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Volume 4, Issue No. 8                                   August,  2006

AUGUST SHOOT – A FAMILY AFFAIR

The August Shoot was a real family affair.  How so? Well, amongst the shooters were Tucson Tuco & his sons, Gator & Hoot Owl, and Mrs. Tuco kept score for their posse.  And Bad Eye Tom & his son, Bad Arm Slim were there.  And there were Wildcat Wilkey & his little feller, Polecat Carl. And Pleasant & Unpleasant. And Boondock Saint & his son, Irish Jake.  And then there were the husband & wife shooters: 2 Dogs & Red Neckerson; and Last Kiss & Fast Harley; and Killin’ Time & Rusty Spur Slim, and Deadeye Daisy & Sheriff Donald; Josephine Marksman & Krazy Jim. And there were brothers who shot together: Doc Duncan & Judge ‘em All Duncan. You get the idea. (I’ve probably missed some.  Sorry.)  In all, 80 shooters participated, and we had a number of visitors who observed the action.

The Outlaw posse seems to keep growing.  One of these days, we may have to have 2 of ‘em, if they keep growing. And then there was the Buffalo Shoot.  Marshal Too Tall moseyed up to Mesquite Millie, while she was counting the money and doin’ administrative stuff and said, “Hey, Millie.  Do you want to know who won the Buffalo Shoot?” Of course the ol’ gal said yeah. Too Tall grinned and said, “I won it all.”  And he did.

Who else did well at the shoot?  Everybody who was there.  The objective is to have fun, and it sure seemed that everyone did.  Festus D. Deputy was the Top Gun and Last Kiss, shooting Gunfighter, was the Top Cowgirl shooter. 8 shooters shot no-miss matches: Festus D. Deputy, Dustin Clays, Mr. Pistol, Lightning McCoy, Horseshoe John, Wildcat Wilkey, Limp Along Charlie, and Deadman. Oddly enough, 6 of the 8 shot in the same posse.

The Top 10 Shooters were: (1) Festus D. Deputy (2) Marshal Too Tall (3) Slater (4) Fiddleback (5) Doc Duncan (6) D.Q. Jones (7) Double Eagle (8) Pleasant   (9) Dustin Clays and (10) Unpleasant

IN MEMORIUM –  Dirttown Desparado

Dirttown Desparado, a.k.a. Jim Carter, joined the cowboy & cowgirl posse in the sky on August 3rd.  Jim began cowboy shooting and shooting with us last year. He attended matches with his wife, Judi. In an email to Ocoee Red not long before Jim left us, Judi said, “He tells everyone about the western shoot organization with a passion and a knot in his throat because not only does he miss the shoot, he misses all the cowboys that have treated us like family. I wish with all my heart he could come to one more shoot. … He didn’t do it long but his compassion grew for it.”

Goodbye, Dirttown Desparado.

OUTLAW SHOOTERS

Fast Harley shooting Outlaw.  Yellowcreek Johnson times while Widowmaker counts misses.

L-R:  Tennessee Tombstone & Badlands Beck Demonstrating Outlaw Shooting Style

August Wranglers were Bad Arm Slim, Keystone, Lightning McCoy, Killin’ Time, Tennessee Ted, Boondock Saint, Gator and Hoot Owl.  Ocoee Ranger Wranglers are cowboys & cowgirls who put forth just a bit more effort in helping their posse conduct the shoot.

SHOOT RESULTS

Top Gun – Festus D. Deputy  … Top Cowgirl – Last Kiss … Buffalo Shoot (all classes) – Marshal Too Tall

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The Ocoee Ranger page 2                August, 2006

THE REEL WEST, THE REAL WEST & THE WEST OF OUR IMAGINATION

The Reel West – Rhonda Fleming

Rhonda Fleming is a Westerner, a Californian. Born to show biz parents in 1923, she got into the movie business largely because of her looks.  Her story is like several others. She was walking down the street.  A guy saw the tall, good-looking redhead with a terrific figure, and 1 thing led to another and she was in the movie business.  Oddly, she never became a major actress.  Critics admit she had the acting skill and the charm and the looks, but somehow she never rose to the heights of a lady superstar.  But so what?  She did well in her career in the movies, on stage and on TV.  Then she retired in 1960 and became a humanitarian of great note, involved at a major level in several charities.

