Graveside in Colorado ... "Eaten By Mountain Rats In The Year 1876" Graveside in Colorado ... "Eaten By Mountain Rats In The Year 1876"
Settlers fleeing U.S. Dakota war massacre, 1862who duh gunfighters?
Man, I gotta tellya - “eaten by mountain rats” is NOT what I’d want on my gravestone.
The second part I only hear from idiotic libtards who use it as a strawman (and on rare occasion in jest by others).
My Great Grandfather was asked once if he knew Calamity Jane.
“I never slept with her, if that is what you mean.” At that time C.G. Meaker was a grocer, and Wild Bill would stop by his old friend “Charlie” to get provisions for his Wild West Show.
CG didn’t like cats. He would shoot them off his back fence with an old .45 Colt pistol.
I never heard that phrase and I watched all the old western TV shows and films when growing up in the 50’s and 60’s. Women were treated with respect in those old shows. It was made clear that life was hard and everybody worked together on the frontier, both men and women, because they had to in order to survive.
Code of the West
by James P. Owen
1.Live each day with courage
2.Take pride in your work
3.Always finish what you start
4.Do what has to be done
5.Be tough, but fair
6.When you make a promise, keep it
7.Ride for the brand
8.Talk less and say more
9.Remember that some things aren’t for sale
10.Know where to draw the line
One thing the online digital age has brought is the frequency and the easy for one man to call another a lair. It wasn’t so then and a man chose his words more carefully as he may be call to back them up.
Oh, I’d guess there was plenty of killin’ back in the day. A book I read long ago detailed much of the kind of killing that went on. Contrary to film westerns, much of the killing was with knives and clubs and such. Lead and powder were scarce and expensive. But, make no doubt, there was killing. Imagine a world that truly was free - no fences or land ownership to a large degree. On top of that, the frontier was a magnet to the bold, the hopeful and the outcasts - many of whom were on the run and only lived to ply their trade in a land of little consequence. Come to think of it, it sounds a little like modern America and foreign born criminals coming to do crime Americans are too lazy to do and for which they will not be penalized.
and nowadays, men are men and women are men too
O’Keefe claimed he buried all that was left of Erin (her skull) under a pile of rocks with a marker and this inscription, “Erin O’Keefe, daughter of John and Nora O’Keefe, who was eaten by mountain rats in the year 1876.” The grave became a popular tourist attraction, and O’Keefe charged 50 cents for tourists to have their picture taken at the site. O’Keefe was eventually revealed as a fraud. He didn’t have a wife or daughter, and probably buried his dead burro under the rocks.
http://www.newfalconherald.com/DisplayArticle.php?ArticleID=7248
.
In Europe, [Annie Oakley] performed for Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, King Umberto I of Italy, Marie François Sadi Carnot (the President of France) and other crowned heads of state. Oakley had such good aim that, at his request, she knocked the ashes off a cigarette held by the newly crowned German Kaiser Wilhelm II.
The Annie Oakley Foundation suggests that she was not the source of a widely repeated quip related to the event: “Some uncharitable people later ventured that if Annie had shot Wilhelm and not his cigarette, she could have prevented World War I.” After the outbreak of World War I, however, Oakley did send a letter to the Kaiser, requesting a second shot. The Kaiser did not respond.
I once lived in Dodge City. There were plenty of old photos of cattle drives which ended in Dodge and of cowboys on the range and also in town.
Now I recently saw the beginning of a movie by some Black guy where it had writing on the screen at the beginning, saying that over one third of all cowboys were Black. Well I know there were some Black cowboys but in all those pictures I never saw the first one. Certainly not over a third of them.
That “over a third” figure is clearly a modern PC made up claim and most people will believe it.
Calamity Jane comes to mind.....women in the west knew their place all right....it was hunting and shooting and fishing and farming and doing what it took to keep family going....
Including this article, once.
Uh...never?
In fact the stories out of my family made it plain that no one messed with granny. She might have looked sweet but you threaten her family and you might as well just dig a hole pull it in after you.
Just OUCH!