WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.359 welcome back to the deep dive today we are holstering 00:00:03.359 --> 00:00:05.419 up and walking straight into the dusty streets 00:00:05.419 --> 00:00:08.779 of the american west but before you picture that 00:00:08.779 --> 00:00:10.939 you know the square -jawed hero staring down 00:00:10.939 --> 00:00:13.859 the bad guys i want you to pause because the 00:00:13.859 --> 00:00:16.899 man we are talking about today wyatt erp is probably 00:00:16.899 --> 00:00:20.789 not the man you think you know It is a classic 00:00:20.789 --> 00:00:23.410 case of the legend completely eclipsing the human 00:00:23.410 --> 00:00:25.550 being. Yeah. I mean, when most people hear Wyatt 00:00:25.550 --> 00:00:27.329 Earp, they think of law and order. Right. The 00:00:27.329 --> 00:00:29.289 OK Corral. They think of the OK Corral. They 00:00:29.289 --> 00:00:31.289 think of a white hat. Exactly. We think of Henry 00:00:31.289 --> 00:00:33.829 Fonda or Kurt Russell, this this sort of stoic 00:00:33.829 --> 00:00:36.829 icon of justice. But we have been digging through 00:00:36.829 --> 00:00:40.310 a massive stack of source material, biographies, 00:00:40.329 --> 00:00:43.689 court records, census data. A lot of it. And 00:00:43.689 --> 00:00:45.969 the mission today is to peel back those layers 00:00:45.969 --> 00:00:50.399 because the real Wyatt Earp. He was messy. Messy 00:00:50.399 --> 00:00:53.039 is putting it lightly. I mean, really lightly. 00:00:53.140 --> 00:00:55.460 We're talking about a man who was, yes, a lawman. 00:00:55.619 --> 00:00:58.899 Yeah. But he was also a pimp. He was a saloon 00:00:58.899 --> 00:01:01.140 keeper. He was a boxing referee and a really 00:01:01.140 --> 00:01:03.740 controversial one at that. He was a wanderer 00:01:03.740 --> 00:01:06.260 and at one point a horse thief who broke out 00:01:06.260 --> 00:01:09.620 of jail. And that is the aha premise for this 00:01:09.620 --> 00:01:12.569 deep dive, isn't it? We tend to view Earp through 00:01:12.569 --> 00:01:15.129 the lens of his final years or, you know, the 00:01:15.129 --> 00:01:17.489 movies made after he died. But if you look at 00:01:17.489 --> 00:01:20.670 the trajectory of his actual life, his fame during 00:01:20.670 --> 00:01:23.030 his lifetime didn't really come from being a 00:01:23.030 --> 00:01:26.290 hero. In fact, for a huge chunk of his life, 00:01:26.409 --> 00:01:28.769 he was more likely to be arrested than to be 00:01:28.769 --> 00:01:30.969 doing the arresting. So let's unpack this. We 00:01:30.969 --> 00:01:32.769 need to go back to the beginning. Before the 00:01:32.769 --> 00:01:34.969 musk ash, before the Buntline Special Revolver. 00:01:35.450 --> 00:01:39.349 Wyatt Barry Stapp Earp was born March 19, 1848 00:01:39.349 --> 00:01:41.790 in Monmouth, Illinois. And right from the start, 00:01:41.829 --> 00:01:44.109 you see this restlessness in his character. The 00:01:44.109 --> 00:01:46.250 source material paints a picture of a kid who 00:01:46.250 --> 00:01:48.870 just could not sit still. The Civil War breaks 00:01:48.870 --> 00:01:51.430 out when he is barely a teenager. His older brothers, 00:01:51.670 --> 00:01:54.629 Newton, James, Virgil, they all go and join the 00:01:54.629 --> 00:01:57.890 Union Army. And Wyatt, he's only 13, but he tries 00:01:57.890 --> 00:02:00.709 to run away and enlist multiple times. 13, wow. 00:02:01.200 --> 00:02:04.040 Yeah. And every single time, his father, Nicholas 00:02:04.040 --> 00:02:06.299 Earp, has to go find him and drag him back home. 00:02:06.500 --> 00:02:08.719 It's almost cinematic, this kid desperate for 00:02:08.719 --> 00:02:11.460 action. But the real drama, the thing that really 00:02:11.460 --> 00:02:14.180 shapes him, it starts a little later, after the 00:02:14.180 --> 00:02:16.919 family moves around Iowa, California, and eventually 00:02:16.919 --> 00:02:20.300 Wyatt lands in Lamar, Missouri around 1869. This 00:02:20.300 --> 00:02:22.020 is where we see the first major tragedy. This 00:02:22.020 --> 00:02:24.560 is what we call the first spiral. The first spiral. 00:02:24.860 --> 00:02:27.710 Right. He's in his early 20s. He takes over his 00:02:27.710 --> 00:02:29.949 father's job as the local constable. It seems 00:02:29.949 --> 00:02:32.990 like he's on a straight path, you know. He marries 00:02:32.990 --> 00:02:36.110 a woman named Euryla Sutherland in January 1870. 00:02:36.550 --> 00:02:39.370 They're building a life. He buys a lot for $50, 00:02:39.389 --> 00:02:41.629 builds a house. They are expecting their first 00:02:41.629 --> 00:02:45.750 child. And then catastrophe. Typhoid fever. Euryla 00:02:45.750 --> 00:02:48.330 dies later that same year carrying their unborn 00:02:48.330 --> 00:02:51.810 child. And this is just a pivotal moment in Earp's 00:02:51.810 --> 00:02:54.229 psychology. The sources really suggest this death 00:02:54.229 --> 00:02:56.050 just broke him. Completely understandable. He 00:02:56.050 --> 00:02:58.449 goes into this rapid downward spiral. And when 00:02:58.449 --> 00:03:00.469 we say spiral, we don't just mean he was sad. 00:03:00.650 --> 00:03:02.590 He started ending up on the wrong side of the 00:03:02.590 --> 00:03:05.830 law almost immediately. Immediately. He gets 00:03:05.830 --> 00:03:07.979 hit with lawsuits. He was supposed to be collecting 00:03:07.979 --> 00:03:10.219 license fees for the local schools in Lamar, 00:03:10.319 --> 00:03:13.000 basically acting as a tax collector, but he was 00:03:13.000 --> 00:03:14.960 charged with failing to turn the money over. 00:03:15.080 --> 00:03:16.919 So he was pocketing it. He was pocketing it. 00:03:17.219 --> 00:03:21.740 Then, in March 1871, it escalates. He's charged 00:03:21.740 --> 00:03:24.699 with stealing two horses in Indian country. Wait, 00:03:24.759 --> 00:03:27.879 hold on. Horse theft in 1871? That's not like 00:03:27.879 --> 00:03:29.840 stealing a car today where you get probation. 