Rhonda Fleming

But lets talk about the important stuff: her career in Western Movies.  Rhonda made several shoot’um ups.  She was in PONY EXPRESS (with Charlton Heston), and THE REDHEAD AND THE COWBOY (Glen Ford), and BULLWHIP (Guy Madison), and GUNGLORY (Stewart Granger), and ABILINE TOWN (Randolph Scott) and others.  And in her roles, she played spirited gals who weren’t wallflowers to the heroes.  Unfortunately, she was never paired with John Wayne.  That would have been something. Rhonda’s most notable role was that of Laura Denbo, a lady gambler and Wyatt Earp’s love interest in GUNFIGHT AT OK CORRAL.  Burt Lancaster was Earp. GUNFIGHT AT OK CORRAL is a good movie.  It ain’t no TOMBSTONE, but it’s good.  The 3 best things in the movie are Rhonda’s portrayal of the lady gambler, Kirk Douglas’ portrayal of Doc Holiday, and Frankie Lane’s song – Gunfight at OK Corral.  Rhonda also appeared on TV Westerns:  shows like Wagon Train and The Virginian and others.

Oh yeah, Rhonda had a nickname when she was making movies. Her striking red hair, figure (frequently in skimpy costumes) and charm resulted in her being called “the Queen of Technicolor.” 

Dajango Slim

The West of our imagination –

Dajango Slim

Dajango Slim has been a cowboy shooter for about a year and a half. One day, Buckwitt invited him to an Ocoee Rangers shoot, and he’s been a cowboy shooter ever since.  “The first time I came, I thought I was going to be an observer.  But Buckwitt handed me a holster and a pair of guns and said, ‘You’re gonna shoot.’ I got hooked because of the camaraderie and the spirit of the game.  You couldn’t shoot with a better group of people.”

What does he shoot? “I shoot the old style Ruger Vaqueros in .38 caliber, but I’m gonna save up and get some .45’s.” (Doesn’t that sound like music to an old cowboy’s ears?)  How did he come by his alias?  “I’ve always had the nickname of Slim.  I saw a movie called Da-Jango.  So, I sorta put them together, without the hyphen.”

Who’s his favorite cowboy? “John Wayne.  When I was 7 years old, I saw the movie TRUE GRIT, and I fell in love with it.  I’ve been a John Wayne fan ever since.”  A feller could do worse than admire John Wayne and worse than shootin’ with Dajango Slim. 

The Real West – Lottie Deno  

(1844 – 1934)

Carlotta Thompkins, the eldest daughter of a rich plantation owner, was born in Kentucky in 1844.  When she was 17, her daddy was killed in the War of Northern Aggression, and her mama sent her to visit folks in Detroit to find a rich husband. But Lottie was strong willed and made other plans.  She’d traveled extensively with her daddy and had been exposed to his business dealings and his gambling on cards and horse races.  And her daddy had taught her to play cards and to apply the tricks to win. And that’s how she supported herself and was the source of money she sent home to her mother and sister.  Of course they didn’t know that.  They thought he’d married a man with money.  Lottie never went back to the plantation.

Lottie Deno

Queen of Hearts

Ol’ dad had taken Lottie with him on Mississippi riverboats, so she played her game on the boats and eventually landed in New Orleans.  Then she went west to San Antonio, TX, where Frank Thurmond hired her to be a dealer at his University Club.  Lottie always dressed stylishly and was a good-looking redhead, and the fellers couldn’t wait to lose their money at her table.  She became the belle of the gambling trade, and Frank’s gal. Later, Frank was accused of cheating at cards, killed a man, and left town on the dodge.     

Lottie stayed in San Antonio for a while, then drifted west to Ft. Griffin to find Frank. That was where she became Lottie “Deno”. Supposedly some drunk who’d lost a lot of money to her said that she should call herself Lotta Dinero, and for whatever reason, she liked it and became Lottie Deno.  She also met, played against and beat Doc Holiday at cards at Ft. Griffin.

