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Volume 3, Issue No. 6 June, 2005
Last Kiss – 1st Cowgirl ocoee ranger posse leader at june shoot!
Howdy pardners. Ready for some Ocoee Rangers shootin’ stuff. Well, here goes. The June shoot was great, but they’re all great … just some are better than others. And this 1 was a hum-dinger. 66 cowboy & cowgirl shooters rode out to the range for the round-up. Then they unleashed their imaginations and their six-shooters … that hold only 5 rounds …and took after them bad guys. You know, bad guys yell differently than good guys. When a good guy is hit by something, he or she yells something like, “Oh” or “ouch” or if the Rev. Adam Jones ain’t around something like “@#$%” (that’s difficult to pronounce). But bad guys yell, “clang”, when they get hit. Anyway, the Top Gun of the day was Tennessee Snuffy, a visiting cowboy from Spring, TX, closely followed by Dustin Clays and Pleasant. Roma Jane was the top cowgirl shooter. 9 cowboys shot no-miss matches: TN Snuffy, Dustin Clays, Pleasant, (these cowboys ranked 1, 2 & 3 in the top 10 shooters), Blayde Hollister, Festus D. Deputy, Owlhoot Hardin, Deadman, Wildcat Wilkey and Hombre Sin Nombre.
Flossie –
1st cowgirl shooter
The June shoot was notable because it was the 1st time a cowgirl served as posse leader at an Ocoee Rangers shoot. That distinction went to Last Kiss, and she did great. Since she began shooting as an Ocoee Ranger, she’s improved in her shooting, taken the Range Officer I and II classes, and been recognized as an Ocoee Ranger Wrangler for helping her posses conduct matches. Last Kiss joins another cowgirl who has a “1st to” distinction: Flossie. Flossie was the 1st cowgirl to shoot in an Ocoee Ranger match and was a regular shooter, until her other half, Jack Rabbit Bob,
Last Kiss –
1st Cowgirl Posse Leader
hauled her off to Florida. Now, she collects hurricanes as a hobby.
June Wranglers are: R.I.P. Overland, John Daniel, Awful Close, TN Snuffy, Wildcat Wilkey, Roma Jane & Adam Jones. These folks showed extra effort in helping their posses conduct the match. Speaking of extra effort, thanks to the Set-up Gang for making the range ready for us to go out and challenge them bad guys.
1 other comment worth mentioning: Fast Harley earned the distinction for showing the most hair-raising drumsticks seen on the range in a long time. Wearing an Apache flap in front and back, he had legs showing from ankle to Jupiter. It was a sight. Reno, the wonder horse (the spotted nag that held the guns on stage 1) almost ran away when he saw them legs. Some cowboy grabbed the reins, or Reno would stilling be runnin’.
SHOOT RESULTS ……….. Buffalo Shoot: .22 cal … Marshal Too Tall
Long Range … Yukon Hootch
|
Traditional 1. Dustin Clays 2. Whiskey River Nelson 3. Slater |
Cowgirl 1. Roma Jane 2. Deadeye Daisy 3. Last Kiss |
Modern 1. Tennessee Snuffy 2. S.A. Pondwater 3. Awful Close |
|
Senior 1. Tabasco JOT 2. Linc 3. Wildcat Wilkey |
Gunfighter 1. Pleasant 2. Keystone 3. R.I.P. Overland |
49er 1. Marshal Too Tall 2. Ocoee Red 3. Festus D. Deputy |
|
Black Powder 1. T-Bone Angus 2. Catoosa Kid |
Duelist 1. Horseshoe John 2. Owlhoot Hardin 3. Ranger Roger |
Outlaw 1. Loose Cinch 2. Badlands Beck |
Out on the Range – Last Kiss’s 1st Posse
L-R: Kneeling – Ocoee Red, Hombre Sin Nombre. Sitting – Keystone, Anvil, Slater, Grey Rider. – Standing:
R.I.P. Overland, Widowmaker, Tennessee Ted, Last Kiss, Fast Harley, Rawhide Rex, Badlands Beck.
NEXT OCOEE RANGER SHOOT – 23 July
The Buffalo Shoot begins 8:00 am. Registration 8:30 am – Tabasco JOT’s Side Match 8:30 am – Posse Leader walk-through 9:15 am – Safety meeting 9:45 am – Shooting follows ! All times are Eastern Time.
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The Ocoee Ranger, page 2 June 2005
The Reel West, The Real West & The West of Our Imagination
The Reel West – Edgar Buchanan 1903- 1979
To those of us over 40, Edgar Buchanan is one of the most recognized faces in cowboy movies and TV flicks. Ol’ Ed’s specialty was playing grizzled old characters that were either villains or sorta crooked, shifty & lazy critters. He started doing that when he was a young feller. During his screen career, he appeared with a lot of film cowboys. He was in McLintock, with John Wayne. And in Shane, with Alan Ladd. And in the Sheepman, with Glenn Ford, and Ride the High Country with Randolph Scott & Joel McCrea, and with Bill Boyd in a lot of his Hopalong Cassidy movies, and …. Well, you get the drift. He even did a couple of TV movies
Edgar Buchanan
with another feller who started playing old geezers when he was young, Walter Brennan. They were 2 of the Over The Hill Gang.