00:03:30.060 --> 00:03:32.139 That's a hanging offense in some places, isn't 00:03:32.139 --> 00:03:34.840 it? It was incredibly serious. A horse was a 00:03:34.840 --> 00:03:37.259 person's livelihood, their transportation, their 00:03:37.259 --> 00:03:40.960 tractor. Stealing one was seen as a fundamental 00:03:40.960 --> 00:03:43.699 attack on a person's survival. So he gets arrested. 00:03:43.939 --> 00:03:46.740 He was arrested. Bail was set at $500, which 00:03:46.740 --> 00:03:49.860 was a huge sum at the time. But here's the kicker. 00:03:50.020 --> 00:03:53.219 He didn't wait for the trial. He escaped. He 00:03:53.219 --> 00:03:55.580 broke out. Like something out of a movie. He 00:03:55.580 --> 00:03:57.139 literally climbed out through the roof of the 00:03:57.139 --> 00:03:59.750 jail and fled to Illinois. So the future marshal 00:03:59.750 --> 00:04:01.810 of Tombstone, the face of American law and order, 00:04:01.870 --> 00:04:04.969 is technically a fugitive horse thief. Precisely. 00:04:05.030 --> 00:04:08.289 And he lands in Peoria, Illinois. Now, if you're 00:04:08.289 --> 00:04:10.530 imagining he went there to start fresh and become 00:04:10.530 --> 00:04:14.330 a respected citizen, think again. Okay. This 00:04:14.330 --> 00:04:16.910 is where we get to the era of the Peoria bummer. 00:04:17.230 --> 00:04:19.589 I love this nickname, the Peoria bummer. Why? 00:04:19.709 --> 00:04:22.990 It sounds funny to modern ears, like a bad sports 00:04:22.990 --> 00:04:25.810 mascot, but it was not a compliment, was it? 00:04:25.829 --> 00:04:29.610 Not at all. A bummer in 1872 was synonymous with 00:04:29.610 --> 00:04:33.129 a loafer, a tramp, someone who imposes on hardworking 00:04:33.129 --> 00:04:36.310 citizens. It was a slur for the underclass. A 00:04:36.310 --> 00:04:39.370 drain on society. Exactly. And the records from 00:04:39.370 --> 00:04:43.009 Peoria are just eye -opening. In February 1872, 00:04:43.189 --> 00:04:45.689 the police raid a brothel. And who do they arrest? 00:04:46.329 --> 00:04:48.790 Wyatt Earp. And he wasn't just there as a customer. 00:04:48.949 --> 00:04:51.949 The charge was keeping and being found in a house 00:04:51.949 --> 00:04:55.029 of ill fame. Keeping is the operative word. So 00:04:55.029 --> 00:04:56.490 he's working there. He was working there. He 00:04:56.490 --> 00:04:58.389 was fine. And it wasn't a one time thing. He 00:04:58.389 --> 00:05:00.189 gets arrested again in May and then again in 00:05:00.189 --> 00:05:02.250 September. This time he's on something called 00:05:02.250 --> 00:05:05.550 the Beardstown Gunboat. The Beardstown Gunboat. 00:05:05.610 --> 00:05:07.769 That sounds like a warship. Far from it. It was 00:05:07.769 --> 00:05:10.910 a floating brothel. Get out. Yeah. A keelboat 00:05:10.910 --> 00:05:13.730 fitted with a ramshackle wooden house that floated 00:05:13.730 --> 00:05:16.730 on the river. The idea was that by being on the 00:05:16.730 --> 00:05:18.769 water, they could drift between jurisdictions 00:05:18.769 --> 00:05:21.230 and make it harder for the local police to raid 00:05:21.230 --> 00:05:23.689 them. That's actually pretty smart. So he's running 00:05:23.689 --> 00:05:26.889 security or management for a floating sex barge. 00:05:27.269 --> 00:05:29.709 Essentially. The newspaper reports from the time 00:05:29.709 --> 00:05:33.000 are brutal. They list him as the Peoria bummer 00:05:33.000 --> 00:05:36.259 and group him with contemptible loafers. He was 00:05:36.259 --> 00:05:39.199 essentially working as a pimp or an enforcer 00:05:39.199 --> 00:05:41.720 for these brothels. This is the part of the biography 00:05:41.720 --> 00:05:44.379 that Hollywood ignored for decades. This is such 00:05:44.379 --> 00:05:47.139 a stark contrast to the legend. Later in life, 00:05:47.160 --> 00:05:49.459 didn't Earp try to cover this up? Because if 00:05:49.459 --> 00:05:51.639 I were trying to be a famous hero, I would not 00:05:51.639 --> 00:05:54.199 want brothel bouncer on my resume. Oh, absolutely. 00:05:54.500 --> 00:05:57.160 Years later, when he was talking to his biographer, 00:05:57.259 --> 00:06:00.019 Stuart Lake, Earp claimed that during this exact... 00:05:59.980 --> 00:06:03.819 period, the winter of 1871 to 1872, he was out 00:06:03.819 --> 00:06:05.879 hunting buffalo on the plains. Of course he was. 00:06:06.040 --> 00:06:08.620 He painted this picture of himself as the solitary 00:06:08.620 --> 00:06:11.500 frontiersman commuting with nature. The classic 00:06:11.500 --> 00:06:14.160 I was hunting buffalo alibi. Yeah. Sounds much 00:06:14.160 --> 00:06:17.319 better than I was in jail in Peoria. Right. But 00:06:17.319 --> 00:06:19.660 the court records in Peoria place him squarely 00:06:19.660 --> 00:06:22.300 in jail or in court paying fines for running 00:06:22.300 --> 00:06:25.870 brothels. There is zero evidence he ever hunted 00:06:25.870 --> 00:06:28.529 buffalo during that specific window. It was a 00:06:28.529 --> 00:06:31.050 complete fabrication to hide his criminal past. 00:06:31.449 --> 00:06:34.750 So he eventually leaves Peoria, probably a good 00:06:34.750 --> 00:06:37.269 idea given the reputation he was building, and 00:06:37.269 --> 00:06:40.829 heads to Wichita, Kansas in 1874. This is where 00:06:40.829 --> 00:06:43.089 the lawman persona finally starts to emerge, 00:06:43.170 --> 00:06:44.829 right? It does, but it's still adjacent to the 00:06:44.829 --> 00:06:47.209 vice trade. How so? He goes to Wichita because 00:06:47.209 --> 00:06:49.209 his brother James is running a brothel there. 