In 1864, an irascible 51-year-old Nicholas Earp proclaimed himself a wagonmaster and offered to lead a group of Iowa emigrants to California. Sarah...
Sins of the Father
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Features & Gunfights
Nebraska’s Outlaw Trail
Early law and order came not from lawmen, but citizens, in what is now Nebraska. When the wagon trains left Independence and St. Joseph, Missouri,...
The Spark that Launched the Vendetta Ride
March 18, 1882 A one-night showing of the play Stolen Kisses is being staged at the Turnverein Hall, north of Schieffelin Hall. It has been...
Nevada’s Silver Roots
What do San Francisco real estate, George Hearst, Mark Twain, the Civil War and the Nobel Peace Prize have in common? The answer: Nevada’s famous...
Mormon War’s Grand Views
With a blast of the steam whistle, a small steamboat cast off from California’s Fort Yuma during the early days of 1858 to explore the Colorado...
Custer’s Gold
“GOLD!” proclaimed Dakota Territory’s Bismarck Tribune, August 12, 1874. Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer’s Black Hills expedition had discovered...
The Brutal Truth About Most Billy the Kid Wannabes
We get a “new” Billy the Kid photo sent to us almost every week. The photo of the cocky-looking gent on the opposite page is a good example. Some...
Oatman Genesis
Did John Moss, friend of Mohave leader Irataba, name the Oatman mine and, hence, the town after Olive Oatman? Or was the town originally called...
Heart Gone Wild
In 1857, Olive Oatman’s ghostwriter said this about her life story: “Much of that dreadful period is unwritten, and will remain forever unwritten.”...
A Plague of Flea Market Billys
The conversation all started with a letter from my hometown, Buffalo, New York. Rob McElroy had sent a note to the Yahoo group “Photo History” about...
The Oatman Massacre
Roys Oatman and his family have just finished hauling their belongings up a rocky grade to a bluff on the south side of the Gila River. At the end...
Stories of the Oregon Trail
When the travelers loaded their wooden wheeled wagons and hitched oxen or mules to begin a nearly 2,000-mile journey from the Missouri River to...