Did you know that in 1954, Ed had his own TV series, and it was a Western. Believe it or not, he played Judge Roy Bean. That was also the name of the series, JUDGE ROY BEAN.
Ed didn’t start out to be a movie character. Nope. Born in Missouri, he graduated from North Pacific Dental College in Eugene, Oregon, and became a dentist. But like Doc Holliday, he developed other interests. Doc took up drinkin’ and gamblin’, and Ed took up acting. He started out doing it in his non dentist time, then later, he chunked the dentist trade and became a full time movie old geezer. And he was good at it. Ed joined the cowboy posse in the sky in 1979.
Purly
The West of our Imagination – Purly
Purly has been Cowboy Shooting for 15 months, and he loves it. How did he get involved? Here’s how he tells it..”Tucson Tuco was 1 of my students. He was taking a course I was teaching, and he told me about being into Cowboy Shooting. I went to an Ocoee Ranger shoot with him, but I didn’t have any guns. When I got there, Horseshoe John loaned me a rifle, a belt and holsters. I shot Tuco’s pistols and his shotgun. I was hooked. Then a week or so later, Tuco took me over to T-Bone’s, and I bought pistols and a rifle. Then I dug up a shotgun. And by the next shoot, I had everything: guns, leather holsters
& belt, hat, boots and clothes. I had it all.
How did he get his alias? Well, there’s a bit more to his alias than meets the eye. His complete alias is Purly Shell. No, it has nothing to do with Hawaii. His wife’s grandfather’s 1st name was Purly, and his grandfather’s last name was Shell. So, he became Purly Shell, ‘couse he goes by Purly. Purly says that the best thing about Cowboy Shooting is the people. “I’ve never heard anybody say a bad word to anybody. But I have so much fun, I wouldn’t have heard it anyway.”
Last year, Purly made a trip to New Mexico. He investigated and discovered that there was a Cowboy Shooting group where he was going. So, he took his guns and stuff and shot with the New Mexico Cowboys. He said it was “interesting.”
Purly has his priorities in order. He loves Cowboy shootin’, his favorite Western movie actor is Clint Eastwood, and he shoots .45’s. Now some would say it’s a toss up between John Wayne and Clint Eastwood, but the .45’s mean that he’s a real cowboy.
The Real West – Patrick F. Garrett
1850- 1908
Patrick Floyd Jarvis Garrett was a southern boy. Originally from Alabama, he drifted west, like a lot of other young boys. At 19, he was a buffalo hunter out on the plains. He did that for 9 years. Then he quit, with the help of some marauding Comanches, and moved to New Mexico. It was in New Mexico that he would marry and write his name forever in the pages of Western history.
Pat arrived in New Mexico, just as the deadly Lincoln County War was coming to a close. Billy the Kid was prowling the county, generally raising cane (Rev. Adam Jones’ influence
Pat Garrett
put this word in here.). Governor Lew Wallace had just put a $500 reward on Billy so some other feller would do the job of seeing to his capture, and so he could go back to doing what he did best: write the novel BEN HUR.
In the midst of all this excitement, Pat decided to run for sheriff. No other sheriff had caughtBilly. He probably figured that he couldn’t do any worse than anybody else, so Democrat P. F. Garrett ran and won.
Ol’ Pat hustled him up a posse and went out and caught Billy, killing 2 of his followers in the process. He hauled Billy off to jail. Billy was tried, sentenced to hang, shot & killed 2 deputies, and escaped. Pat set out after him again and finally killed him late at night in a dark room. Some historians say that Billy had a pistol in his hand at the time, and others say he had a butcher knife and was headed for the kitchen. Whatever Billy had in his hand, it was still there when he hit the floor.
Believe it or not, Pat didn’t even win the next election. In death, the Kid became the hero, and Pat became the villain. Ain’t that ironic?
In his later years, Pat was a rancher, sometimes lawman, customs collector, and general western character. He never achieved wealth and never became a really successful rancher. His 1 moment of glory, and it didn’t last long, was when he killed Billy the Kid.
Denied heroic acclaim and financial success, Pat was also denied a dignified death. Nature whispered in his ear while he was out riding in a buckboard. So, he got down and was watering the shrubbery. He was murdered while standing on the side of the road painting pictures in the dust.