00:06:49.410 --> 00:06:51.550 It really was a family business for a while. 00:06:51.629 --> 00:06:54.290 That is wild to think about the Earp brothers 00:06:54.290 --> 00:06:56.949 as a syndicate of vice managers. It seems so. 00:06:57.029 --> 00:07:00.189 But in Wichita, Wyatt pivots. He joins the marshal's 00:07:00.189 --> 00:07:02.029 office. And by all accounts, he was actually 00:07:02.029 --> 00:07:04.410 good at it. He was physically imposing. He was 00:07:04.410 --> 00:07:06.629 intimidating. He developed a reputation as an... 00:07:06.800 --> 00:07:09.439 excellent officer, but, and there is always a 00:07:09.439 --> 00:07:11.740 but with Wyatt during these years, he couldn't 00:07:11.740 --> 00:07:13.420 stay out of trouble. What happened in Wichita? 00:07:13.779 --> 00:07:17.439 Politics in his temper. In 1876, a former marshal 00:07:17.439 --> 00:07:20.300 named Bill Smith accused Wyatt of using his office 00:07:20.300 --> 00:07:24.240 to hire his brothers. Nepotism, basically. Wyatt 00:07:24.240 --> 00:07:26.540 didn't take it to court. He took it to the street. 00:07:26.839 --> 00:07:29.360 He found Smith and beat him in a fistfight until 00:07:29.360 --> 00:07:32.160 he was unrecognizable. Which I assume didn't 00:07:32.160 --> 00:07:33.800 go over well with the city council. You can't 00:07:33.800 --> 00:07:35.720 just beat up your political rivals in the street. 00:07:35.980 --> 00:07:40.100 No. He was fired. The council voted against rehiring 00:07:40.100 --> 00:07:43.379 him, and they essentially withheld his pay. So 00:07:43.379 --> 00:07:46.699 he moves on again. This is the pattern. Do good 00:07:46.699 --> 00:07:49.399 police work. Get entangled in politics or violence. 00:07:49.620 --> 00:07:52.699 Get fired or leave town. Move to the next boomtown. 00:07:52.860 --> 00:07:55.160 And the next boomtown is the big one? Dodge City. 00:07:55.319 --> 00:07:59.019 Dodge City, Kansas. 1876. The queen of the cow 00:07:59.019 --> 00:08:01.500 towns. This is where the legend really starts 00:08:01.500 --> 00:08:03.740 to gain traction. He's appointed assistant marshal. 00:08:03.819 --> 00:08:05.759 But even in Dodge, he had his clumsy moments. 00:08:06.040 --> 00:08:08.120 I found the story in the notes hilarious. Tell 00:08:08.120 --> 00:08:10.699 us about the loose gun incident. Because we always 00:08:10.699 --> 00:08:12.699 picture him as having nerves of steel and perfect 00:08:12.699 --> 00:08:16.449 control. Laughing. It is hard to square this 00:08:16.449 --> 00:08:20.029 with the movie image. January 1876, he's sitting 00:08:20.029 --> 00:08:22.889 in a saloon back room. He leans back in his chair 00:08:22.889 --> 00:08:25.290 and his revolver falls out of his holster, hits 00:08:25.290 --> 00:08:28.089 the floor and discharges. Great gunfighter shoots 00:08:28.089 --> 00:08:30.970 himself. He shot a hole through his coat. The 00:08:30.970 --> 00:08:33.889 report says it caused a lively stampede from 00:08:33.889 --> 00:08:36.590 the room as people scrambled for cover. It's 00:08:36.590 --> 00:08:38.909 a reminder that these were real people with primitive 00:08:38.909 --> 00:08:42.450 firearms, not superheroes. It humanizes him. 00:08:42.570 --> 00:08:44.990 But Dodge is also where he meets the other half 00:08:44.990 --> 00:08:48.039 of the legend, Doc Holliday. How did that happen? 00:08:48.120 --> 00:08:50.039 Because in the movies, they usually meet in a 00:08:50.039 --> 00:08:52.419 saloon in Dodge, but the source says it started 00:08:52.419 --> 00:08:56.279 in Texas. Correct. In 1878, Wyatt was tracking 00:08:56.279 --> 00:08:59.259 an outlaw named Dave Rudabaugh. He followed him 00:08:59.259 --> 00:09:01.740 all the way to Fort Griffin, Texas. Wyatt goes 00:09:01.740 --> 00:09:04.039 into the Beehive Saloon, owned by an old acquaintance, 00:09:04.139 --> 00:09:06.899 and asks about Rudabaugh. The owner points him 00:09:06.899 --> 00:09:09.720 to a skinny, sickly gambler sitting at a table. 00:09:09.879 --> 00:09:12.360 That was Doc Holliday. And Doc had the intel. 00:09:12.539 --> 00:09:15.220 He did. He told Wyatt that Rudabaugh had headed 00:09:15.220 --> 00:09:18.159 back to Kansas. But that meeting sparked a friendship. 00:09:18.460 --> 00:09:21.480 Later, when Doc came up to Dodge City, he reportedly 00:09:21.480 --> 00:09:24.379 saved Wyatt's life in a saloon standoff with 00:09:24.379 --> 00:09:27.039 some cowboys. And that cemented it. That cemented 00:09:27.039 --> 00:09:29.279 a bond that, frankly, defined the rest of their 00:09:29.279 --> 00:09:31.620 lives. It's fascinating because on paper, they 00:09:31.620 --> 00:09:34.299 shouldn't be friends. Wyatt is the lawman, the 00:09:34.299 --> 00:09:37.840 stoic. Doc is the chaotic, dying gambler. I guess 00:09:37.840 --> 00:09:39.600 opposites attract, especially when bullets are 00:09:39.600 --> 00:09:41.960 flying. We also have to mention the George Hoyt 00:09:41.960 --> 00:09:45.289 shooting in Dodge. This is often cited as a moment 00:09:45.289 --> 00:09:48.690 of Wyatt's incredible marksmanship. But the facts 00:09:48.690 --> 00:09:50.769 are a little murkier, aren't they? This was July 00:09:50.769 --> 00:09:54.350 1878. Some drunken cowboys are shooting up a 00:09:54.350 --> 00:09:56.690 theater, actually causing a comedian on stage 00:09:56.690 --> 00:09:59.950 to dive for cover. Wow. Wyatt and Bat Masterson 00:09:59.950 --> 00:10:02.929 respond. The writers are fleeing, galloping away 00:10:02.929 --> 00:10:05.190 in the dark. Wyatt fired her. And he claimed 00:10:05.190 --> 00:10:07.370 he drilled the guy, right? Wyatt told his biographer 00:10:07.370 --> 00:10:09.769 later that he saw George White against the morning 00:10:09.769 --> 00:10:13.399 horizon and fired a fatal shot. It sounds very 00:10:13.399 --> 00:10:16.120 heroic, but the historical record shows Hoyt 00:10:16.120 --> 00:10:18.940 fell, yes, but he died a month later from gangrene 00:10:18.940 --> 00:10:21.559 after his leg was amputated. It wasn't quite 00:10:21.559 --> 00:10:23.679 the dead center shot Wyatt remembered, but it 00:10:23.679 --> 00:10:27.360 certainly stopped the outlaw. So by 1879, Dodge 00:10:27.360 --> 00:10:30.080 is calming down. It's becoming civilized. And 00:10:30.080 --> 00:10:33.000 for a man like Wyatt Earp, civilized means boring. 