Jay David Murphy
Just off the highway sits Boot Hill Cemetary.
The morning air in the southern Arizona desert in October is clean, clear, and crisp, it smells sweet from the dew that has touch the creosote bush which gives the Sonora desert that intense delicious odor when it rains.
Waking with the door open and just a screen covering the apartment door next to the original OK Corral, the sounds of the the stage coach and wagon drawn by teams of horse that come clanking up the still deserted Allen Street of Tombstone. They stop in front of Big Nose Kate's and Hatches Saloon, which are across the street from the, original unchanged, since the beginning, Crystal Palace.
Right out side the door of the apartment and across the grass sits the gun shop and 20 steps more your on the Allen Street, where the Earp's started their walk and then turned down Fourth Street, turned the corner west just out side McFlys Photo shop and straight on to the OK Corral and the Clanton's and a gun fight that the shots can still be heard today in the ‘town to tough to die,’ Tombstone, Arizona.
Today, Tombstone Arizona is still alive and kicking with about 1,800 residents and one big party, called Helldorado Days which is coming again on the weekend of October 16th through 18th. If you don’t have your rooms in one of the few hotel there or 25 minuets up the road in Sierra Vista, you’ll probably have to stay almost an hour away in Tucson, even Bisbee 45 south of Tombstone will be booked.
Helldorado Days is a western fans nirvana, and just a big hootn’ hollerin’ good time. Everyone dresses to the nine’s is their best western attire.
Allen Street was recovered with dirt years ago to maintain its authentic charm. Tombstone is a tourist town 7 days a week and everyday of the year. Earp and Clanton historians can be found in every bar and arena in town. Heated daily discussion can be in the Saloons that populate Allen Street.
They do not have gun fights on the Main Street anymore. Up until about a decade ago they did because the original town decree from the late 1800’s was still in place, no guns in the city limits. But one day over decade ago, then Arizoina Senator Dennis Deconcini came to town to have fun wearing his six shooter pistol and was told by the town Marshal he had to take them off. This upset the Senator so much, he made the City of Tombstone retract the over century old law that the Earp brothers had enforced and abide by the State of Arizona law that still to this day allows you to wear a holstered side arm in plain sight.
There is one thing to remember though, real guns and replicas are not allowed into the saloons and must be checked in at the smoke shop before you go saloon hopping, which is the number one pass time in Tombstone.
To insure visitor and local safety all gunfights are held in small arenas on a couple of the side streets.
Everyday the wagons and stage coaches still roam the streets loaded with tourists (some locals call them tourans) on tour guided rides with a colorful driver with headset microphones, who tell the tales of the old west and Tombstone history.
If you sit in Big Nose Kate's (named for Doc Holidays prostitute girl friend) invariably one of the locals will tell you about the access to the mines down a stair well in the bar, and how its haunted down there, but there’s still silver to be found.
Next door is Hatches Saloon where Wyatt Earp's brother was shot and killed. It has a really good green chili burger and there is still a pool table there today.
Across Allen Street is the Crystal Palace which is unchanged since it was built in the late 1800’s. It is real, it is authentic, it is a fully operational bar still today, with bands from all over who play there on the weekends.
Up the street to the east sits the Bird Cage Theater, which is a museum now and is haunted. Several TV shows the past few years have gone there to investigate the stories of the haunting and have come away believers.
The origin of Tombstone’s Helldorado Days comes from the Tombstone Nugget newspaper, which quoted a disgruntled minor as saying that instead of finding their El Dorado of riches they ended up scratching out a living doing what ever they could from shoveling manure to washing dishes, they instead had found their Helldorado. The first Helldorado Days was held in 1929 and in the early 30’s Wyatt Earp himself returned for a visit and the celebration according to some accounts.
Every Memorial Day the Lions Club puts on Wyatt Earp Days with proceeds going to benefit youth activities. The Tombstone Vigilantes and the Tombstone Renegade Lions Club do special gunfight reenactments for delighted tourists and locals.
Tombstone was founded by or at least he was given credit for giving Tombstone its start and name by Ed Schieffelin. He named his first mine Tombstone because people had told him that he would only find his tombstone in the land of the Apache.
The San Pedro River which follows north on the south side of Tombstone is one of only two rivers that flow north in America. For the most part it travels underground, but during the monsoon season in August and September it can become a raging river and floods communities near its banks.
