Lawless Legends: Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday & the Shootout at the OK Corral

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Welcome to Civics and Coffee, a history podcast. The show all about United States history, delivered to you and the time it takes to enjoy your morning cup of coffee. I'm your host, Alicia, a historian trained in United States history with a passion for telling both the known and unknown parts of America's past. So grab your coffee and get ready for some bite-sized history. Hey everyone, welcome back. It is the most famous shootout of the American West, and the shortest. In less than a minute, a flurry of bullets mowed down three men. In the smoke that lingered, frontier legends were born. The story of the gunfight pitting Wyatt Earp, his brothers, and Doc Holiday on one side, and the Clanton and McLaren brothers on the other, has been memorialized on film and in novels, transforming Wyatt Herp and Doc Holiday into quintessential anti-heroes. But the shootout on that dusty afternoon did more than turn Wyatt Herp into a household name. It transformed who he was and how he saw the world. It may have led to national notoriety for the fame lawman, but it also caused a lot of pain and became a sore subject. So much so that he avoided talking about it later in life. I did not intentionally set out to make a triple feature of Western character deep dives, but Darren's request sent me down more than a few rabbit holes, and I just couldn't stop myself. So when I started looking into all of the colorful individuals who peppered the frontier, I felt like I had to do at least one more episode. Thus, this week, I am diving into the shootout at the OK Corral. What happened? Who was involved? And where does John Wayne come in? Grab your cup of coffee, peeps. Let's do this. Before we can get to the events in Arizona, we have to get a sense for some of the men who made Tombstone their temporary home and found themselves adjacent to the OK Corral on October 26, 1881. The man most known for the gunfight is none other than Wyatt Earp. Born in Illinois in 1848, Earp was one of six brothers and was the fourth of five sons born to Nicholas and Virginia. Wyatt spent his youth following his father's wandering ways, traveling from Illinois to Iowa, and eventually California. During the Civil War, when Wyatt's older brothers went off to fight, he stayed behind, where he managed the family farm and looked after his younger brother Morgan. The patriarch of the family was a bit rough, often skipping out on debts, and likely struggling with a drinking problem. This created a close bond between the brothers, making his older brother's absence during the war that much harder to survive. But survive it he did, and Wyatt was eventually reunited with older brother Virgil in California after the war, where he joined him as a stagecoach driver. Perhaps as much a result of the rapidly expanding West as innate skills, Wyatt seemed to be a man of many talents, and throughout his life he held a number of posts. Buffalo hunter, gambler, an agent for Wells Fargo, police officer, and U.S. Marshal. He even helped grade track for the Union Pacific Railroad, work he performed in the spring of 1868. He bounced around a bit before temporarily placing roots in Lamar, Missouri, where he was appointed constable. In 1870, Wyatt married for the first time to Urea Sutherland, but the marriage lasted less than a year when his bride died of typhoid fever, just ahead of giving birth to the couple's first child. With his world turned upside down, Wyatt went on a bit of a self-destructive streak, taking up with prostitutes and frequently getting arrested, perhaps due to serving as an enforcer or protector of sorts of the women. Upon hearing that his brother was opening a brothel in Wichita, Kansas, Wyatt made the move and worked as the establishment's bouncer. But work like that was seasonal, only busy when men were in town due to cattle drives. And so when the town got quiet, Wyatt looked for another gig to occupy his time, helping out an off-duty police officer, pursued some thieves. The work and the recognition gave Wyatt a charge, and he continued to pursue work in law enforcement, eventually becoming a police officer. The time spent in Wichita, according to historian Andrew Eisenberg, was pivotal for Wyatt, as it represented a real shift for the young man. He went from being the muscle for local sex workers to becoming a man of the law, a symbol of respect. Wyatt soon moved to nearby Dodge City, where he became Deputy Town Marshal in 1876, then Marshal the following year. While in Dodge City, Wyatt met and became friends with another man who had become notorious after the shootout at the O.K. Corral, Doc Holliday, after Holliday intervened in a dust-up between the Deputy Marshal and some rough-looking cowboys. From Wyatt's perspective, Holliday was his savior, and the two would remain close through some trying times. But how did Holliday find himself in Dodge City? The man known as Doc Holliday was born John Henry Holliday on August 14, 1851, in Griffin, Georgia. Described by one obituary as a quote unquote desperado, Holliday grew up in the South with a father whom he did not seem to get along with, and a mother he was very fond of. Holliday lost his mother as a teenager, and his father quickly remarried, likely putting further strain on their already tense relationship. Holliday left home at 19 