00:10:33.769 --> 00:10:36.669 And less profitable. Exactly. The Earps were 00:10:36.669 --> 00:10:38.429 always looking for the main chance, the next 00:10:38.429 --> 00:10:40.870 big boom. Virgil Earp was already out in the 00:10:40.870 --> 00:10:43.169 Arizona Territory, and he writes to Wyatt saying, 00:10:43.370 --> 00:10:46.690 come to Tombstone. Tombstone. The name just sounds 00:10:46.690 --> 00:10:49.149 ominous. But they didn't go there to be lawmen, 00:10:49.250 --> 00:10:51.370 did they? No, and this is a crucial distinction. 00:10:51.730 --> 00:10:55.110 They moved to Tombstone in December 1879 to get 00:10:55.110 --> 00:10:58.070 rich. Okay. They wanted to invest in silver mines. 00:10:58.590 --> 00:11:00.990 They bought claims. They bought water rights. 00:11:01.350 --> 00:11:04.580 They wanted to be businessmen. Pinning on a badge 00:11:04.580 --> 00:11:07.220 was plan B. But the law pulled them back in. 00:11:07.320 --> 00:11:09.679 Well, the mines didn't pay out as quickly as 00:11:09.679 --> 00:11:11.980 they hoped, so they fell back on what they knew. 00:11:12.460 --> 00:11:15.620 Virgil was a deputy U .S. marshal. Wyatt started 00:11:15.620 --> 00:11:17.779 working for Wells Fargo as a shotgun messenger. 00:11:18.019 --> 00:11:20.980 But the real friction in Tombstone, the thing 00:11:20.980 --> 00:11:23.980 that led to the OK Corral, wasn't just good guys 00:11:23.980 --> 00:11:26.419 versus bad guys. It was political. It was deeply 00:11:26.419 --> 00:11:28.399 political. Let's pause on that because I think 00:11:28.399 --> 00:11:31.039 we missed this context today. We think of the 00:11:31.039 --> 00:11:34.220 Wild West as just anarchy. But Tombstone was 00:11:34.220 --> 00:11:36.340 basically fighting the Civil War all over again, 00:11:36.419 --> 00:11:38.720 wasn't it? Absolutely. You have to understand 00:11:38.720 --> 00:11:40.919 the demographics. The Earps were Northerners. 00:11:40.980 --> 00:11:43.539 They were Republicans. They represented the Union, 00:11:43.720 --> 00:11:45.940 the federal government, and big business interests 00:11:45.940 --> 00:11:47.940 coming from the East Coast. And the people they 00:11:47.940 --> 00:11:50.799 were fighting against. The cowboys. Now, in 2024, 00:11:51.100 --> 00:11:53.340 cowboy sounds like a compliment. It means a hardworking 00:11:53.340 --> 00:11:56.080 guy on a ranch. Right. But in 1880, Arizona, 00:11:56.320 --> 00:11:58.700 cowboy was a pejorative. It was synonymous with 00:11:58.700 --> 00:12:02.720 rustler or gangster. And politically, these guys 00:12:02.720 --> 00:12:05.340 were southerners. Many were Confederate sympathizers. 00:12:05.399 --> 00:12:07.899 They were Democrats. They represented the rural, 00:12:08.100 --> 00:12:12.129 agrarian, don't tread on me mindset. So the gunfight 00:12:12.129 --> 00:12:14.570 at the OK Corral is basically Republicans versus 00:12:14.570 --> 00:12:17.549 Democrats with revolvers. In a way, yes. It was 00:12:17.549 --> 00:12:20.129 a culture war. The Cowboys, the Clantons and 00:12:20.129 --> 00:12:23.269 McClurys saw the Earps as interfering city slickers 00:12:23.269 --> 00:12:25.649 trying to impose federal law on their territory. 00:12:26.190 --> 00:12:29.309 The Earps saw the Cowboys as a criminal syndicate 00:12:29.309 --> 00:12:31.769 holding back progress. And stuck in the middle 00:12:31.769 --> 00:12:34.259 of this is Johnny Behan. Johnny Behan is the 00:12:34.259 --> 00:12:36.299 antagonist of the story. He was a county sheriff. 00:12:36.519 --> 00:12:38.720 Now, in those days, the sheriff job was incredibly 00:12:38.720 --> 00:12:41.000 lucrative because the sheriff got to keep 10 00:12:41.000 --> 00:12:43.399 % of all the taxes they collected. Wow. We're 00:12:43.399 --> 00:12:46.299 talking $40 ,000 a year in 1880s money. That 00:12:46.299 --> 00:12:49.639 is astronomical. That's millions today. Easily. 00:12:49.639 --> 00:12:52.100 It was the prize everyone wanted. Both Wyatt 00:12:52.100 --> 00:12:55.000 and Behan wanted that job. And according to Wyatt, 00:12:55.159 --> 00:12:58.600 they made a deal. Behan would take the sheriff's 00:12:58.600 --> 00:13:00.980 spot and appoint Wyatt as his undersheriff, and 00:13:00.980 --> 00:13:03.570 they'd split the fees. But Behan reneged. He 00:13:03.570 --> 00:13:05.389 did. He got the job and appointed a Democrat 00:13:05.389 --> 00:13:08.110 instead. Wyatt was a Republican. So you have 00:13:08.110 --> 00:13:11.029 this political rivalry, but then you throw a 00:13:11.029 --> 00:13:13.889 woman into the mix. Josephine Marcus. Josephine 00:13:13.889 --> 00:13:16.509 Marcus. She arrived in Tombstone with Johnny 00:13:16.509 --> 00:13:19.289 Behan. They were living together. She was a Jewish 00:13:19.289 --> 00:13:21.870 actress from San Francisco, very spirited, very 00:13:21.870 --> 00:13:25.309 independent. But eventually she kicks Behan out, 00:13:25.450 --> 00:13:27.470 allegedly after finding him in bed with another 00:13:27.470 --> 00:13:29.889 woman. And she ends up with