Several years later, Lottie and Frank moved to Deming, New Mexico, married and became respectable.  They gave up being gamblers. Frank became a businessman and eventually became the Vice President of the Deming National Bank.  He died in 1908. Lottie died in 1934 and was buried beside Frank.  Some folks have written that Lottie was the inspiration for Miss Kitty, who ran the Long Branch Saloon in GUNSMOKE, and of Laura Denbo, the redheaded lady gambler in the Burt Lancaster and Rhonda Fleming movie, GUNFIGHT AT OK CORRAL.  Whether she inspired either character or not, she became a legendary character in the Old West.

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The Ocoee Ranger page 3                                       August 2006

TN Tombstone,

The Father of Outlaw Shooting

OUTLAW SHOOTING

What do Tennessee Tombstone and George Washington have in common? No, it ain’t wooden teeth or powdered wigs. Both are known as “the father of” something.  George is “the father of his country”.  Tombstone is “the father of Outlaw shooting”. It’s true. 

What caused Tombstone to start shooting that way?  Here’s how he explained it.  “I couldn’t hit nothing anyway, and all the cowboys on TV shot from the hip or pointed, so I thought I’d try it.”  And he did.  He started shootin’ what he called Outlaw style in Knoxville with the Smoky Mountain Shootists Society.  Then Badlands Beck joined him. Then Rawhide Rex started shooting that way, and then others and before long, the Knoxville cowboys recognized Outlaw as a shooting class. At an Ocoee Rangers shoot after the Knoxville cowboys recognized Outlaw as a shooting class, Rawhide Rex asked Deadman if the Ocoee Rangers would recognize the Outlaw class. Deadman said, “Sure.”  At that shoot, Tombstone, Rawhide Rex and Badlands Beck shot Outlaw.  And seeing them, others began doing so in short order.  But that wasn’t the end of it, before long Tennessee Tombstone and his compadres persuaded the Possum Trot and Hooten Old Town shooters to recognize Outlaw as a shooting class.  Then the Kentucky State Cowboy Action Champion Shoot recognized the Outlaw class.

By now, you may be saying, “Ok. Enough.  What is Outlaw shooting?”  And that’s a good          question. Here’s how Outlaw shooting is done:

1.      SASS basic rules govern.

2.      Pistols are shot from the hip or with the arm not higher than armpit level and with a bend at the elbow.  (No fast draw.)

3.      The shotgun is shot from the hip or waist area.  If there’s a flying target, the shooter can shoulder the gun, it he / she chooses.

4.      Rifles are shot from the shoulder.

5.      The shooter must have Fun.

The rules are still evolving, but the basics are as above.  How well do Outlaw shooters do?  Well, they don’t win matches. But they have a growing following, and they have gun. As one shooter said to Tombstone at the Kentucky State Shoot, “You fellers sure do take the tension out of a match.” 

At the Ocoee Rangers August shoot, Tennessee Tombstone missed only 3 shots, shooting Outlaw.  But it’s not for everyone.  At the July shoot, the Outlaws convinced Calibre. 45 to shoot Outlaw style.  Calibre .45 is an excellent pistol shot.  He missed 22 shots.  That equaled his total misses for the previous 3 ½ years. 

If you want to give Outlaw shooting a try, see Tennessee Tombstone, Badlands Beck or Rawhide Rex or any of the other Outlaw shooters, and they’ll show you how it’s done.

WHAT DO THESE PICTURES HAVE IN COMMON?

James Arness

William Conrad

Take a look at these 2 pictures.  Look really close.  What do they have in common? Now if you’re a cowboy about Horseshoe John’s age or more, you probably know.  But if you’re Barnscoop’s age, you probably don’t have a clue.  And if you’re Deadeye Drew’s age, you don’t know and couldn’t care less. What’s the answer?  Both are pictures of GUNSMOKE’S  Matt Dillon.  The feller on the left is James Arness.  He was Matt Dillon on TV for about 20 years. The feller on the right is the original Matt Dillon.  He’s William Conrad.  He played Matt on the radio, before GUNSMOKE moved to TV.  This is a publicity photo from the radio show.  If you haven’t heard the radio show in real time or on tapes of the show, you’ve missed a treat. This word scratcher used to listen to the radio GUNSMOKE with his grandmother. The radio story was told by the sounds of boot steps, jingling spurs, gunshots and the sound of narrator Conrad’s deep voice as Matt Dillon, US Marshal.

