24 Nov 2017 (Posted on Jan 11, 2018)
SKP Saguargo RV Park, Benson, AZ
90 degrees !
The title of this post is Tombstone’s tag line. Tough town, burnt down twice and rebuilt during its heyday (1880s). Many cowboys died in shootouts (OK Coral) and on the streets as recorded in the Boothill cemetery (aptly named as those buried there died with their boots on).
A friend of prospector Schieffelin who was determined to find silver in the area, told him, “The only rock you will find out there will be your own tombstone”. Schieffelin name his claimed and the town……in 1877. Showed him didn’t he.
In March 1882, miners in the mine hit water at 620 feet . The flow wasn’t at first large enough to stop the mining work, but constant pumping with a 4 inches (100 mm) pump was soon insufficient. The silver ore deposits they sought were soon underwater. In 1886, the pumping plant burned down, When the price of silver slid to 90 cents an ounce a few months later, the remaining mines laid off workers. Many residents of Tombstone left.
We walked down the dirt street and zig-zaged the wooden board walks as we entered shop after shop. Neat town, lots of tourists, lots of history, and a good burger and beer at Big Nose Kate’s Saloon. Yep, the proprietor knew everyone’s business in town, thus the name….I had my first green chili cheeseburger with a familiar Sam Adams Okotberfest beer. Ah, life is good….
While at the saloon, we shared a table with a lady and her grown daughter who rode their horses in from the Livery, 10 miles away. While sharing stories, they stated they participated in Cowboy Mounting Riding competitions across the country. Of course, being the cow poke that I am, I had no idea what they were talking about, so after she explained the competition she invited us to watch the event next day at the livery. So we will….
We visited the Bird Cage Theater on a self guided tour. The Bird Cage Theater was combination theater, saloon, whore house, and gambling parlor that operated from 1881 to 1889 during the height of the silver boom. The wooden bar itself was made in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, shipped on the Star of India around the tip of South America to the west coast of Mexico, then wagon trained the rest of the way. Nothing too good for cowboys and money..
There were fourteen boxes on two balconies on either side of the main hall. A dumbwaiter at the end of the bar was used to hoist up the whiskey, beer and cigars to the patrons in the box seats.
In the basement, legend says that a poker room was the site of the longest-running poker game in history. Played continuously twenty-four hours a day for eight years, five months, and three days, legend has it that as much as $10,000,000 changed hands during the marathon game, with the house retaining 10 percent.
They had lots of artifacts from the period and was very interesting.
We mosied across the dirt street, dodging the horse drawn stage coaches as they told the town’s stories to the tourist aboard. Next up was witnessing the most talked about gun fight in the wild wild west, The Gunfight at the OK Coral.
