Talk:Wyatt Earp/Archive 1

Wrong Steve McCabe
The link near the bottom concerning the poem on Wyatt Earp time-travelling links to a Steven McCabe who is not the one who wrote that poem (unless he wrote it when he was eight years old!) I'm not really sure what to do in such a situation, however, so if someone wants to make it right, perhaps this tiny biography might help:

Sorry it's all I could find.

- Sajt 01:23, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Poorly written
This article is poorly written. I suggest it be re-written. It seems to call Wyatt Earp's version of his own life exagerrated, as lies, and as downright not the story of his life. Granted, he may have exagerrated on some points in his life and even lied about them. But I do not think they are very big. If they were so full of errors as portrayed in the wikipedia's version of his life, then why don't you eliminate his name as the main person of the document and put Billy Clanton's, Tom McLaury's, Virgil's, Morgan's, or any other person's name like Sheriff Behan's as the main person of the document. Simplify everything by stating that Wyatt was not the great lawman that is generally thought by everyone. Instead, you present a twisted, convoluted story, with Wyatt Earp not the central figure in many instances. You even go on to say that he was not a marshal or even a deputy marshal in many cases, but a volunteer, or an ordinary citizen. The gist of your whole story seems to fit the volunteer, or ordinary citizen role the best, thereby cutting him down to nothing. So are you saying that Wyatt Earp was not a great lawman who deserves a place in history? Just give a yes or no answer. Your complicated tale is enough to drive the whole Harvard Law School crazy.
 * Well, maybe your definition of "poorly written" is that it's not the "lotion job" of Stuart Lake, nor the "hatchet job" of Bartholemew and Marks. I happen to think Earp was a very skilled lawman, mostly because of the people he avoided killing, in situations where it was nearly always him and couple of other guys (if lucky) against a bunch of drunken armed men, night after night in places like Dodge City. The many acolades sent on his behalf from his former jobs and bosses and fellow citizens all attest that this was the judgement of those he knew, at the time (ie, contemporary 1881) But Earp didn't always have the formal rank he later claimed (or his early biographers claimed for him), and part of this is because of the way law enforcement was "brevetted" out in the Old West so people got various pay grades. Even now, many counties only have one formal sherrif. But the undersherrif and the deputies still get full enforcement powers. It was the same long ago. Wyatt acted in the City Marshal's capacity, even if he never technically was one. So what? As for your other complaint, you're going to have to be specific. If there's a long section of Earps bio here where he's not the central character, or it doesn't bear on what he's about to do that is important, it certainly should be re-written. But I know of no biography that doesn't have to explain some background to explain why its subject does what he or she does. S  B Harris 04:39, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Some Fixing
I'm made a start by fixing some of the grammar and paragraphing. I'm not responsible for what's left, since I didn't do the original! However, a lot of good and and careful history has been put down as a start, so some big hualing has been done.

I agree this thing needs some rewrite, especially since it seems to be done under the cloud of the Marks and Bartholemew, with a lot of later (and pretty good research) ignored. But we'll get this a bite at a time, until we get something middle of the road.

Feel free to vent your historical disagreements here, if things keep getting changed back from how you had them. Wyatt said he got to Tombstone Dec 1, 1879, not 78. I'm taking his word for it. There was hardly anything in Tombstone in Dec 78 but some tents.

Sbharris 05:02, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Redirect
I was redirected to this page when I went looking for the open source ERP software project known as Wyatt ERP. User:AlMac|(talk) 22:53, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Okay, fixed the re-direct. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is an inclusive topic in community/business management, and there is a software package for it called Wyatt ERP. Pun intended, but spelling of course different. And yes, I suppose that infamous Spectre of the Gun epsode of Star Trek where Captain Kirk and crew are going to be executed in the O.K. Corral, must be a prime example of poor Enterprise resource planning. Sbharris 23:17, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Gunfight at OK Corral
Am I the only one who thinks that it is strange that there is more detail here about the OK Corral than at the OK Corral entry?

Someone should take the OK Corral stuff here, make it more comprehensible and add it onto the OK Corral entry and leave just a summary of on this entry.