SCORES & RANKING – July 22, 2006

Overall Score = The total of Rank of all stages    Overall Rank = The ranking of shooters by overall score  Overall Time = The sum of scores of stages       Misses = Total shots missed on all stages     Total Stages = Number of stages with no recorded missed shots  Red type indicates a clean match (In the event of ties in Overall Score, the tied shooter with the lowest Overall Time is ranked higher)

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Volume 4, Issue No. 7                                 July,  2006

IN MEMORIUM – SANTA FAYE

Santa Faye, a.k.a. Faye Mauney, joined the cowgirl & cowboy posse in the sky on Sunday, July 9th.  Although she never fired a shot in an Ocoee Rangers CAS match, she was and had been for several years an important member of our group.  Accompanying shooting husband, Loose Cinch, Santa Faye was an excellent scorekeeper, and she always had a smile and a cheery comment, even when health-wise she didn’t feel like smiling. She will be missed.  Goodbye, Santa Faye.  You’re a lady we’ve been proud to know.

73 Shooters Participate in July Shoot

Friday, it rained. Well, to put it bluntly, it stormed.  But that cooled Saturday off a bit.  Then, shooters and their pardners drifted out to the range, and the sun wasn’t to be seen…. Until Sunshine Billy arrived.  He was wearing the sun.  He had on bright yellow britches.  Shucks, you could close your eyes and see ‘em through your eyelids.  But they sure supported his shootin’:  he was the Top Gun of the day.  Last Kiss, shootin’ gunfighter style, held that honor in the field of lady shooters. Speaking of lady shooters, there were 10 cowgirl shooters, a record for the Ocoee Rangers. And the cowgirls shot in the following ladies’ categories: Gunfighter, Duelist, Traditional, 49er and Outlaw. We also had 2 junior shooters:  Deadeye Drew and Irish Jake. Both shot very well.

How’d the shootin’ go?  Well, 1 cowboy pretty much summed it up.  He said, “The worst cowboy shoot I ever went to was good, and the rest have been even better.” This 1 was very good. Just ask Fast Harley.  He walked away from the Buffalo shoot with a smile on his face and said, “I took the 100 yard pistol shoot from ol’ Too Tall.”  Of course Marshal Too Tall won all the rest: .22 cal.. Long Range Lever Action Rifle and Long Range Single Shot Rifle and he placed 8th in overall shooting. That ain’t bad for a feller with an injured arm, who couldn’t shoot 2 weeks ago.

All our shooting posses were special.  But 1 was a bit more special than the others.  A group of Loose Cinch’s shootin’ buddies rode out to shoot with him. And that entire posse, led by Last Kiss, shot very well. Of course Calibre .45 might smile at that remark.  He seldom misses with his pistols. But some silver- tongued devil slickered him into shootin’ Outlaw, and he missed 22 shots. That’s probably more than he’s missed in the previous 2 or 3 years. Maybe that’s why he’s trying to hide behind Abagail Rose in the picture below.  He’s deadly with a pistol.

POSSE NO. 1

Front Row L-R: Doc Duncan, Killin’ Time, Rusty Spur Slim, Cactus Red, DQ Jones Middle Row L-R: Yellowcreek Johnson, Last Kiss, Yazoo City Gal, Abagail Rose Back Row L-R: Judge’m All Duncan, Loose Cinch, Badlands Beck, Tennessee Tombstone, Fast Harley, Calibre. 45

The Top 10 Shooters for the day were: (1) Sunshine Billy, (2) Festus D. Deputy, (3) DQ Jones, (4) Doc Duncan, (5) Fiddleback, (6) Rusty Spur Slim, (7) Unpleasant, (8) Marshal Too Tall, (9) Dustin Clays, and  (10) Cherokee Maddog.  5 shooters had no miss matches: DQ Jones, Mr. Pistol, Bad Eye Tom, Deadman and Moonshine Roberts.  July Wranglers were Boondock Saint, Awful Close, Yellowcreek Johnson, DQ Jones, Red Neckerson, Lightning McCoy and Keystone.  Ocoee Ranger Wranglers are cowboys & cowgirls who put forth just a bit more effort in helping their posse conduct the shoot.

Here’s a summary of the July shoot results.

