Tombstone's Epitaph: The History of a Frontier Town as Chronicled in its Newspaper Paperback – January 1, 1997

Excellent collection of the Tombstone Epitaph from the O.K. Corral era of that bloody town.As a lifelong journalist this book is a wonderful example of history told through hard news. I also enjoyed the quaint manner which the writers put their stories in using colorful hyperbole and facts-only news.The author made a lot of clear deductions regarding the actual story of Tombstone during the era of the Clanton's, who called themselves "Texas Cowboys" and rustled Mexican cattle across the border in order to gain money, power and leverage in an already murderous town near the Mexican border, and the Earp's who had the confidence, support and admiration of the decent people living in Tombstone, but that's not to say that the Earp's were angels.Especially Doc Holiday who was being eaten alive by tuberculosis and a drunk, degenerate gambler and downright scoundrel, but he was close friends with Wyatt Earp--even though the other Earp brothers didn't really care for him but a gun is a gun and none were faster than Holiday! It's quite possible that the shotgun Holiday had at the OK Corral was quite probably the gun that caused the shootout. Holiday was always quick on the trigger and it was Virgil Earp's desire to simply disarm the Clanton's. The Epitaph ran a story regarding a huge fight at the Oriental Bar between Holiday and Virgil Earp just after the shooting that nearly came to blows but was broken up the other Earp's.This book is old and written during the 1950s, It's a no-nonsense factual history of a town that had a higher murder rate than modern-day Detroit. If you're looking for folk tales and romantic versions of the shootout and the ensuing war with the Texas Cowboys, then you'd be better off watching the movie Tombstone--which has so many factual errors in it that it's almost laughable (for instance: Josie, Wyatt's lover, wasn't a rich actress--she was a hooker at the Birdcage Theater which had "cribs" in the box seats so a person could watch the show and then have sex with the many prostitutes employed by the Birdcage, however, Josie was running from the legitimacy of her rich family so she was just a "bad girl.") so if you could care less about history then watch the entertainment versions of the truth but I embrace real history and this book is a piece of gold in that manner!

I really enjoyed this book. Learned a lot about Tombstone in the Wild West Days, but more importantly there was a lot of Info about The Earps and the events at the OK Corral as they were published in the Tombstone Epitaph. All in all a GREAT Book if you want to learn about Old West Tombstone Arizona which I had the opportunity to visit back in 1982.

Real insight by people that lived it.

Accurate history of Tombstone

Great History told here.

Using articles from the pages of Tombstone, Arizona's major newspaper, the Epitaph, and some pieces from a rival paper, author Martin paints a vivid picture of life in this booming mining "camp" as it is referred to. Besides plenty of bordellos and saloons to divert the hardworking miners, the affluent citizens of Tombstone enjoyed concerts, elaborate parties, and social events of various sorts. The exploits of some of the more colorful lawmen and outlaws (sometimes they were one and the same) of the Arizona territory were chronicled in the Epitaph's florid articles, and the much-recounted shootout at the OK corral is detailed (Epitaph writers went into almost clinical detail in describing gunshot wounds). The last part of the book covers a disastrous blaze in one of the mines that shut down mining and the town and then presents a series of exuberantly optimistic articles in which new investors and mining engineers restore mining activity by installing massive pumps to keep groundwater from invading the ore face. However, by 1908, the water had overwhelmed all efforts, and Tombstone camp ceased to produce ore once and for all. The book suffers some from the author's rather awkward writing, but the book is mostly taken directly from the pages of the Epitaph, and his selection of colorful and evocative prose by various Epitaph editors and reporters conveys the life and times of this vibrant community very well.

I got interested in Tombstone by recently watching the black & white reruns of "Tombstone Territory." I started looking up books and this looked like the perfect book to relive the past western heritage. It's a wonderfully relaxing read that helps you escape back to the streets of Tombstone with such characters as Doc Holiday and Wyatt Erap.