 * Well, I'm sort of torn on this... For many, the OK Corral gunfight is the first thing many think of when they think of Wyatt Earp. Its logical then that it should be a prominent part of his article.  I could easily support beefing up the gunfight at the ok corral article with the information in this article, and could be talked into paring it down in this article and giving a link at the top of that section that referenced the main Gunfight at the OK Corral. --Syrthiss 13:43, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

The reason there's more O.K. Gunfight info here temporarily, is that I happened to start work on Wyatt first. The O.K. gunfight site will eventually be expanded by quite a lot, since there are many controversial points which need to be addressed individually and of course impartially. When this happens, the unbalance will disappear. Some of the material in the Wyatt site will eventually move to the O.K. article, and I think the best way to do that is to keep the Wyatt-centered O.K. gunfight material in his bio, sketching the rest more broadly. I haven't carefully partitioned it, yet, but will. Thanks! Sbharris 22:09, 3 January 2006 (UTC) Okay, I've taken the suggestion to put nearly all the O.K. Corral material into the article on that single subject. This will save space on a lot of bios of the participants, which can at the appropriate place in the bio, can now be simply redirected to the O.K. Corral after a few pointers on the subject's main role. The main thrust on doing this for the Wyatt Earp article has been length. The bio on Wyatt is going to be long enough, as is-- with O.K. Corral material we were up over 111 K, where the upper limit on suggested length for Wiki articles is 100 K or so. Sbharris 22:09, 24 January 2006 (UTC) 21 April 2008: I realize that the section is made long by the OK Corral and its aftermath--most of it my additions, too, and copiously annotated from original sources, but I don't see how any treatment of Wyatt Earp can neglect this material. I have also updated the "Gunfight at the OK Corral" section with this material, and harmonized both treatments. I will try to annotate the other sections still requiring it from the sources I have on hand. Josie Marcus, Wyatt's mistress at the time, is remarkably frank in her account--even to the point of noting that Wyatt and Virgil said whatever they had to at the hearing to protect themselves. Even though she does make some mistakes, her testimony accords well with the rest of the record. Where she is not frank or where she prevaricates, Glenn G. Boyer is at pains to point out her cover(especially her attempts to skirt the fact that she openly lived first with Sheriff Johnny Behan and then in the house her parents bought for her and Behan, with Wyatt Earp [!!] in his notes.Doktorschley —Preceding unsigned comment added by Doktorschley (talk • contribs) 17:52, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

The picture in this section is from the picture that is in the section called Life after Tombstone. You might want to take a look at it and see. They look very much alike.
 * They are exactly alike except for the airbrushing I did to remove other people's hands and so on on, when I took the single photo from the group photo! Click on the photo source to see-- this is all above-board.
 * The reason I've used the photo twice (once in a blown up section) is that bears looking at in context twice. The group photo is good for a look at Wyatt's crowd and what he was doing in 1883. It's a classic. But the close look at Earp in this photo shows the man only 19 mo after the O.K. Corral, in the same short (probably blue) peacoat and roundtop hat that the Earps were described at the fight to be wearing. How many "best suits" did this man (who had just lost most of what he owned in a flight out of the Arizona Territory) own? I'm guessing we're probably seeing him here exactly as he appeared at the O.K. Corral. And if not, very close. It's certainly the best image we have for the probable look of the Wyatt Earp of Tombstone, Oct. 81.Sbharris 19:49, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

References to Wyatt Earp in Movies and television
Under the headline Movies and television there is a link to the movie Vacation (1983) starring Chevy Chase. Is there any reference in it to Wyatt Earp? --Bensin 04:14, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Answer: Not that I know of (but I admit I didn't watch the movie again to make sure). Certainly nobody is credited with playing Wyatt in the movie cast. So I'm going to delete the Wiki reference as being a joke. No, not the same kind of Joke as Marie Osmond as Sadie Earp in TV docu-drama I Married Wyatt Earp; A less subtle joke. Whoever added the original reference to National Lampoon's Vacation is welcome to re-add and defend it. Sbharris 03:17, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

The reference in NL's Vacation is to Dodge City--the marshal is just that, a marshal (wearing tennis shoes)--not to Wyatt. Earp was the most famous, but not the only famous marshal. However the marshal in Vacation was dressed like Hugh OBrien's take on Earp.--Buckboard 18:46, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

The Dodge City marshall in Vacation was referred to as Wyatt Earp by Anthony Michael Hall. In the scene he said, "That guy makes a crummy Wyatt Earp. He's wearing tennis shoes."

