On July 19, 1879 in Las Vegas, New Mexico a drunk Mike Gordon—either because of a problem with a girl or bad luck at the gaming tables—started...
Doc Holliday’s First Killing?
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Mark Boardman
The Deadly Dade Massacre
The Dade Massacre is almost forgotten in the annals of the U.S.-Indian wars—but it was one of the deadliest in army history. On December 28, 1835—at...
The Tombstone Doctor
Dr. George Goodfellow is best known as the physician who treated Morgan and Virgil Earp after the OK Corral gunfight. He was a close friend of the...
An Arizona Outlaw
Fleming “James” Parker was a career criminal, primarily a rustler, but in 1897, he took a step up to train robbery near Peach Springs, Arizona. It...
The Bald Knobbers
The Bald Knobbers were a pro-Union vigilante group that emerged in the southwest region of Missouri in the 1880s. The area had been virtually...
The Steadfast Seminole
The Indian Removal Act of 1830 led to the forced relocation of thousands of Indians from their native areas to reservations, primarily in what’s now...
The Archer Gang
There were an estimated 16 members of Indiana’s Archer Gang—almost all blood kin. And they made their mark in the 1880s in the southwest part of...
Lawrence Murphy and the Lincoln County War
Lawrence Murphy’s name is synonymous with New Mexico’s Lincoln County War. He began his business there in 1869, monopolizing mercantile goods and...
“Big Ed” Burns
“Big Ed” Burns was a con man of the first order, roaming the Midwest and West from the 1860s until around 1920. In 1877, he was head of a bunco gang...
A ‘Gem’ of a Saloon
Al Swearengen—yes, the real one, on whom the TV character was based—built the Gem Saloon in Deadwood in 1877. It was the most prominent...
The Last Man Standing
At the end of the day—or at least when the shooting stopped—Ed Tewksbury was the man who survived Arizona Territory’s infamous Pleasant Valley War. ...
Outlaw Jeff Ake
Jeff Ake was a Texas hard-case. Jeff first ran into trouble in Georgetown in 1868 for disturbing the peace, and later assault and cattle theft. In...