"Top 10 Gunfights" Topic

"It needs to be asked: Of all the heady "Top 10" subject matter we could scour for discriminating C&I history buffs, why gunfights? Well, certainly not because we would ever actually endorse people (even ones with last names like James or Earp) engaging in such grave behavior — at least not without a John Ford-caliber director and a good makeup artist present.

Maybe it's because we just can't quite get our heads around the fact that, unlike Burt Lancaster's winning turn as Wyatt in Gunfight at the O.K. Corral or Robert Duvall's maniacal portrayal of Jesse in The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid, these larger-than-life characters, these wilder-than-anything events, actually existed in some raw, unfictionalized shape or form. They were real. And lethal. And they became an indelible part of America's Western heritage, like it or not…"

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Armand

Thanks

Very interesting. I'd heard about only two of them.

The fascinating thing (for me, at least) is just how tawdry and brutal most of these events were. Western gunfights are a bit like the golden age of pirates, I suppose: highly popular and romanticised in story but extremely nasty in reality.

Knew most of them. Would be a couple more I would nominate.

They left out an important gunfight, and not just because it happened in my hometown..
The Mussel Slough Tragedy in Hanford, CA on May 11th, 1880. Seven people died in the shootout and it made national headlines. It may not be as "sexy" as other gunfights, like O.K. Corral, because there was no "big name" gunfighters involved, but it was pretty significant.

My GG uncle was working ranch security for the Clay County (Texas) Cattle Company and killed three fence cutters. I see that shooting didn't make the list. Dang.

Glad you enjoyed it boys…

Armand