Wyatt Earp: From Dodge City to Tombstone

Wichita was a railroad terminal where Texas cattle drives ended, and its streets filled with armed cowboys. Wyatt Earp joined the marshal's office on 21 April 1875. His time as a policeman ended in April 1876, after he beat a former marshal in a fist fight and was fined $30. The council did not rehire him, and Earp then moved west to Dodge City.

Location precision: The sources give no street address for Earp's Wichita posts; the pin marks the city.

In 1878 Earp was assistant marshal of Dodge City under Charlie Bassett. That summer about two dozen cowboys rode in and shot up the town, galloping down Front Street. Earp later credited his friend Doc Holliday with saving his life that day, and the two stayed close for good. The Long Branch Saloon, where Earp and Holliday were patrons, burned down in 1885 and was never rebuilt. Boot Hill Museum stands on the site of the original Boot Hill Cemetery.

Location precision: The Long Branch no longer exists; the pin marks Boot Hill Museum on Front Street.

Visitor guidance: Boot Hill Museum recreates the Old West town; check its site for hours.

The Earps reached the silver boomtown of Tombstone on 1 December 1879. On 26 October 1881 Virgil, Wyatt and Morgan Earp and Doc Holliday faced five Cochise County Cowboys. Despite the name, the fight was not in the corral: it took place in a narrow lot beside C. S. Fly's photography studio on Fremont Street. About thirty shots were fired in thirty seconds, and the whole gunfight lasted less than a minute.

Location precision: The fight happened in a lot on Fremont Street, six doors west of the corral's rear entrance; the pin marks the O.K. Corral site.

Boothill holds the graves of Billy Clanton, Frank McLaury and Tom McLaury, the three men killed in the gunfight. It closed in late 1886, when a new city cemetery opened, and was neglected for decades. Today it is open to the public for a fee and is a popular stop for visitors to Tombstone.

Visitor guidance: Open to the public for a small entry fee.

The gunfight did not end the feud. On 18 March 1882, Morgan Earp was playing billiards at 10 p.m. at Campbell & Hatch in Allen Street, in the heart of today's downtown. He was killed by a shot through a window that struck his spine, as Wyatt looked on. The suspects escaped arrest. Wyatt, newly a deputy U.S. marshal, decided official justice was out of reach and took matters into his own hands in a personal vendetta.

Location precision: The sources name Campbell & Hatch on Allen Street, not a surviving building; the pin marks Allen Street.

After Morgan's death Wyatt formed a posse that included Doc Holliday. It then guarded his brother Virgil and Virgil's wife Allie to Tucson, where Cowboys were thought to be waiting. The next morning Frank Stilwell's body was found alongside the railroad tracks. Wyatt's pursuit of the other suspects led back into the Arizona country around Tombstone.

Location precision: The sources place the events at Tucson's railroad but give no exact spot; the pin marks the city.

Wyatt Earp died on 13 January 1929. His widow Josephine, who was Jewish, had his body cremated and secretly buried the ashes in the Marcus family plot at Hills of Eternity, a Jewish cemetery in Colma, California. His fame grew mainly after his death, when Stuart Lake's 1931 biography Wyatt Earp: Frontier Marshal became a bestseller.