Wyatt. No, wait. 00:13:30.149 --> 00:13:32.600 We need to stop here. Because the movies usually 00:13:32.600 --> 00:13:35.039 show Wyatt and Josephine riding off into the 00:13:35.039 --> 00:13:37.980 sunset. But the source material mentions someone 00:13:37.980 --> 00:13:40.559 else. Someone that the movies often leave out 00:13:40.559 --> 00:13:43.460 or minimize. Maddie Blaylock. This is one of 00:13:43.460 --> 00:13:45.200 the tragic parts of the Earp story that often 00:13:45.200 --> 00:13:47.799 gets erased. When Wyatt came to Tombstone, he 00:13:47.799 --> 00:13:50.690 wasn't single. He brought his common -law wife, 00:13:50.909 --> 00:13:53.429 Maddie. She was a former prostitute he met in 00:13:53.429 --> 00:13:56.629 Dodge. By the time they are in Tombstone, she's 00:13:56.629 --> 00:13:58.649 suffering from severe headaches and is addicted 00:13:58.649 --> 00:14:01.870 to laudanum, which is a potent liquid opiate. 00:14:01.950 --> 00:14:04.269 And while Wyatt is courting Josephine, the glamorous 00:14:04.269 --> 00:14:08.100 actress, Maddie is just... She's being pushed 00:14:08.100 --> 00:14:11.019 aside. And the sad reality is, after Wyatt leaves 00:14:11.019 --> 00:14:13.840 Tombstone with Josephine, Maddie is left behind. 00:14:13.879 --> 00:14:17.019 She spirals. She has no support system. She goes 00:14:17.019 --> 00:14:19.059 back to prostitution in a mining camp called 00:14:19.059 --> 00:14:22.360 Pinal City. Oh, that's awful. And in 1888, she 00:14:22.360 --> 00:14:25.019 commits suicide by taking a lethal overdose of 00:14:25.019 --> 00:14:27.799 opium. That is heartbreaking. It really complicates 00:14:27.799 --> 00:14:29.899 the hero narrative when you realize he abandoned 00:14:29.899 --> 00:14:32.320 a dependent partner who was struggling with addiction. 00:14:32.620 --> 00:14:35.039 It does. And Josephine Earp, in later years, 00:14:35.139 --> 00:14:37.440 worked very hard to erase Maddie's name from 00:14:37.440 --> 00:14:40.080 any biography of Wyatt. She didn't want the world 00:14:40.080 --> 00:14:42.059 to know about the other wife. She wanted to be 00:14:42.059 --> 00:14:44.700 the only love story. So, back to the pressure 00:14:44.700 --> 00:14:46.700 cooker in Tombstone. You have the political rivalry 00:14:46.700 --> 00:14:49.480 with Behan, the romantic scandal, and the criminal 00:14:49.480 --> 00:14:51.899 element of the cowboys escalating. Right. And 00:14:51.899 --> 00:14:54.259 remember, the cowboys were a real threat. They 00:14:54.259 --> 00:14:56.879 were stealing army mules, robbing stagecoaches. 00:14:57.159 --> 00:14:59.879 The tensions were rising for months. There were 00:14:59.879 --> 00:15:02.200 death threats. The cowboys were telling the Earps 00:15:02.200 --> 00:15:04.539 to get out of town or face the consequences. 00:15:04.919 --> 00:15:08.700 Which brings us to October 26, 1881, the gunfight 00:15:08.700 --> 00:15:11.440 at the O .K. Corral. It's the most famous shootout 00:15:11.440 --> 00:15:14.080 in American history. But if you blink, you miss 00:15:14.080 --> 00:15:17.769 it. It lasted only 30 seconds. 30 seconds. All 00:15:17.769 --> 00:15:20.190 that legend, all those movies, for half a minute 00:15:20.190 --> 00:15:22.470 of violence. That's it. Around 3 o 'clock in 00:15:22.470 --> 00:15:24.970 the afternoon, Virgil Earp is the town marshal. 00:15:25.049 --> 00:15:27.970 He deputizes Wyatt. Morgan Earp is there, and 00:15:27.970 --> 00:15:30.190 so is Doc Holliday. They go down to Fremont Street, 00:15:30.450 --> 00:15:32.909 actually a vacant lot near the OK Corral, not 00:15:32.909 --> 00:15:35.509 inside it, to disarm the Cowboys. And facing 00:15:35.509 --> 00:15:38.509 them are Ike Clanton, Billy Clanton, Frank McClory, 00:15:38.669 --> 00:15:41.190 Tom McClory, and Billy Clybourne. The spacing 00:15:41.190 --> 00:15:43.330 was incredibly tight. They were only about six 00:15:43.330 --> 00:15:46.450 to ten feet apart. Wow. Can you imagine staring 00:15:46.450 --> 00:15:48.529 at someone who wants to kill you from six feet 00:15:48.529 --> 00:15:51.009 away? Who fired first? That is still debated 00:15:51.009 --> 00:15:54.149 to this day. Witnesses gave conflicting accounts, 00:15:54.490 --> 00:15:58.059 but the outcome isn't debated. In 30 seconds, 00:15:58.279 --> 00:16:00.960 roughly 30 shots were fired. And when the smoke 00:16:00.960 --> 00:16:03.799 cleared? Tom McLaurie, Frank McLaurie, and Billy 00:16:03.799 --> 00:16:06.240 Clanton were dead. Virgil was shot through the 00:16:06.240 --> 00:16:09.460 calf. Morgan was shot across the shoulders. Doc 00:16:09.460 --> 00:16:12.639 was grazed. And Wyatt? Wyatt stood there, completely 00:16:12.639 --> 00:16:16.039 unstazed. He was the only one not hit. And that 00:16:16.039 --> 00:16:18.840 fact alone contributed massively to his mystique 00:16:18.840 --> 00:16:21.799 later on. The idea that he was invincible or 00:16:21.799 --> 00:16:24.460 divinely protected. Now, usually the movie ends 00:16:24.460 --> 00:16:27.039 there. Or maybe a few minutes later with a victory 00:16:27.039 --> 00:16:29.980 lap. But the reality was a legal nightmare, wasn't 00:16:29.980 --> 00:16:32.320 it? They weren't hailed as heroes. No, they were 00:16:32.320 --> 00:16:34.539 arrested for murder. Ike Clanton, who had run 00:16:34.539 --> 00:16:36.279 away when the shooting started, filed charges. 00:16:36.700 --> 00:16:38.879 There was a month -long preliminary hearing. 