Talks

Forget the OK Corral. Here are six of the strangest gunfights ever just the way they really happened without any help from Hollywood. Billy the Kid squared off against John Jeffords, younger brother of Tom, while Buckskin Frank took on Johnny Ringo. Best of all tales, was one of a gunfight involving a love triangle, or maybe octahedron, and an unlikely honeymoon. 

Told as Bill Sublette. Sublette was a mountain man who has almost as many things named in his honor as Kit Carson. His brothers, too, were mountain men. Unlike Kit, Bill was educated and a businessman who was among those who bought out General Ashley’s Rocky Mountain Fur Company challenging the Astorians, the Hudson Bay Co., and the Blackfoot for dominance of the beaver trade. It wasn’t just men’s hats at stake. This is a personification. Tools & clothing of the beaver trade are displayed. 

In 1858, the Butterfield Overland Mail carried the first transcontinental post from St. Louis (& Memphis) to San Francisco in under 25 days. Through most of this period, the Chiricahua Apache offered little resistance. Raiding increased dramatically in 1861 as a nation began to rend itself apart and the people of the region were faced with confusion and difficult choices and the mail often went through despite raids by Confederates, Mexicans and Apaches. 

Topographic Engineers were vital to the opening of the West. Here their story is told from the experience of Captain William Emory talking about his part in mapping and opening the Southwest. Lieutenant William H. Emory, topographical engineer, rode with General Kearny in the 1846/47 conquest of New Mexico, Arizona, and California. Bold Emory, as he was known at West Point, fought beside the general at the Battle of San Pascual. Throughout his trek from Missouri to California, he recorded the terrain, its people, ruins, flora and fauna, minerals, agricultural resources and trails. His map opened the Southern Emigrant Road to travel, and his published work introduced the Southwest to the American people and established the need for the Gadsden Purchase. He told the nation what was in the Southwest, why they should come and how to get there. After the war, he returned to survey our southern boundary. He was among the first to command a cavalry regiment. 

In 1896, top billing among Cochise County Cowboys went to the High Five Gang also known as Black Jack’s Gang.  They robbed trains, railroad platforms, and even Cookie’s chuckwagon. With complete daring they did the almost unknown and hit the bank in Nogales. Even Sheriff Texas John Slaughter couldn’t catch ‘em. Cochise County Cowboys typically came up from Texas driving cattle to Arizona, where they got paid off and spent their money on wine, women, song, and gambling, totally wasting the rest finding themselves with no way to get back. So, they took to herding other folks’ cattle . . . without permission and then went after stagecoaches. Soon they discovered that three of the largest and wealthiest towns in the West, Tombstone, Bisbee, and Silver City, were prime pickin’s. 

n 1858, seven men worked at the Dragoon Springs Station of the Overland Mail, colloquially known as the Butterfield Mail. In the night as the men slept, three Mexican employees attacked the other four. They lay wounded and dying for many days in the Arizona sun until relief came. Only Silas St. John, horribly mutilated, survived. The other three lie buried in two cairns along with Silas's arm. The story was recorded by survivor Silas St. John, Surgeon Irwin who removed his arm, and the rescuers who came to his aid and buried the dead. This is a story of isolation, courage and the will to live and of the U.S. Mail running from coast to coast in only 25 days.

For more than 300 years New Mexico was a Franciscan mission field and her people, other than Indians, an afterthought. With the Mexican Revolution in 1821 that changed and the Franciscans were expelled leaving the land with only one priest. Padre Martinez performed wonders, trained priests and led the Penitentes only to have much of his work undone by a French bishop who didn’t understand the culture. He owned and operated the first printing press in New Mexico, started the first school and seminary, served the Mexican and then the American legislature. He's rumored to have fathered five children and to have been the head of the Pentitente secret society. He was excommunicated for baptizing his flock without forcing them to tithe first.

Although Hollywood and novels confuse them, prospecting and mining are at opposing ends of the spectrum. Learn how prospectors went about finding mineral deposits, staked, and perfected their claims. See how mining was done from beginning to end, spotting “color” or the right kind of plants to digging, refining, and shipping bullion to the mint. Look at prospecting and mining from an historian’s point of view. Focused on anachronisms that trip us up and on how mining changed. Considers the tools and techniques of prospectors, what they were looking for, and what it took to turn a claim into a mine. 

In the late 19th and early 20thcentury, Tombstone, Bisbee, and Silver City were among the largest and richest towns in the West. The southeast corner of Arizona was border country between the U.S. and Mexico and between U.S. and Mexican states. Drovers brought cattle from Texas and divided the herds leaving their cowboys to become a restless population of outlaws. Unable or unwilling to find honest employment, they rustled cattle and robbed stagecoaches. When payrolls traveled by train, they robbed the trains. The result was seldom successful and often remarkable. Posses were arrested. Outlaws vanished to bury their treasure in caves. Sheriffs pursued departing trains on foot! Outlaws joined the posse in search of themselves. 

He pursued Geronimo for robbing trains and stagecoaches and hunted Black Jack’s High Five Gang. Slaughter brought in noted gunman Buckskin Frank Leslie, killer of Johnny Ringo and Billy the Kid, for the murder of Blonde Molly. It’s all true but not everything is what it seems. Five foot four John Slaughter was a big man and a fine sheriff in Arizona’s toughest county feared by outlaws and Pancho Villa. 

An interactive talk with many questions for young people. Takes the children back to what it was like to live in the first half of the 19thcentury. It addresses the importance of the trail to the United States, the peoples along the trail and their contributions. Looks at the dangers and hardships along the trail. Supported objects to be passed around including Rio Grande blankets, trail food, Indian artifacts, hats, skins. Period weapons – knives, pistols, rifles, tomahawks available when permitted.