The Last Gunfight

A revisionist history of the Old West battle challenges popular depictions of such figures as the Earps and Doc Holliday, tracing the influence of a love triangle, renegade Apaches, and the citizens of Tombstone.

A provocative history that reveals how guns—not abortion, race, or religion—are at the heart of America's cultural divide. Gunfight is a timely work examining America’s four-centuries-long political battle over gun control and the right to bear arms. In this definitive and provocative history, Adam Winkler reveals how guns—not abortion, race, or religion—are at the heart of America’s cultural divide. Using the landmark 2008 case District of Columbia v. Heller—which invalidated a law banning handguns in the nation’s capital—as a springboard, Winkler brilliantly weaves together the dramatic stories of gun-rights advocates and gun-control lobbyists, providing often unexpected insights into the venomous debate that now cleaves our nation.

November 1, 1950 -- an unseasonably hot afternoon in sleepy Washington, D.C. At 2:00 P.M. at his temporary residence in Blair House, President Harry Truman takes a nap. At 2:20 P.M., two Puerto Rican natives approach from different directions. Oscar Collazo, a respected metal polisher and family man, and Griselio Torresola, an unemployed salesman, don't look dangerous, not in their new suits and hats, not in their calm, purposeful demeanor, not in their slow, unexcited approach. What the three White House policemen and one Secret Service agent guarding the president cannot guess is that under each man's coat is a 9mm German automatic pistol and in each head, a dream of assassin's glory.

The gunfight at the O.K. Corral has excited the imaginations of Western enthusiasts ever since that chilly October afternoon in 1881 when Doc Holliday and the three fighting Earps strode along a Tombstone, Arizona, street to confront the Clanton and McLaury brothers. When they met, Billy Clanton and the two McLaurys were shot to death; the popular image of the Wild West was reinforced; and fuel was provided for countless arguments over the characters, motives, and actions of those involved. And Die in the West presents the first fully detailed, objective narrative of the celebrated gunfight, of the tensions leading up to it, and the bitter, bloody events that followed. Paula Mitchell Marks places the events surrounding the gunfight against a larger backdrop of a booming Tombstone and the fluid, frontier environment of greed, factions and violence. In the process, Marks strips away many of the myths associated with the famous gunfight and of the West in general.

Known for his ability to make history come vividly to life, Reasoner strips away the dime novel legends and Hollywood myths to show us how the gunfighters of the Old West really lived, killed, and were killed. Praised for his “well-researched” (Booklist) and “lively, suspenseful” (Publishers Weekly) novels, James Reasoner now proves that truth can be even more exciting than fiction. Among the true stories he brings us: • Doc Holliday’s Last Gunfight • The Last Bloody Ride of the Dalton Gang • The End of the Notorious John Wesley Hardin • Wild Bill’s Tragic Mistake • The End of an Earp • Turkey Creek Canyon Shoot-out • Gunfight at Stone Corral • The Doolin Bunch vs. the U.S. Marshals • Rourke’s Bad Luck Robbery • Shoot-out at the Tuttle Dance Hall • Wichita’s New Year’s Day Gunfight • Bat Masterson and the Battle of the Plaza • The Sam Bass Gang’s Luck Runs Out • The Long Branch Saloon’s Spectacular Fray • Ben Thompson’s Christmas Day Shooting • The Man Who Killed the Man Who Killed Jesse James • and more! These are the shoot-outs and showdowns that gave the Wild West its name, recounted here with gritty accuracy, colorful detail, and all the drama of life—and death—on the frontier.

A former firearms executive pulls back the curtain on America's multibillion-dollar gun industry, exposing how it fostered extremism and racism, radicalizing the nation and bringing cultural division to a boiling point. As an avid hunter, outdoorsman, and conservationist-all things that the firearms industry was built on-Ryan Busse chased a childhood dream and built a successful career selling millions of firearms for one of America's most popular gun companies. But blinded by the promise of massive profits, the gun industry abandoned its self-imposed decency in favor of hardline conservatism and McCarthyesque internal policing, sowing irreparable division in our politics and society. That drove Busse to do something few other gun executives have done: he's ending his 30-year career in the industry to show us how and why we got here. Gunfight is an insider's call-out of a wild, secretive, and critically important industry. It shows us how America's gun industry shifted from prioritizing safety and ethics to one that is addicted to fear, conspiracy, intolerance, and secrecy. It recounts Busse's personal transformation and shows how authoritarianism spreads in the guise of freedom, how voicing one's conscience becomes an act of treason in a culture that demands sameness and loyalty. Gunfight offers a valuable perspective as the nation struggles to choose between armed violence or healing.

The story of how a young Wyatt Earp and his brothers defeated the Old West’s biggest outlaw gang, by the New York Times–bestselling author of Texas Ranger. Wyatt Earp is regarded as the most famous lawman of the Old West, best known for his role in the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral in Tombstone, Arizona. But the story of his two-year war with a band of outlaws known as the Cowboys has never been told in full. The Cowboys were the largest outlaw gang in the history of the American West. After battles with the law in Texas and New Mexico, they shifted their operations to Arizona. There, led by Curly Bill Brocius, they ruled the border, robbing, rustling, smuggling and killing with impunity until they made the fatal mistake of tangling with the Earp brothers. Drawing on groundbreaking research into territorial and federal government records, John Boessenecker’s Ride the Devil’s Herd reveals a time and place in which homicide rates were fifty times higher than those today. The story still bears surprising relevance for contemporary America, involving hot-button issues such as gang violence, border security, unlawful immigration, the dangers of political propagandists parading as journalists, and the prosecution of police officers for carrying out their official duties. Wyatt Earp saw it all in Tombstone. Praise for Ride the Devil’s Herd A Pim County Public Library Southwest Books of the Year 2021 A True West Reader’s Choice for Best 2020 Western Nonfiction Winner of the Best Book Award by the Wild West History Association “A marvelous book. By means of meticulous research and splendid writing John Boessenecker has managed to do something never before attempted or accomplished, tying together the many violent clashes between lawmen and outlaws in the American southwest of the 1870-1890 period and showing how depredations by loosely organized gangs of outlaws actually threatened “Manifest Destiny” and the successful taming of the Wild West.” —Robert K. DeArment, author and historian “A ripsnortin’ ramble across the bloodstained Arizona desert with Wyatt Earp and company. . . . Boessenecker displays a fine eye for period detail. . . . A pleasure for thoughtful fans of Old West history, revisionist without being iconoclastic.” —Kirkus Reviews

John Benton was one of the toughest men ever to wear a Texas Ranger badge. But eight years ago, in August 1871, he hung up his guns for good. Or so he hoped. Then young Robby Coles challenged him to a fight over some imagined slight to the boy's sixteen-year-old girlfriend. At first Benton tried to laugh off the affair. Why, the boy was little more than a child. But rumors and gossip spread like wildfire through their dusty frontier town and soon enough the entire community seems to be goading both men towards a fatal confrontation neither one truly wants. Benton doesn't want to kill again. Robby is secretly terrified of facing the legendary gunfighter. Yet, with both men's honor on the line, is there any way to avoid a duel to the death? At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.