00:16:39.539 --> 00:16:41.700 Johnny Behan, the sheriff, testified against 00:16:41.700 --> 00:16:44.279 the Earps. Of course he did. Claiming the Cowboys 00:16:44.279 --> 00:16:46.019 were trying to surrender when the Earps opened 00:16:46.019 --> 00:16:47.620 fire. So it could have gone either way? They 00:16:47.620 --> 00:16:50.379 could have hanged for this? Absolutely. But Judge 00:16:50.379 --> 00:16:53.460 Wells Spicer ruled in the Earps' favor. He ruled 00:16:53.460 --> 00:16:55.769 it was self -defense. He noted the cowboys were 00:16:55.769 --> 00:16:58.450 armed and had been threatening the Earps. But 00:16:58.450 --> 00:17:01.049 the town was split. Half saw them as heroes who 00:17:01.049 --> 00:17:03.610 cleaned up the trash. Half saw them as cold -blooded 00:17:03.610 --> 00:17:06.289 murderers. And the cowboys? They weren't done. 00:17:06.569 --> 00:17:08.210 Not by a long shot. This is where the story gets 00:17:08.210 --> 00:17:09.990 really dark. This isn't law enforcement anymore. 00:17:10.029 --> 00:17:12.650 This is a blood feud. It is the vendetta. The 00:17:12.650 --> 00:17:14.930 cowboys decided that if the courts wouldn't punish 00:17:14.930 --> 00:17:18.789 the Earps, they would. In December 1881, Virgil 00:17:18.789 --> 00:17:21.049 is ambushed walking across the street at night. 00:17:21.450 --> 00:17:24.839 A shotgun blast shatters his arm. He survives, 00:17:25.160 --> 00:17:28.039 but he's maimed for life. And then Morgan. March 00:17:28.039 --> 00:17:30.799 1882. Morgan is playing billiards. He's leaning 00:17:30.799 --> 00:17:32.960 over the table. A shot comes through the window 00:17:32.960 --> 00:17:35.480 from a dark alley. Assassinated. Struck in the 00:17:35.480 --> 00:17:38.079 spine. He dies 40 minutes later, and this is 00:17:38.079 --> 00:17:41.279 the breaking point for Wyatt. Up until now, he 00:17:41.279 --> 00:17:43.980 has tried to use the legal system. But watching 00:17:43.980 --> 00:17:47.259 his brother die, he realizes the courts can't 00:17:47.259 --> 00:17:49.920 touch these guys. The system is broken. So he 00:17:49.920 --> 00:17:53.119 pins on a deputy U .S. marshal badge. gathers 00:17:53.119 --> 00:17:56.160 a posse, and goes rogue. He becomes a vigilante 00:17:56.160 --> 00:17:59.240 with a badge. Exactly. He wasn't trying to arrest 00:17:59.240 --> 00:18:02.140 anyone anymore. He was hunting them. The first 00:18:02.140 --> 00:18:04.240 target was Frank Stilwell, who they believed 00:18:04.240 --> 00:18:07.220 killed Morgan. They found him at the Tucson train 00:18:07.220 --> 00:18:10.359 station. Wyatt filled him with buckshot. It was 00:18:10.359 --> 00:18:12.900 a brutal execution. And then the Iron Springs 00:18:12.900 --> 00:18:15.160 shootout. This one feels like an action movie 00:18:15.160 --> 00:18:18.099 scene, but the sources say it actually happened 00:18:18.099 --> 00:18:29.789 like this. It really did. Wyatt's men scatter 00:18:29.789 --> 00:18:32.910 for cover. Doc Holliday dives for cover. But 00:18:32.910 --> 00:18:35.650 Wyatt, he just walks forward. Into the fire. 00:18:35.809 --> 00:18:38.269 Into heavy fire. Curly Bill shoots at him with 00:18:38.269 --> 00:18:41.609 a shotgun but misses. Wyatt fires his own shotgun 00:18:41.609 --> 00:18:44.130 and practically cuts Curly Bill in half. Then 00:18:44.130 --> 00:18:46.109 he pulls his revolver and shoots another outlaw. 00:18:46.269 --> 00:18:48.190 And there is this myth about his coat, right? 00:18:48.329 --> 00:18:50.740 Yes. After the fight, when the adrenaline wore 00:18:50.740 --> 00:18:53.500 off, Wyatt checked his gear. He claimed his long 00:18:53.500 --> 00:18:55.559 coat was shredded by bullets on both sides through 00:18:55.559 --> 00:18:58.039 the tails of the coat. He said his saddle horn 00:18:58.039 --> 00:19:02.640 was shot off, but his skin never touched. It 00:19:02.640 --> 00:19:05.259 reinforced that supernatural aura around him, 00:19:05.359 --> 00:19:08.240 the man who couldn't be killed. But after this, 00:19:08.299 --> 00:19:10.710 they can't stay in Arizona. They are wanted men. 00:19:10.849 --> 00:19:13.109 They are. They have warrants out for the killing 00:19:13.109 --> 00:19:15.230 of Stilwell. The posse has to flee to Colorado. 00:19:15.630 --> 00:19:18.490 And that is really the end of Wyatt Earp, the 00:19:18.490 --> 00:19:21.250 lawman. He spends the next nearly 50 years of 00:19:21.250 --> 00:19:24.289 his life doing, well, everything else. This is 00:19:24.289 --> 00:19:27.029 the second act that I find so fascinating. Because 00:19:27.029 --> 00:19:29.210 he doesn't just retire to a porch. He becomes 00:19:29.210 --> 00:19:32.730 a grifter. He essentially becomes a career gambler 00:19:32.730 --> 00:19:35.829 and opportunist. He drifts around the West. In 00:19:35.829 --> 00:19:38.109 Gunnison, Colorado, there is a story about him 00:19:38.109 --> 00:19:41.329 pulling a gold brick scam. What exactly is a 00:19:41.329 --> 00:19:43.309 gold brick scam? Is it just selling a fake brick? 00:19:43.509 --> 00:19:45.769 It's a classic con. You take a rock or a lead 00:19:45.769 --> 00:19:47.930 brick and you coat it in gold or drill holes 00:19:47.930 --> 00:19:50.049 and fill them with gold dust to make it way right. 00:19:50.230 --> 00:19:52.990 Okay. Then you find a wealthy, gullible tourist, 00:19:53.250 --> 00:19:55.710 in this case a German visitor, and sell it to 00:19:55.710 --> 00:19:58.970 him for $2 ,000, claiming it's pure bullion. 00:19:59.420 --> 00:20:01.480 This is the man who stood down the cowboys, selling 00:20:01.480 --> 00:20:04.440 fake rocks to tourists. It's a stark comedown. 