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Short Stuff: The O.K. Corral · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh, there's Chuck,
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: there's Jerry. Let's get to it. Giddy up, draw that's
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: pretty good, little pea shooter laser. That's right. So we're
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: talking about the gunfight at the Okay Corral. I've been there?
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Have you ever been there? No, you've been there. What's
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: it like? Dusty? I'll bet I was gonna say dusty hot?
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Were there? Tumbleweeds sure everywhere? Varmints, you wouldn't believe the varmints, wraps, gallions,
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: that's barilla, Yeah, all that good stuff. Have you ever
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: tasted sasaparilla? Sure, it's kind of like roop here. That's
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: what I've always thought. But I don't I don't know.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure. I think I had one back then,
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: but I don't remember that that when I was a child.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: But we are talking about the gunfight at the Okay Corral,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: the very excuse me, famous gunfight between the the Earps
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: and Doc Holiday and the cowboys. A very simplistic way
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: to look at this, which was in the um. Otherwise,
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: pretty good. How stuff works short article is, you know
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: the Earths were the good guys. The bad guys were
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: the other guys wrong. But there's some nuance there because
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: the earps and I think, like most lawman of the
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: time out west, you know, there were criminals too sometimes
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: they were. The thing that differentiated them was the badge
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: and the fact that they were able to enforce the law. Yeah,
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: and not to say that they were all awful people
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: and they were horse thieves and you know, no good cusses,
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: as this article says for the bad guys, but that
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: was definitely, Um, I think it was kind of few
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: and far between where you had a truly just and
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: righteous lawman. Well so why at A he had been
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: run out of California for horse thieving, so he was
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: an actual horse thief. He moved to Wichita and he
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: was a marshal there for three years before he was
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: run out of which atall for corruption. And then he
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: ended up in Tombstone where his brother Virgil was the
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: marshal there. And then Wyatt and his brother Morgan became
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: basically deputy marshals under their brother and they kind of
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: selectively enforced the law. But when it came to those cowboys,
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: the Clanton gang is another way to put it, Um,
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: they enforced the law extra judiciously, very frequently. Yeah. They
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  Speaker 1: also had a buddy named John Henry Holiday. He's from Griffin,
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: went by the name of doc was he, Yeah, dent.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: His dental office is still in Griffin. I think it's
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: like your museum now. So he was a he was
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  Speaker 1: good with a gun and not shy with a trigger finger.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: And we should mention the bad guys, he said. The
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  Speaker 1: Clanton Gang was a man named Billy Claiborne, and then
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: I can Billy Clanton and then Frank and Tom McLaury.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: And they weren't just like you know, low life cowboys.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: They were actually from wealthy ranching families from what I understand. Yeah,
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: but you know it was sort of a thing back
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: in the day, which I guess you could still be
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: a rich low life really, yeah, kidding me. They're they're everywhere. Uh,
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  Speaker 1: These these two groups of men did not like each
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: other though, um for a full year. Uh in Tombstone,
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  Speaker 1: they really went through a population explosion when someone found
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: not gold in them dar Hills, but silver good enough,
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: good enough at the time, and uh, they said, we
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: need some law enforcement. And it was literally the wild
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: West out there at the time. I know that that
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: word has used a lot like it's the Wild West
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: and podcasting. Yea, with all these shootouts. You know who's
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: quick on the draw is that Roman mars Man. That
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: guy's good. But they went to the town leaders, and
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: they had a lot of the town leaders on their side.
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: They went to Verge and white ear It's like, you guys,
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: are you know good enough? I guess yeah, you've done
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: it before and you're not afraid to shoot someone in
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: the face, right, So go shoot him in the face. Boys. So, um,
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  Speaker 1: you've got like this this uh history of of run
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: ins between the herbs and the cowboys. There was bad
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: blood between them. Um. I read elsewhere that Wyatt Earp
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: had designs on becoming sheriff of a neighboring town or
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: neighboring county, and so he wanted to make his name
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: by bringing the Clanton gang down. So he actually went
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: to Ike Clanton and said, hey, why don't you turn
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  Speaker 1: on your brother and the rest of the gang members
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  Speaker 1: and I'll make sure that you get off, you know,
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  Speaker 1: Scott free. And apparently apparently Ike was thinking about it.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: That was a great cattle wrestler, I think, but Ike
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: was thinking about it, But he ended up not doing it.
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  Speaker 1: So why it realized that he was in a bit
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: of a pickle here because it would harm his reputation
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  Speaker 1: if it was found out that he was making chunder
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: the table deals with bandits Um. And so he decided
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: that I needed to go the evidence against him. I
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: needed to be rubbed out. So that's basically from what
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  Speaker 1: I saw that actually led to this gunfight at the
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: Okay Corral. That the earth Boys were spoiling for a fight.
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: They were actually stalking the Clanton gang that day. All right, well,
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  Speaker 1: let's take a break and we'll come back and talk
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: about what happened. Not high noon, but about three o'clock.
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  Speaker 1: I guess it was high noon somewhere on October. All right,
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: so here's the deal. In Tombstone. It was against the
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: law to carry weapons in Tombstone, which is shocking. Yeah,
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: don't they know about the Second Amendment? I don't know.