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The Ocoee Ranger page 3 June 2005
DEADFOOT – THE DOCENT
Cowboy & cowgirl shooters do and are all kinds of things when they’re not out on the range. For example, did you know that Deadfoot is a docent? It’s true. At the May shoot, I was talking with Deadfoot about shootin’ & aliases and stuff. In the conversation, he said , “I’m a docent.”
Not being too cultured and with limited vocabulary, I didn’t know what that was. So, I backed up a step. If it was contagious, I didn’t want to catch it. But while I ain’t too smart, I ain’t bashful. So I asked, “What’s a docent?” And he told me.
Deadfoot – the Docent
Mr. Webster defines a docent as follows: a person who conducts groups of people through a museum or art gallery. That’s Deadfoot’s version too.
Deadfoot does volunteer work at the Booth Western Art Museum in Cartersville, GA. It’s a top notch museum, and folks like Deadfoot help make it that way. In his volunteer work at the museum, Deadfoot is a tour guide, a teacher and a cowboy poet. Yep, a poet. And in his on-range persona as Deadfoot the cowboy shooter, he holds to the old West persona. He shoots 1 handed, uses black powder and either a real, live ’73 Winchester .38 – .40 (made in 1890) or a real Marlin .32 – .20 (made in 1901).
If you haven’t visited the Booth Western Art Museum, it’s well worth the trip. Just ask Tucson Tuco or Mesquite Millie. Tuco and his better half have visited and were impressed. Mesquite Millie and her other half have visited a couple of times. More than 1 visit means that it’s worth going back for. And who knows, the old docent, Deadfoot, might be there to show you around.
OCOEE RANGERS SHOOTERS COMPETE AT OTHER SHOOTS
Shoot-Out at Mule Camp … Georgia
6 frequent Ocoee Ranger shooters competed in the Shoot-Out at Mule Camp Memorial Day weekend, and they did very well. Diamondback Dennis placed 25th overall in a field of 512 shooters, which included Evil Roy and Judge Roy Bean. Diamondback also placed 10th in the Traditional category. Tabasco JOT placed 79th overall and 9th in the Senior category. Carolina Gem placed 1st in the Lady Gunfighter class and was 136th overall. Other shooters were Cherokee Maddog, who placed 9th in the Classic Cowboy category, Hombre Sin Nombre and Ricochet Richard.
Smokin’ Guns at Rabbit Ridge …. Mississippi
Smokin’ Guns at Rabbit Ridge is the Mississippi State Championship shoot, and 182 shooters showed up to participate. Amongst this august group were 7 shooters familiar to us Ocoee Rangers: Cool Waters (placed 15th), Sunshine Billy (18th), Pleasant (20), Unpleasant (26), Dustin Clays (29), Pyro (39) and Lighting McCoy (59). Lightning McCoy placed 1st in the Classic Cowboy category. Pleasant placed 1st amongst the Gunfighters. Sunshine Billy placed 2nd in the B-Western cowboys and Pyro was the 3rd place gunfighter. Not to be denied honors, Dustin Clays received the “Spirit of the Game” recognition for his performance in his posse. Both Pleasant and Unpleasant were Side Match winners.
Hooten Holler Roundup … Kentucky
Hooten Holler Roundup is the Kentucky championship shoot. 18 familiar shooters participated in a field of 160 shooters. Sunshine Billy placed 1st in the B-Western class and 12th overall. Dustin Clays was 2nd in the Sr. group and 31st overall. Curly Bill was 2nd in the Frontier class and 94th overall, and Owlhoot Hardin was 2nd in the Elder Statesman class and 96th overall. Badlands Beck shot his way into 3rd place in the Frontier class and 124th overall. Other participants were; Ocoee Red, Double Eagle, Unpleasant, Fiddleback, Kenesaw Kid, Devil Dog, Summer Dove, Long Gulch, Roma Jane, Tennessee Tombstone, El Carrera and the silent but deadly Rawhide Rex. Rawhide Rex shot Duelist: the Outlaw class ain’t recognized just everywhere.
Parting Comments
All these cowboys and cowgirls and their fellow participants from many other shootin’ groups gathered to play our favorite game, and play it as ambassadors for their various shooting groups. Us East Tennessee & North Georgia cowboys and cowgirls were very ably represented by these cowboys and cowgirls who shoot in Cleveland regularly or as often at they can. Good shootin’ gang.
Hooten Holler: Double Eagle gets his ammo. Over his shoulder is Rawhide Rex. Curly Bill is in front of the cowboy in red.
OCOEE RANGERS CONTACTS
Ocoee Red … (423) 476-5303 ocoeered@bellsouth.net … Sundance .. (423) 479-8465 JSNEYMAN@aol.com … Pleasant .. (423) 476-6865 pleasant2@charter.net ..
Horseshoe John .. (706) 866-5372 ..
Deadman & Mesquite Millie .. (770) 889-0934 … jedalton@mindspring.com
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