00:20:04.460 --> 00:20:08.779 He moves to San Diego, runs gambling halls. He 00:20:08.779 --> 00:20:11.400 buys racehorses. He's trying to be a respectable 00:20:11.400 --> 00:20:14.119 businessman, but he's always operating on the 00:20:14.119 --> 00:20:16.539 fringe. But the thing that really defined his 00:20:16.539 --> 00:20:18.460 reputation while he was alive, the thing that 00:20:18.460 --> 00:20:20.900 made him a household name before the movies, 00:20:21.059 --> 00:20:24.299 wasn't Tombstone. It was a boxing match. The 00:20:24.299 --> 00:20:27.960 Fitzsimmons -Sharky fight in 1896. This is crucial 00:20:27.960 --> 00:20:30.259 for understanding Earp's life. He was living 00:20:30.259 --> 00:20:32.680 in San Francisco. He was asked to referee the 00:20:32.680 --> 00:20:34.759 heavyweight championship of the world. That's 00:20:34.759 --> 00:20:36.559 a huge gig. That's like refereeing the Super 00:20:36.559 --> 00:20:39.119 Bowl. It was. Bob Fitzsimmons versus Tom Sharkey. 00:20:39.599 --> 00:20:41.559 Fitzsimmons is the favorite. He is dominating 00:20:41.559 --> 00:20:44.720 the fight. He is pummeling Sharkey. In the eighth 00:20:44.720 --> 00:20:46.980 round, he lands a massive uppercut and knocks 00:20:46.980 --> 00:20:49.440 Sharkey down. Sharkey is out cold. So Fitzsimmons 00:20:49.440 --> 00:20:52.200 wins. He should have. But Wyatt Earp steps in 00:20:52.200 --> 00:20:54.319 and calls a foul. On what grounds? He claimed 00:20:54.319 --> 00:20:57.309 Fitzsimmons hit Sharkey below the belt. But here's 00:20:57.309 --> 00:20:59.990 the thing. Practically nobody else saw it. Oh, 00:20:59.990 --> 00:21:02.769 no. The crowd went nuts. They booed him out of 00:21:02.769 --> 00:21:04.869 the building. It was widely believed the fight 00:21:04.869 --> 00:21:07.130 was fixed and that Earp was in on it. So for 00:21:07.130 --> 00:21:09.930 decades, if you said Wyatt Earp, people didn't 00:21:09.930 --> 00:21:12.450 say Hero Tombstone. They said that crooked referee. 00:21:12.750 --> 00:21:16.170 Exactly. He was pilloried in the press, caricatured 00:21:16.170 --> 00:21:19.170 in cartoons as a blind man or a thief taking 00:21:19.170 --> 00:21:22.230 a bribe. That was his legacy for a long time. 00:21:22.329 --> 00:21:26.079 A washed up. Crooked ref. So he escapes the bad 00:21:26.079 --> 00:21:29.779 press and heads north to the Alaska gold rush. 00:21:30.440 --> 00:21:33.720 1897. He heads to Nome. But again, he's not there 00:21:33.720 --> 00:21:36.240 to dig for gold. He's there to mine the miners. 00:21:36.480 --> 00:21:38.839 Of course. He opens the Dexter Saloon. Which 00:21:38.839 --> 00:21:41.200 is incredibly fancy for a tent city. It was a 00:21:41.200 --> 00:21:43.380 palace compared to the rest of the town. Two 00:21:43.380 --> 00:21:46.460 stories, thick carpets, mirrors, and according 00:21:46.460 --> 00:21:49.599 to the sources, a brothel upstairs. He was back 00:21:49.599 --> 00:21:51.460 to his old tricks. Of course he was. He made 00:21:51.460 --> 00:21:54.519 a fortune. An estimated... $80 ,000? That's millions 00:21:54.519 --> 00:21:56.559 today. He should have been set for life. But? 00:21:56.640 --> 00:22:00.759 But Josephine, she had a gambling habit. The 00:22:00.759 --> 00:22:02.980 poker face lady. She loved to gamble. And she 00:22:02.980 --> 00:22:04.440 wasn't particularly good at it. She apparently 00:22:04.440 --> 00:22:06.619 burned through that fortune almost as fast as 00:22:06.619 --> 00:22:08.599 Wyatt made it. So they end up in Los Angeles. 00:22:08.740 --> 00:22:11.660 The final chapter. The Hollywood years. This 00:22:11.660 --> 00:22:15.680 is the 1920s. Wyatt is an old man. And it sounds 00:22:15.680 --> 00:22:18.380 kind of sad. It is a bit melancholic. He's living 00:22:18.380 --> 00:22:21.680 in small rental bungalows in L .A. In the winters, 00:22:21.680 --> 00:22:23.920 he's driving out to the Mojave Desert to work 00:22:23.920 --> 00:22:27.039 these tiny copper claims, just trying to scrape 00:22:27.039 --> 00:22:29.400 together enough money to pay the rent. But he's 00:22:29.400 --> 00:22:31.519 also hanging around the movie studios. He's a 00:22:31.519 --> 00:22:34.500 consultant. An unpaid consultant. He visits the 00:22:34.500 --> 00:22:37.119 sets of Silent Westerns. He becomes friends with 00:22:37.119 --> 00:22:39.779 Tom Mix and William S. Hart, the big cowboy stars 00:22:39.779 --> 00:22:42.440 of the day. They loved him. They loved hearing 00:22:42.440 --> 00:22:44.460 the real stories. And there's a connection to 00:22:44.460 --> 00:22:47.700 John Wayne. Right. Yes. A young prop boy named 00:22:47.700 --> 00:22:49.779 Marion Morrison, who would later become John 00:22:49.779 --> 00:22:53.000 Wayne met Earp on set. No way. Wayne later said 00:22:53.000 --> 00:22:55.460 that he based his walk, his talk and his entire 00:22:55.460 --> 00:22:58.500 onscreen persona on Wyatt Earp. So every time 00:22:58.500 --> 00:23:00.539 you see John Wayne, you're seeing a reflection 00:23:00.539 --> 00:23:02.859 of the real Wyatt Earp. But Earp was desperate 00:23:02.859 --> 00:23:04.920 to tell his own story. He wanted to clear his 00:23:04.920 --> 00:23:07.859 name after the boxing scandal. He was. He wanted 00:23:07.859 --> 00:23:10.579 people to know he was a hero, not a crook. He 00:23:10.579 --> 00:23:12.460 starts working on a biography with his friend 00:23:12.460 --> 00:23:14.720 John Flood. They sit in Wyatt's kitchen drinking 00:23:14.720 --> 00:23:17.799 coffee, smoking cigars. But there is a problem. 00:23:18.160 --> 00:23:20.339 Josephine. Josephine is the gatekeeper. She sits 00:23:20.339 --> 00:23:22.640 there and censors everything. Don't tell them 00:23:22.640 --> 00:23:24.559 about Maddie. Don't tell them about the brothels. 00:23:24.660 --> 00:23:27.519 Make it sound nicer. The resulting book. It is 00:23:27.519 --> 00:23:31.059 famously unreadable. Josephine insisted on it 00:23:31.059 --> 00:23:34.160 being peppy. She literally demanded that Flood 00:23:34.160 --> 00:23:37.700 write the word CIEC in all capital letters every 00:23:37.700 --> 00:23:40.160 time a gun went off. Crack. Crack. Oh, that sounds 00:23:40.160 --> 00:23:42.720 like a comic book. Publishers rejected it immediately. 