SHOOTING RESULTS

Top Gun – Sunshine Billy

Top Cowgirl – Last Kiss

Modern 

1. Awful Close

2. Sundance McNeyman

Buffalo Shoot:

o       Long Range Lever Action – Marshal Too Tall

o       Long Range Single Shot – Marshal Too Tall

o       .22 Cal. – Marshal Too Tall

o        100 Yard Pistol – Fast Harley

Traditional

1. Fiddleback             

2. Unpleasant

3. Dustin Clays

Gunfighter

1. DQ Jones

2. Doc Duncan

3. Pleasant

49er

1. Festus D. Deputy

2. Marshal Too Tall

3. Double Eagle

Duelist

1. Rusty Spur Slim

2. Cherokee Maddog

3. Horseshoe John

Senior

1. Sunshine Billy

2. Mr. Pistol

3. Rev. Adam Jones

Outlaw

1. Badlands Beck

2. Loose Cinch

3. TN Tombstone

Classic

1. Lightning McCoy

Lady Duelist

1. Killin’ Time

Lady Traditional

1. Yazoo City Gal

2. Emerald Isle

3. Deadeye Daisy

Junior

1. Irish Jake

Remember, we only award category recognition and certificates when more than 1 person shoots in the category.  For example, Last Kiss was the Top Cowgirl Shooter, but she was the only cowgirl who shot in the Ladies Gunfighter category. So, Lady Gunfighter is not reported.

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The Ocoee Ranger page 2                                                       July, 2006

THE REEL WEST, THE REAL WEST AND THE WEST OF OUR IMAGINATION

THE REEL WEST  –  WALTER BRENNAN  1894 – 1997

Walter Brennan as he appears at the Cowboy Hall of Fame Museum

Walter Brennan was born in Massachusetts in 1894. But we can forgive him for that.  He probably knew that Ted Kennedy would 1day flim-flam most folks in the state, so he left.  During his working career, he did lots of things.  He was a lumberjack, a construction worker, a soldier in WWI, worked in banking and real estate, and then he got into the movies, starting as a stuntman and then becoming an actor. Walter was 1 of those “forever-old” fellers.  He was the sidekick or old codger in most of his movies.  But just as Walter could very convincingly play lovable folks, he could also convincingly play nasty villains. For example, he was good old Stumpy in John Wayne’s RIO BRAVO and nasty old man Clinton in Henry Fonda’s MY DARLING CLEMENTINE. Shucks, he won 3 Academy Awards for Best Supporting Actor and was nominated for another. By the way, he won his last Oscar portraying Judge Roy Bean in Gary Cooper’s THE WESTENER.  In that movie, he was a crusty villain and got shot by the hero. 

In his time, old Walter appeared in lots of movies, and a lot of them were Westerns. Ever heard of HOW THE WEST WAS WON? He was a villain in that one.  How about THE FAR COUNTRY? He was Jimmy Stewart’s sidekick in that one.  Or RED RIVER?  John Wayne’s sidekick.  SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL SHERRIF.  He was a comic villain to hero James Garner.  Walter also got into the series TV business.  He was the lead in:  THE REAL MCCOYS and THE GUNS OF WILL SONNETT, a Western. He appeared as a grandfather in both series, but as Will Sonnett, he was a gun-slinging grandfather.

Walter left quite a legacy.  Granted he wasn’t a legend like John Wayne, but he helped John Wayne and many others in their on screen performances.  Shucks, he made lots of movies better because of his appearance.  He’d put his teeth in his pocket, put on his scrunched up high-crowned hat, make a few old codger noises, and steal scenes from the best of ‘em.  Visit the Cowboy Hall of Fame Museum in Oklahoma City and go the film West section and you’ll see terrific portraits of Western Movie folks. Walter’s there as he appears above. He joined the cowboy posse in the sky in 1997.

THE WEST OF OUR IMAGINATION – DEADMAN

Deadman

In 1998, Deadman visited a cowboy shoot and couldn’t imagine going out in public dressed like what he saw.  But he did. And he began shooting with TN. Jake, the Catoosa Kid, Deadfoot, Tellico, and T-Bone. And then Horseshoe John drifted in and …. But, he didn’t begin shooting as Deadman. He was the Yellowstone Kid at his 1st shoot. But he didn’t much like that name, and Mesquite Millie told him he was too old to be a kid.  So, he became Deadman.  Most times he lies about how he selected that alias.  He usually says it’s because of all his property: there’s a Deadman’s Point in Apple Valley, CA., and a Deadman’s Bar Road in the Grand Teton’s National Park, etc.  But regardless of how he became Deadman, he’s always shot .45’s, and with lots of powder in them.  No butterfly loads for him.  That’s partly why he shoots low in the competition.  Mesquite Millie would tell you the other reason he’s down in the pack: “You just shoot slow.”