I recall that one episode of the 1960s Star Trek series recreated the Gunfight at the OK Corral and some events leading up to it, with Kirk, Spock and McCoy in the middle of it all (of course). Does anyone know the name of the episode for inclusion here? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.147.142.222 (talk) 06:53, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Found it: [] ... but I see someone's already added it, thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.147.142.222 (talk) 07:41, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Genealogy and Film
There are at least a dozen films alone featuring Wyatt Earp, with as many actors, so I've re-set the second paragraph reference, which was to a couple of (random) movies, to (instead) simply refer to the extensive list of films at the end of the article. The opening paragraphs of a main article on a historical figure, are not the place to mention a TV film called "Four Eyes and Six Guns."

The original article has some enthusiastic genealogy which I'm grateful for, but really, nobody cares who Nick Earp sold the farm to, much less when the BUYERS lived and died. I'm going to delete a few such bits.

Sbharris 00:44, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

The television show "The Rousters" http://imdb.com/title/tt0086211/ also used the Wyatt Earp name. The main character was Wyatt Earp III and was forever trying to convince people he was related to the famous Wyatt Earp.

cowboy, Cowboy, CowBoy, cow-boy, Cow-boy, Cow-Boy
The article uses 4 different spellings for "cowboy". In some cases, it seems like it's a random mix of spellings.

How about using "cowboy" when it's meant in a general way as someone who works with cattle, and "Cowboy" when it's a reference to the gangs of cattle rustlers that Earp had ongoing conflicts with? Or if it'd be less confusing, perhaps using "cowboy" in all cases? Mainly, I'd just like to see more consistency. --Flash 01:11, 20 June 2006 (UTC)


 * So would I! But the people of the time didn't even know what to do about it, and you find all kinds of spellings for the southeast A.T. rustler group, in the period papers. Let me look to see if I can find a term that's used most commonly, and we'll try to stick to that. 02:17, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Length of Article
I was wondering if something could be done to cut down on the length of this article. It is way too long.--Lastexit 14:42, 9 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Yep. The vendetta ride stuff is about to be "main articled" to there. Hold on. S  B Harris 15:46, 9 July 2006 (UTC)


 * There's a separate article on that? Seems important to Wyatt here, but I suppose one must cut from somewhere. Wyatt is a crucial and massively important figure in American history and folklore. Problem is the writing I think as much as the length.--Lastexit 00:48, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Stuart N. Lake
Have a stub at Stuart N. Lake ready to take any Lake-specific info. Cheers. knoodelhed 20:52, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Italics
Why is Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp italicized in the Siblings section? Clarityfiend 01:13, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Year of birth
Just about every other source seems to say 1848, not 1849. --Anshelm &#39;77 21:50, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Place of Birth
The article says Monmouth, Iowa (where I've heard before, Pella in particular as also being the birthplace of some siblings) and again says Trenton, NJ. Is there anyone with references who can back either up? JesseRafe 05:48, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Genealogy
Adelia Douglas EARP, was born on 16 Jun 1861 in Pella, Marion County, Iowa. She died on 16 Jan 1941 in San Bernardino County, California. Adelia Douglas EARP and William Thomas EDWARDS were married in 1877 in Rice County, Kansas. William Thomas EDWARDS, died on 30 May 1919 in San Bernardino County, California. Adelia Douglas EARP and William Thomas EDWARDS had the following children:

Nicholas EDWARDS

Estelle Josphine EDWARDS

Mary Virginia EDWARDS2 was born about 1880. She died in 1935 in San Bernardino County, California.


 * Interesting to know, but applies to Wyatt's sister (ie, gives info about his nephew and two neices), and probably is not germane enough to include in the article. S  B Harris 20:38, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Wyatt Earp's family
Since the "Siblings" sec & the "Geneology" sec kept getting deleted, I created a Wyatt Earp's family article. I added a main page jump to the "Early years" sec of this article. --Evb-wiki 18:59, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Fitzsimmons Sharkey
Accounts of fight normally describe the blow thrown by Fitzsimmons as a blow 'to the mark', or what was later called a solar plexus punch.While Earp called it a low blow, most accounts disagree. Corbett, who was near ringside and who had agreed to fight the winner, then faced Fitzsimmons for the Heavyweight Championship. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.17.29.36 (talk) 16:57, 26 October 2007 (UTC)