00:23:43.019 --> 00:23:46.380 They called it stilted and florid. So Wyatt dies 00:23:46.380 --> 00:23:49.299 in 1929, largely believing he failed to clear 00:23:49.299 --> 00:23:51.519 his name. He dies in a small rental bungalow. 00:23:52.140 --> 00:23:54.559 Tom Mix cried at his funeral, but the general 00:23:54.559 --> 00:23:57.599 public, they had mostly moved on. But then, two 00:23:57.599 --> 00:24:00.859 years later, resurrection. Stuart Lake. Stuart 00:24:00.859 --> 00:24:03.640 Lake publishes Wyatt Earp. Frontier Marshall 00:24:03.640 --> 00:24:07.640 in 1931. And this book, it basically invents 00:24:07.640 --> 00:24:10.339 the modern Western hero. Is it accurate? Not 00:24:10.339 --> 00:24:13.319 even close. It is largely fiction. Lake took 00:24:13.319 --> 00:24:15.539 the stories Wyatt told him, stripped out all 00:24:15.539 --> 00:24:18.400 the messy parts, the pimps, the scams, the mistresses, 00:24:18.400 --> 00:24:21.900 and turned Wyatt into a stoic teetotaling knight 00:24:21.900 --> 00:24:25.240 in shining armor. He invented conversations. 00:24:25.339 --> 00:24:28.339 He glorified the violence. People loved it. It 00:24:28.339 --> 00:24:30.700 became a massive bestseller, and that book is 00:24:30.700 --> 00:24:33.400 the reason we have the movies. My Darling Clementine, 00:24:33.440 --> 00:24:37.980 Gunfight at the OK Corral, and Tombstone. The 00:24:37.980 --> 00:24:40.039 Wyatt Earp we know is a fictional character based 00:24:40.039 --> 00:24:43.140 on a real man created by a writer two years after 00:24:43.140 --> 00:24:45.640 the real man died. And Josephine, she got her 00:24:45.640 --> 00:24:47.779 way in the end. She did. She controlled the narrative. 00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:50.660 She successfully threatened litigation to keep 00:24:50.660 --> 00:24:52.700 Maddie Blaylock out of the story for decades. 00:24:53.220 --> 00:24:56.400 She crafted the Sadie and Wyatt romance legend. 00:24:56.680 --> 00:24:58.400 Before we wrap up, we have to talk about the 00:24:58.400 --> 00:25:01.740 grave. Because even in death... Wyatt Earp couldn't 00:25:01.740 --> 00:25:04.619 escape drama. It is bizarre. He's buried in Colma, 00:25:04.660 --> 00:25:06.920 California, in a Jewish cemetery, the Hills of 00:25:06.920 --> 00:25:09.480 Eternity Memorial Park. Right. Josephine was 00:25:09.480 --> 00:25:11.539 Jewish, and she buried him in her family plot. 00:25:11.759 --> 00:25:13.819 Which is surprising to a lot of people who expect 00:25:13.819 --> 00:25:16.279 him to be in Tombstone or Dodge City. Right. 00:25:16.539 --> 00:25:19.920 But the headstone? It kept getting stolen. Stolen. 00:25:20.099 --> 00:25:22.759 Like, taken. Multiple times. People wanted... 00:25:22.940 --> 00:25:26.460 a piece of the legend. In 1957, grave robbers 00:25:26.460 --> 00:25:28.619 actually tried to dig up his ashes but failed, 00:25:28.799 --> 00:25:31.980 so they stole the 500 -pound stone instead. 500 00:25:31.980 --> 00:25:34.599 pounds? How do you even move that without a forklift? 00:25:35.240 --> 00:25:37.440 Determination, I guess. It eventually showed 00:25:37.440 --> 00:25:39.920 up at a flea market. Hugh O 'Brien, the actor 00:25:39.920 --> 00:25:42.359 who played Wyatt on the TV show, had to offer 00:25:42.359 --> 00:25:45.059 a reward to get it back. That is just... You 00:25:45.059 --> 00:25:47.339 can't make this stuff up. It perfectly encapsulates 00:25:47.339 --> 00:25:50.180 his legacy. It's never just peaceful. It's always 00:25:50.180 --> 00:25:52.519 a little chaotic, a little criminal, and very 00:25:52.519 --> 00:25:56.539 public. Exactly. Even his grave is a scene. So 00:25:56.539 --> 00:25:58.359 what does this all mean when we look at the source 00:25:58.359 --> 00:26:00.440 material, the stack of facts versus the stack 00:26:00.440 --> 00:26:03.619 of movies? Who was he? He was a man of his time. 00:26:03.740 --> 00:26:06.430 That's the most honest answer. The frontier wasn't 00:26:06.430 --> 00:26:08.950 a place for clear -cut morality. He was violent 00:26:08.950 --> 00:26:11.430 because the world was violent. He was opportunistic 00:26:11.430 --> 00:26:13.829 because you had to be to survive. He was loyal 00:26:13.829 --> 00:26:16.910 to his brothers, absolutely. But he was also 00:26:16.910 --> 00:26:19.509 a man who used the law when it suited him and 00:26:19.509 --> 00:26:21.390 ignored it when it didn't. He was a survivor. 00:26:21.609 --> 00:26:25.269 He was. And he was a reinventor. From farm boy 00:26:25.269 --> 00:26:28.650 to horse thief to pimp to lawman to vigilante 00:26:28.650 --> 00:26:31.089 to gambler to saloon owner to Hollywood consultant, 00:26:31.369 --> 00:26:34.900 he lived ten lives in one. And thanks to a biography 00:26:34.900 --> 00:26:37.279 published after he died, we only really remember 00:26:37.279 --> 00:26:39.259 one of them. Which raises the most provocative 00:26:39.259 --> 00:26:41.920 question of all. If Stuart Lake hadn't written 00:26:41.920 --> 00:26:45.420 that exaggerated book in 1931, would we even 00:26:45.420 --> 00:26:48.220 know Wyatt Earp's name today? Or would he just 00:26:48.220 --> 00:26:50.700 be a footnote, that guy who fixed a boxing match 00:26:50.700 --> 00:26:53.500 in 1896? A sobering thought to leave you with. 00:26:53.680 --> 00:26:55.759 Sometimes a legend is just better print than 00:26:55.759 --> 00:26:57.920 the truth, but the truth is a heck of a lot more 00:26:57.920 --> 00:27:00.539 interesting. That's it for this deep dive on 00:27:00.539 --> 00:27:02.200 the real Wyatt Earp. Thanks for listening.