Tombstone, situated some 30 miles from the Mexican border on a small plateau called Goose Flats, saw its first white man back in 1539 when a Spanish Franciscan missionary by the name of Fray Marcos de Niza jogged through astride the back of a donkey.
According to Virgil Earp’s wife Allie, Wyatt Earp’s sister-in-law, the place was a “hodgepodge of shacks, adobes, and tents.” Evidently Allie Earp wasn’t too impressed because she also remarked that it hadn’t changed in 340 years.
Prior to the Earp clan gracing Tombstone with their presents, Ed Schieffelin arrived at Camp Huachuca, later known as Fort Whipple, with a party of soldiers. He soon left, though, to go prospecting. As this whole area, at the time, was known to be Apache country, he was told that rather than finding silver, he would find his tombstone. He was also warned that what the Apaches didn’t claim the snakes, scorpions, tarantulas, and bandits did. But in 1877, Schieffelin proved them wrong and named his first claim Tombstone. And so began the mining boomtown of Tombstone.
Over the course of seven years the mines in the area produced millions of dollars in silver and gold before rising underground waters forced operations to be suspended. But true to its calling Tombstone was too tough to die. And, as a matter of fact, some of the old structures are still standing as well as being used.
One attraction, then as well as now, is the Bird Cage Theater, built in 1881 at 6th and Allen Streets. Today it remains virtually unchanged, just as it was in its hay day when wisecracking song-and-dance man, Eddie Foy tread its boards, entertaining lawman and outlaw alike.
Contrasting each other, also then as well as now, is St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, built in 1882, and the Crystal Palace, one of the more luxurious saloons in the West. Also still doing time and printing the news, just as it did when the Earps and Holliday traded hot led with the Clantons and the McLaurys near the O.K. Corral, is the Tombstone Epitaph building. This newspaper is the oldest continuously published paper in Arizona.
Allie Earp may not have appreciated the town that wouldn’t die, but as she gave it her glare Tombstone was sprouting, including the ongoing construction of a new corral. This new corral evidently took its name from the Democratic O.K. Club, an organization dedicated to the support of Martin Van Buren during his second presidential term. O.K. was an abbreviation of Old Kinderhook which was an affectionate nickname for Van Buren. Oddly, not far from where Van Buren was born in New York State, a Scotch-Irish family was also putting down roots. The descendants of that particular family were Tom and Frank McLaury of Tombstone fame.
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