to enroll at the Pennsylvania College of Dental Surgery in 1870, and despite earning enough credits and being otherwise eligible to graduate on March 1, 1872, Holliday didn't qualify as he had not yet turned 21 and thus had to delay his graduation five months. Once his credentials were established, Holliday started practicing in Atlanta at the office of Dr. Arthur C. Ford, and even briefly opened his own practice. But after developing chronic pulmonary tuberculosis, doctors recommended Holliday head toward a drier climate. And so the young dentist closed shop and headed west, in the hopes a change of scenery would soothe his ailment. Holliday briefly practiced dentistry upon his arrival in his new home city of Dallas in September 1873, but the allure of the card table proved too inviting, and Holliday was soon earning his living through cards. He earned a name for himself and even got arrested after getting into a gunfight in 1875 with a saloon owner. Luckily, the charges were eventually dropped, which was enough motivation for Holliday to skip town. Like so many other young men along the western edges during this period, Holliday became a bit of a wanderer, traveling from town to town, covering territories in states including Colorado, Wyoming, and South Dakota, before eventually settling for a brief time in Dodge City, where he met and befriended Wyatt Earp. Holiday also met and maybe married, the historical record remains unclear, Mary Catherine Harrany, also known as Kate Elder, and opened another dentistry practice. Holliday continued playing cards, however, using the tables as a way to supplement his income. And quote unquote, save Wyatt Earp, earning himself a new friend in the process. While Holliday was attached to Kate Elder, Wyatt was not exactly alone either. When he arrived in Dodge City, Earp brought along Maddie Blaylock, a former prostitute, as his companion. The couple remained in Dodge City until Wyatt received word from his brother Virgil about the potential to strike it rich in a new boomtown down in Arizona, the recently founded Tombstone. Located in what today is known as Cochise County, Tombstone was established in 1877 by Ed Schifflin, a prospector and Indian scout who found silver while searching the area for ore. The community quickly turned into a boom town, attracting speculators, cowboys, and businessmen from across the country, all eager to carve their stake in the silver mining claims and extract a bit of wealth for themselves. Wyatt and his paramour arrived in Tombstone in December 1879, followed shortly thereafter by Doc Holliday. Motivated by the potential for monetary gains, Holiday also had other motivations. Before arriving in Tombstone, Holliday was running a saloon in a town in New Mexico, and after getting into a fight, Holiday killed a man and wounded another, and was likely looking for any reason to get out of town. By the time of their arrival in 1879, however, there was not much money to be had from extracting silver. But the city of Tombstone appeared to be on an upward trajectory. Within just a few years, the town grew from just a few hundred to several thousand residents, with a host of fancy restaurants and hotels to boot. Unable to make money via the mines, URP, who also enjoyed the support of his brothers, dabbled in other business ventures, including water rights and gambling concessions. But the competing interests in Tombstone presented a problem. Was the area going to continue to be a lawless free-for-all, where quote unquote cowboys would be allowed to roam free as people turned a blind eye? Or were they going to turn Tombstone into a law-abiding, functioning city and make a push for official recognition? This tension is what brought Wyatt and his brothers back into the legal business, so to speak, and it is what eventually prompted the notorious showdown at the OK Corral. As historian Gary L. Roberts explained, Wyatt became a kind of foot soldier for the establishment, helping those who wanted to attract investment from the East and promote the idea of statehood by creating quote-unquote law and order. Thus, Wyatt became deputy sheriff, Virgil became Deputy U.S. Marshal, and younger brother Morgan signed on as a shotgun guard for Wells Fargo. It was a decision that had significant consequences. In the spring of 1881, news came that Tombstone was going to become the county seat, which meant that the area's governor would be appointing the county's offices, including sheriff. If selected, Wyatt would enjoy new levels of influence and a significant salary increase. But regional politics were against him, and the territorial governor passed Wyatt over for someone else. When cowboys robbed a Wells Fargo coach, murdering the driver and wounding a passenger, Wyatt saw an opportunity to challenge the incumbent sheriff and make a bid to finally take his seat. Wells Fargo issued a demand that the men responsible be brought in, dead or alive, something completely allowed and acceptable back then, and Wyatt enlisted the help of his brothers to try to track them down. He believed that if he could successfully bring the men responsible to justice, he could parlay that goodwill into an electoral victory. Unfortunately, despite scouring the local landscape, the Earth brothers were unable to locate the men. But Wyatt knew someone in town who might have a better chance at connecting with them. Ike Clanton. Clanton was a local rancher who frequently bought