to strike it rich.

While Johnny Behan was The County Shrerif there, it was mostly a tax colleting position. Not Law enforcement. He was born in the Harris House in Westport, Mo,(part of KC) and one of his relatives at one time lived next door to me!

While I will give Kostner a Yes, The Women who played her looked enough like Josie to be her! Dana Delaney did not.

Doc is buried on a hilltop in South Glenwood Springs, Co.

Most towns did not have both a City Marshall and Police force by the way!

Wyatt also worked in Law Enforcement in Witchita, Hays, and Dodge City, Ks.

Times were tough and those that worked were the ones who made money and Gambling and owning Saloons were posperious Citizens in Good Standing.

T. G. Earp