November 14, 1937 Tombstone -"The Town Too Tough to Die" (N. H. Rose photo.) (N. H. Rose photo.) Big Ed Schielfelin. the prospector Graves in Boothill cemetery oi the (N. H. Rose photo.) (N. H. Rose photo.) (N. H. Rose photo.) who discovered rich silver deposits Nellie Cashman. boarding house John Holliday. a dentist who gave five first men to be hcrnged legally Wyatt Earp, once Tombston.'s No. William M. (Billy) Breakenridge. Jolut H. Behan. who got the lob of in Arizona and who is given credit keeper and ••cam p angel" of up the business of filling teeth with in the town of Tomb.tone. That was 1 manipulator of the hand gun, a. a fearless law and order man who .hem of Cochi.e county. a $4D.DDD.a- ••hell roarin'" Tombstone. for founding the to~ of Tombstone. gold for that of filling men with lead. S3years ago. a. the marker reveal •. he appeared eleven year. ago. became deputy sherif. year plum that Wyatt Earp want.d. Where Gunmen Played a Story of the Earps and Game with Death Their Enemies Sixty years ago men, carrying Where men live dangerously All Tombstone knew that a have it," cried Wyatt. "Throw little more than unvarnished for high stakes, as they did in showdown was due. up your hands! " ordered Virgil. courage and well oiled guns, Tombstone, courage and the gun On the night of Oct. 25, 1881, "Don't shoot, I don't want to were beating their way through frequently rule. Men held life Ike Clanton and Tom McLowery fight," pleaded Billy Clanton. the western bad lands towa,.rda cheaply and sometimes killed on drove into Tombstone in a light Firing began at once. Ike clump of desolate hills in south· slight provocation. wagon. Doc Holliday, enraged Clanton and Tom McLowery eastern Arizona, just a shake Dick Lloyd, a cowboy on a over the outlaws' insinuations bellowed they had no guns-a north of the Mexican border. drunken spree, yelling "Whoo- that he knew something about condition their foemen did not The lure was silver. pee," rode his horse into O'Neil's the Benson stage murders, cqr- know. The Earps and Doc Hol- saloon near town, right into the By FRANK CIPRIANI nered Clanton, daring him to liday coolly and murderously midst of a hot poker game. The fight. "You've been threatening kept on dealing hot lead. Ike Tombstone, Ariz. players, annoyed over the Inter- to kill me," he shouted. "We're Clanton fled. Tom McLowery ACKin 1877 big Ed Schief· ruption, shot him off his horse, man to man now-get out your retreated. Billy Clanton, only a felin never dreamed of sent for the coroner, and reo gun and fight." boy, but a brave one, and Frank B f 0 u n din g "The Town sumed their poker game. It happened that Clanton car- McLowery would not yield. That's Too Tough to Die." He ried no arms at the moment. was too busy prospecting for • • • Modem Tombstone. the" town that's too tough to die," Today it has fewer than 1,000inhabitants: once i(had The Earp boys appeared at this • • • rich ores, and' dodging the bad Stuttering Jerry Barton, a go- n.arly IS.DDD. (AsllOc:iated Preas photo.) juncture, quieted Holliday, and :Silly fired at Wyatt as Wyatt men and worse Indians who in- rflla-strong saloonkeeper and sent Clanton away. But later shot Frank McLowery and Mol" fested the southwest. This was constable of nearby Charleston, law and order man. Behind him him. Earp shoved O'Rourke into marshal, and Morgan, town po- Clanton warned Wyatt Earp gan Earp blazed away at Billy. indeed risky business, and more killed men with his fists and not long afterward came his the bowling alley in Allen street, liceman, and the Clantons and that" no man can abuse me like Doc Holliday, in a split second than once he was warned that he sometimes used the gun, but he brothers, Virgil, Morgan, James, stationed Doc Holliday and Vir- McLowerys, who were not. Doc Holliday did and get away survey of the action, lifted Tom probably would find his tomb- never "c-e-o-countedM·M-M·Mex- and Warren Earp, and also one gil Earp, who was town mar- Wyatt regarded Ike Clanton as with it. I'll kill him, and I'll McLowery, unarmed off the stone-meaning he'd be killed- icans " in the notches on his gun- John Holliday. Holliday was a shal, on guard, and then waited a " sort of chief among the out- settle with all you fellows to- ground with a' double blast from instead of finding gold or silyer. handle. William (Kid) Clay- dentist who had given up the . in the street for the mob. laws" and