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  Speaker 1: So Virgil Earp and Virgil was the he was the
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  Speaker 1: marshal at the time. He said, cowboys, you know, you're
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: not supposed to have your guns. And there was some
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: other run ins that day. There were a couple of
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  Speaker 1: violent pistol whippings. H and Tom I Clanton and Tom
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: McClary were kind of beat down by the RBS earlier
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: in the day. Yeah, I didn't. I didn't see anything
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: about that elsewhere. But well, it basically came to a
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  Speaker 1: head at about three o'clock on October. And this is
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: crazy to think about, but the gunfight at the Okay
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  Speaker 1: Corral lasted about thirty seconds. There were about thirty to
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: forty shots fired between. Mean, how many guys? Was it six? No?
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: I think it was more like eight or nine. But
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: estimates say that they were about six ft apart from
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: one another. Can you imagine they were just in a
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: little circle. Basically, he'd just be like shooting at each other.
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  Speaker 1: Stop quick stop. I'm surprised they all didn't end up
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  Speaker 1: dead A couple of them did. Um, I know that
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  Speaker 1: both of I think both of the Clanton brothers ended
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: up dead, right, Billy Clanton died and then both mcclari brothers.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: So three of the cowboys died. Um, none of the
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: herbs died. But Whyatt got off scott free? He had
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: no scratches on him. Virgil almost died. He got shot
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: through the back and just narrowly missed his spine. Right now,
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: that was Morgan. Virgil got hit in the leg. But yeah, Morgan,
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: it just was like a through shot. But I mean,
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: I know, I'm sure that felt great. Dot got a
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: little scrape and I think he said, like, why you
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: know this is Kevin Costner. But yeah, that's some pretty
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: terrible shooting right there from six right. So um, yeah,
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: that's that's basically like closing your eyes and just firing
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: like in a direction that level of of contact. Yeah,
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: you would have seen my boot spurs running in the
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: other direction in a zig zaggie pattern. So um. The
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: shootout of the Okay Corral lasted thirty seconds. It was
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  Speaker 1: not at high noon, and another little known fact is
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: that it wasn't even at the Okay Corral. It was
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  Speaker 1: in a vacant lot behind the corral, between a boarding
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: house and a photo studio. Oh really, yeah, I don't
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  Speaker 1: think I knew that it's true. It was in an
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  Speaker 1: Olen mills. Afterwards, Doc Holiday went and got a picture
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  Speaker 1: where it's like face on and then up in the
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: corner he like looking off into the into the moon.
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  Speaker 1: So here's how it apparently went down. It's like I said,
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  Speaker 1: those brothers are mclarie and Clinton had been pistol whipped
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  Speaker 1: earlier in the day. Um, the cowboys came into town
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  Speaker 1: pretty ticked off about this and kind of looking for
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  Speaker 1: a fight. So posedly, but also supposedly the RBS were
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: just like waiting to start a fight with these guys. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Actually the um earps were almost charged with murder for
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: a second there, I think Ike, you said Ike survived, right? Uh? Yes,
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  Speaker 1: Ike Clanton a couple of days later formally accused the
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  Speaker 1: Herbs of murder, basically saying that they had ambushed the cowboys.
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  Speaker 1: That's right. There were a lot of eye witnesses, but
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  Speaker 1: there was one kind of apparently really important eye witness
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  Speaker 1: uh named Addie Borland, and she said, uh, quote, I
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: didn't see anyone holding up their hands. They all seemed
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: to be firing in general, on both sides. They were
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: firing on both sides at each other. Right. So, what
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  Speaker 1: the historians think actually happened is that the RBS came
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: upon the Clantons, who were caught by surprise, and the
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: Herbs said drop your weapons or we'll start firing, right.
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  Speaker 1: They actually said it out loud, but then started firing
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  Speaker 1: before they even had a chance to drop their weapons.
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  Speaker 1: The Clanton gang star, it's firing back. But again they
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: were ambushed, they were caught by surprise, and they weren't
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: given a chance to actually surrender. Um. And so there
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: were kind of some things in there in the favor
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: of a case of murder against the herbs. But the
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: thing that got them off is that earlier witnesses had
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  Speaker 1: overheard the Clanton saying that they were going to kill
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: the earps. So the RBS are like, see, this is
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: all just self defense. Yeah, And there wasn't actual hearing
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: because of that, um that call for murder old timing
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: name please, justice of the piece. Well, Spicer had a
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: hearing and he basically said, uh no, you know what,
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: it seems to me like they were well within their
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: rights as marshals and what they called special policemen to
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: do their duty. And because of Addie Borland's testimony, um,
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: and you know, I Clanton came out and he had
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: his own testimony, but it looks like they just you know,
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: it's frontier justice. They sided on the quote unquote law. Yeah.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: I think I Clinton said that he and his brother
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: and gang members had their hands up and we're still
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: fired upon and at least one of them might not
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: have had a weapon, depending on who you asked on
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: the cowboys side. So that's how it went down. The
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: gunfight at the Ok Corral in a vacant lot at
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  Speaker 1: three pm, that's right. And later on there was an
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  Speaker 1: attempt assassination attempt on Virgil Earth in December of that
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  Speaker 1: same year. Morgan Earp was murdered and a billiard club
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  Speaker 1: in early eighty two, and everyone is cycle this is
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: clearly the work of Clanton, although who knows, because it's
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: frontier justice, it could have been anything. He could have
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: snored too loud. I'm sure the brothers had more more
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: enemies than just I Clanton, but people still suspect that
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: it was him. And as for Clanton, he was killed
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: and seven in the Arizona Territory by a detective and
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: Wyatt Earp lived until eighteen to the ripled age of
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: eighty where he died. Where else Los Angeles, where he
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: was a DJ and a sometime music producer. That's funny.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: That's it for Short Stuff, everybody. If you want to
• 12:14
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• 12:16
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• 12:19
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• 12:24
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