Aside from a tourist town, modern day Tombstone lies in a very heavy traffic area for Illegal immigrants coming over the Mexico border. Border patrol has a strong presence around Tombstone and the Freeman vigilante movement began there several years ago as an activist group opposed to illegal immigration and actively set out to do something directly about it. It was this movement that brought focus to this issue and has been a political hot button since.
The illegal drug trade also has a strong presence in the area, and the border patrol is always doing double duty. It is a regular occurrence to see the latest pot bust of 40 to a 100 pounds in the local paper.
If you think Tombstone is a historical marker of days gone by, it is still today making news.
Recently, Billy Clanton passed, a family decedent who carried the famous Billy Clanton name who was in the famous gun fight at the OK Corral.
The locals know the whole story, and even to this day it is still a hot topic of discussion, and there are definitely differences of opinion on how the gun fight started, who was at fault, and who really was the good guys and bad guys.
The tourist keep coming and it is estimated that a half a million people come every year to enjoy themselves in the history, take a taste of the old west, and enjoy a draft beer in one of the many Saloons. If it is a souvenir your looking for, there are no shortages in Tombstone. Allen Street, aside from Saloons, is packed with Souvenir shops.
The Tombstone Epitaph newspaper, which covered the famous fight still lives on, but not as a regular paper, but a monthly paper which reprints the great stories of the past. It is an unusual paper in that there is no current news, just news from days gone by.
Speaking with a notable historian the other day from Tombstone Digital Journal found out recently there has been fist fights in the streets over handbills being passed out in front of the wrong business. If you think Tomstonians have lost their pluck, you would be wrong. Tourist dollars are now the life blood on the small town and competition is tough for those dollars, just as it was for the silver mines that the town sits on.
Over a century every inch of the town was covered with little mines, and today if you by a piece of property there you signed a waiver which warns that your property could fall in an abandoned mine. There are mines that gone down over a 1,000 feet that where dug by hand from mostly Chinese labor. Water was pumped out by huge pumps that were imported from Europe.
Tombstone has world wide appeal. Peter Brand from Australia has become a notable writer about the history surrounding Tombstone, receiving accolades in western magazines and self publishing a wonderful book called “The Life and Crimes of Peter Mallon,” which is available through the web site called Tombstone Vendetta. Also, there is for the first time ever available, from researcher and writer, Chuck Smith, two volumes of the 1880 Tombstone Census and the 1882 Tombstone Census which had been over looked by historians until Smith made the discovery and published these famous years censuses.
Weird headlines in the Tombstone News, owned by Mayor Dusty, are always popping up like, “Kirby Salesman asked to leave town,” or “Car fire starts fist fight,” then there’s “Bird Cage Theater is Haunted: Evidence Captured by Ghost Adventure’s Investigation,” and of course, “Passing out handbills causes fist fight on Allen Street.”
Of course any thing noted about Tombstone would not be complete without mentioning the graveyard “Boot Hill” which sits on the highway just before you enter the town of Tombstone. It is free and open for tourist to go take a photo by one of the many interesting tombstones.
Tombstone has always been tied to Bisbee the copper mining town that is now an antique store mecca, with fantastic early 1900’s architecture. During the late 1980’s and early 1990’s Bisbee had a huge influx of people from California's Gay community and has remained vibrant since.
Of course, just south of Bisbee is the border town of Douglas, Arizona, which is a gateway into Mexico and is part of the tourists stop when visiting this part of the southwest.
To the east of Tombstone is the Chiricahua Mountains which is both beautiful and has a diverse and unique environment. If you take I10, you will pass through Texas Canyon and a great stop for a picnic and photo opportunity in the massive rocky terrain. The Chiricahua Mountains and the Texas Canyon area were home to the Chiricahua Apache, which along with other Apache tribes battled the encroachment into their territory for over 30 years.
In Americas march westward the Indian tribes were defeated usually in four years time according to historical records. But not the Apache they struggled for over 30 years, and had keep Mexico and the Spanish at bay for over a 100 years.
By no means has Tombstone been pacified in this modern area, and you could say that the Old West is still alive and well, in “the town to tough to die,” home of the most famous gunfight ever in the old west and time portal to the history of the southwest United States.