Who’s old Deadman’s favorite Western movie cowboy? “That’s not as easy to answer as it used to be.  Randolph Scott was my 1st movie hero.  And John Wayne’s special.  And I agree with Marshal Too Tall that Tom Selleck is excellent.  But all in all, Roy Rogers has to be no. 1.  He lived the life he showed on the screen.  He was no. 1 on the screen, and from all I’ve read, he was no. 1 in real life.”

THE REAL WEST – WARREN EARP     1855 – 1900

Warren Earp

Warren Earp was 1 of Wyatt Earp’s little brothers. Unlike Wyatt’s younger brother Morgan and older brother Virgil, Warren wasn’t in the gunfight near Tombstone’s OK Corral.  Oh, he was in Tombstone during the months leading up to the shootout, but he wasn’t a shootist until after Virgil was crippled and Morgan was killed, both occurrences after the historical gunfight.

Warren was born in Iowa in 1855, and like most of the Earp men, he moved around a bit before and after the doings in Tombstone.  During the Tombstone era, he rode shotgun guard on stagecoaches and gambled and did other stuff.  But when Morgan was killed, he joined brother Wyatt, Doc Holiday and their compadres and went varmint huntin’.  After “Wyatt’s vendetta ride” was over, Warren drifted to Colorado and then other places as years went by.

At about 1 o’clock in the morning on Friday, July 7, 1900, Warren was hanging around a saloon in Wilcox, AZ.  He managed to get into a heated argument with another saloon bird named Johnny Boyett.  One thing led to another, and Warren challenged Boyett to go get his gun.  Boyett did.  Warren was either mighty stupid or mighty drunk, because he didn’t have a gun.  All he had was a pocketknife.  Boyett returned, fired 4 shots at Warren, and missed.  Warren kept mouthing off and advancing toward Boyett, who told him to stop or he would shoot.  Warren probably thought, “So what.  You done missed 4 times.”  But, Boyett’s 5th shot didn’t miss.

Sometimes things move fast.  Warren was killed Friday morning about 1 o’clock. Later that morning, a corner’s jury was impaneled and they determined the obvious: Warren was dead, he had been shot with a gun, and Johnny Boyett had the gun in his hand. Wow. Think how hard that was to determine. Continuing with events, Warren was buried that afternoon. On Saturday afternoon about 1 o’clock, Boyett was marched into court.  He appeared before a judge in a preliminary hearing.  The judge heard the evidence: Warren initiated the conflict, challenged Boyett to go get his gun, advanced on Boyett when told to stop, and had a half opened pocket knife in his hand when Boyett shot him.  The judge dismissed Boyett.  He didn’t rule dismissal was because of self-defense.  He said that he didn’t think a grand jury would indict Boyett, and if they did, a jury wouldn’t convict. How ‘bout that?

Of all the Earp brothers, only Wyatt and Newton were never shot. James was shot in the War of Northern Aggression, Virgil was shot in the war and while he was in Tombstone, and Morgan and Warren were shot and killed. Newton minded his own business and never got into the adventures that his other brothers did.  Wyatt … he was charmed. 

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Ocoee Ranger page 3 July 2006

July’s Ocoee Wranglers

Awful Close

Yellowcreek Johnson

DQ Jones

Red Neckerson

Lightning McCoy

No Photo Available

Boondock Saint

Keystone

OCOEE RANGERS

SCORES & RANKING – June 24, 2006 – Sorted By Class

Click Here for Standard Sort

Overall Score = The total of Rank of all stages    Overall Rank = The ranking of shooters by overall score  Overall Time = The sum of scores of stages       Misses = Total shots missed on all stages     Total Stages = Number of stages with no recorded missed shots  Red type indicates a clean match (In the event of ties in Overall Score, the tied shooter with the lowest Overall Time is ranked higher)