cattle from cowboys. As a result, he often knew when they'd be coming to town. Seeing an opportunity, Wyatt approached Clanton and made him an offer. If Clanton agreed to turn over the cowboys' location to Wyatt for capture, Wyatt would ensure that Clanton received the $6,000 reward offered by Wells Fargo. Clanton agreed. The suspected culprits were later killed in unrelated incidents, and so Clanton never had a chance to live up to his side of the bargain, but he soon became worried that Wyatt was going to betray their deal. If word ever got out that Clanton was cooperating with the law, his life would be at risk, and Clanton spent the summer in a fit of paranoia, drinking heavily in the local saloons and letting his suspicions get the better of him. By the fall, things had deteriorated considerably, and Clanton's nerves finally snapped. On October 25th, 1881, Ike Clanton walked into one of the local saloons and started drinking. The drinking didn't stop as he moved from location to location, and as the liquor flowed, so did Clanton's mouth. What started as paranoia in the morning quickly shifted to anger and vitriol by the afternoon. And before the night was over, Clanton was making threats against Wyatt, claiming he was going to kill him. As historian Paul Hunton explained, quote, when you're dealing with someone like Wyatt Earp, you really just don't casually say, I'm going to kill you, end quote. The rumor mill took off, and by morning it was unclear whether cowboys were on their way to aid Clanton in his mission to, quote, kill me an ERP, end quote. In reality, there was no horde of cowboys. There was just the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday on one side, and Ike Clanton, his brother Billy, and Frank and Tom McClary on the other. The two sides met in an enclosure on the edge of town near the OK Corral. The day was cold and windy, with dust flying everywhere, and as the story goes, Virgil made an attempt to arrest the men, when one man, perhaps Frank McLaren, reached for his gun. And that is when pandemonium ensued. In a flash of a few seconds, a ring of bullets smote down Frank and Tom McLaren as well as Billy Clanton. Ike Clanton, the one whose paranoia and anger had started the chaos, ran away as the battle began. Morgan, Virgil, and Doc were all wounded in the melee. Only Wyatt managed to survive unscathed. Clanton immediately sought to punish ERP through the law and filed murder charges on October 29th, just three days after the shootout. Wyatt was arrested and spent just over two weeks in jail before Judge Wiles Spicer vacated the charges, citing insufficient evidence. Tensions remained high, however, and at the end of December, Virgil was shot and crippled in the arm by an unknown assailant. Knowing his brother's role as a deputy U.S. Marshal was over, Wyatt applied immediately to take over and went on the hunt for Ike Clanton to try to end the bloody feud, to no avail. Just three months later, in March 1882, Morgan Earp was shot and killed in front of Wyatt. Witnessing his younger brother's murder shifted something in Wyatt. After securing safe passage for the women in the family, Wyatt went on a revenge tour, supported in part by the establishment in Tombstone, who turned a blind eye to his murdering of Frank Stilwell, a man known as Indian Charlie, and others. Eventually, however, Wyatt's vendetta became too much of a liability, and the support dried up. Initially expecting a pardon for murder so he could return to Tombstone and run for sheriff, Wyatt instead ended up in San Francisco. By this time, his friendship with Doc Holiday had run its course, and Holliday, who was living on borrowed time due to his tuberculosis diagnosis, died in 1887 at the age of 36. Wyatt Earp found new love in his life. Josephine Marcus, the wife of Tombstone Sheriff Johnny Bahan, was waiting for Wyatt when he arrived in San Francisco, and the couple would travel the West together, searching out the next big boom town. And while Wyatt never got his revenge against Ike Clanton, he wasn't long for the world and was killed by another lawman in 1887. Wyatt Earp died on January 13, 1929, at the age of 80. He spent his last years in Los Angeles, serving as an advisor for Western films, and met several actors, including John Wayne, who later said he based his depiction of Western lawmen on the man himself. Much of the legend of ERP is thanks to the biography written by Stuart Lake, which was published two years after ERP's death in 1931. The shootout at the OK Corral might be a famous piece of frontier lore, but it was also a turning point for a man who wanted to be accepted in society and who shared a deep bond with his family. It is perhaps no surprise that Wyatt Earp came to detest talking about the notorious battle, still trying to heal from the emotional scars it left behind. My thanks again to Darren for submitting a truly epic topic request. I had a lot of fun digging into the lives of some of the most legendary figures of the American West and getting a chance to separate fact from fiction. If you ever want me to cover a topic, just let me know. You can reach me on the social media channels or through my website at www.civicsandcoffee.com. Thanks, peeps. I'll see you next time. Thanks for sitting down with me as I explored this chapter of American history. If you liked what you heard, be sure to subscribe and share with your friends. I look forward to our next cup of coffee together.