all the Clantons and morrow." his shotgun as McLowery But Schieffelin stubbornly .bourn, a tough cowboy, killed business of filling teeth with All Wyatt Earp had was a McLowerys as cattle thieves. Wyatt Earp considered Ike reached for one of Frank Mc. went ahead. He found silver. casually here and there, but fell gold for that of filling men with double barreled shotgun in the It was natural that bad blood Clanton's explosive 0 r a tor y Lowery's extra guns. Billy Clan- And he founded Tombstone. under the gun of the quicker lead. No deadlier shot, no more crotch of his arm. should develop between such merely drunken chatter, but ton, on the ground from Mol" A mining camp town mush- shooting Buckskin Frank Leslie, merciless killer ever stomped The mob-nearly 500 fanatical contrasting men, but the definite changed his mind the next day gan Earp's bullets, continued roomed over night on his silver a good rider, a good shooter, a the plains and mesas of the west men-rushed up; Earp stopped origins were plural rather than when friends sent him fearful the uneven battle. He drilled discovery, and to him came the good scout, and a good bar- than this slender, blond, and them with a sharp gesture. "We singular. Among them the fact warnings that "Ike Clanton's Virgil Earp through the leg and honor of selecting the town's ten del'. Johnny- Behind· the- gray eyed fighting man from want Johnny-Behind-the-Deuce," that Billy Clanton stole Wyatt on the warpath." The same news Morgan Earp through the shoul- name. He chose Tombstone, this Deuce, so named because he al- Georgia. H 0 II ida y became they snarled. "You can't have Earp's favorite horse; the fact. was carried to Wyatt's brothers, del' just as Virgil finished him macabre name having lingered ways played the deuce on the Wyatt Earp's right hand gun- him; he's my prisoner," thun- that the Clantons and Mel.ow- Virgil and Morgan, and to Doc with a shot in the breast. Doc in his mind from frequent warn- faro layout, shot and killed man. dered Earp. The lynching lead- erys supported Johnny Behan Holliday. Of ominous import Holliday and Morgan Earp ings. Tombstone the town be- Henry Schneider, a mining en- .Wyatt Earp came to Tomb- ers threatened Earp. Then some instead of Wyatt Earp for sherif. also was the information that reo turned their guns on Frank Me- came, and Tombstone's the town gineer, because Schneider would stone at a time when outlaws one shouted, "Go ahead, he's Two events of similar design enforcements in the persons of Lowery a split second after Me- that boasts today that it's too not say hello to him. were robbing the stages on the only bluffing." At this Earp hastened a showdown. In March, Billy Clanton and Frank Me- Lowery creased Holliday's thigh. tough to die. Tolerant of private shooting Benson and Bisbee roads. He raised his shotgun and swept the 1881, between Tombstone and Lowery had come into town. All It was all over in 30 seconds. You'll find it in southeastern scrapes and even feuds, Tomb- promptly offered his services as front ranks. "Come on, then," Benson, three road agents held were armed, Wyatt was told, The casualties: Billy Clanton Arizona, in a lazy setting of pur- stone's citizens whitened with a messenger to the Wells-Fargo he challenged grimly. " Let's see up the Benson stage and killed and all were raging to settle the and Tom and Frank McLowery ple hills, cactus, and mesquite, fury at burglary, street and express. For seven months he you get him. You can kill me, Bud Philpot, the driver, and long standing feud. dead; Virgil and Morgan Earp quite as drab as its surround- all right, but I'll blow the bellies Peter Roerig, a passenger. The stage coach robberies, and mur- rode the Tombstone-Benson Sherif Behan heard the rum- and Doc Holliday wounded. ings. Just 60 years old, it is not out of you in front, and take a Earps and Doc Holliday pursued del' for profit. Punishment was stages, a loaded shotgun on his blings. He rushed over to the The Earps won the battle, but old as conventional towns go, few of you to hell with me." the gunmen, who escaped, only Clantons and McLowerys to dis- at the price of their exile. They but very old, almost patriarchal, This was no bluff. The mob to die of bullets later anyway. arm them. He found them near were acquitted at a preliminary The trio were Jim Crane, Bill as mining camps go. broke. The life of Johnny- the O.