In theWild Westof American traditional knowledge , cowboys are the undisputed lead homo . Women , most often , are to be saved , or woo , or ignored , or leave behind when it ’s time to dispatch the trail .
Annie Oakley — who was not really aWestern womanand most definitely did n’t need to be saved — may be the most glaring exception to that rule . The sharpshooting Oakley , born Annie Moses in 1860 , was a 5 - foot - nothing , 110 - pound dichotomy ; a crack shot who played in front of trillion of people inBuffalo Bill ’s Wild Westshow but who preferred her privacy ; a trailblazing womanhood who notwithstanding believed adult female did n’t merit the right to vote ; a person with nonindulgent esthesia who made a fine living by hang out with the whooping , hollering menagerie of " Buffalo Bill " Cody ’s far-famed circus - like show at the turn of the 20th century .
In many people ’s minds , Oakley istheleading ma’am of the American West . It ’s a pretty impressive feat to rive off , consider she was born in Ohio and never traveled much far west than Cincinnati — until she bring together Cody ’s show in 1885 .
" She did not match the stereotype of a womanhood that was in a show like the Wild West . She had ethical motive , she had manners , she was somewhat civilized , " say Brenda Arnett , a manager at theGarst Museumin Greenville , Ohio , home of theNational Annie Oakley Center . " She was n’t like the idle and wooly charwoman that were being portrayed . She was a very dainty and proper Victorian lady . "
Becoming Annie Oakley
Phoebe Ann Moses(some historians say her menage name was Mosey ) was born into crushing impoverishment in Darke County , Ohio , roughly 90 mi ( 145 kilometers ) north of Cincinnati . She wastaught to apply a gunas a youngster when she learned to hunt down for food . She finally got so just with her rifle and shotgun that she sold pith to a local grocer to help her family .
But Oakley ’s metabolism into one of the finest marksmen of her time was not soft . Her father died when she was untried . Oakley , the young of seven tiddler , was forced to work at a local " poor house , " and later was lent out to a family who used her as unpaid Labour Party . On at least one occasion , the wife of the family line beat her and locked her out of the abode . She was 10 .
I was a beaten man the moment I come along for I was learn off guard , " he would say . " Never were the fowl [ clay discs used in shooting shows ] so hard for two shooters as they flew from us , but never did a person make more inconceivable shots than did that small girl . She killed 23 and I kill 21 . It was her first big catch — my first frustration .
Oakley would afterwards wed Butler in a successful business partnership and marriage that lasted until their deaths some 50 years by and by . That first get together activate the idea behind Irving Berlin ’s musical , " Annie Get Your Gun . "
Annie Oakley, Star Shooter
Shortly after Butler and Oakley met , Oakley assume over for Butler ’s sick married person in his shooting act , which travel the Midwest doing various circuses and mixture shows . In 1885 , after Cody initially turn her down for Buffalo Bill ’s Wild West , she talked him into another tryout . Kasper , in her book , describes one of the practices Oakley did before the tryout , designed to test her endurance , in which she tried to break 5,000 glass clod in one day with a shotgun :
shell glass balls thrown into the air , with a scattergun , was a standard part of shot human activity in the Wild West show . ( scattergun were used because their buckshot did n’t travel so far to threaten hearing fellow member . ) But Oakley also had done other human activity in which she ’d shoot the ash off a fag purse between Butler ’s lip , or blare a cork out of a nursing bottle . She ’d shoot while tilt backward , and with the scattergun or plunder upside down . She ’d pass over over tables and grab a ordnance off the ground , shooting a ball before it collide with the background . She wasambidextrous , too .
One of her most famous tricks was using a mitt mirror to take aim at something behind her . Always garb immaculately in skirt , loose blouse and sombrero , Oakley ( with Butler by her side load up her guns and release clay pigeon ) shortly became one of the top acts in the show , which included the bully Buffalo Bill himself , re - creations of stagecoach robberies and buffalo hunt , and ( for a brief time ) real Native American chiefSitting Bull .
" In the shows , she was very outgoing , very idle - hearted , whereas she was just as comfortable in private living stay on home , " Arnett say . " Frank enjoy to write verse . And they loved fine art . They liked the fine thing in life sentence . She was very secret , very smooth , a stay-at-home when she was n’t on stage . "
In 1894 , Oakley appear inone of Thomas Edison ’s first strike pictures , shooting a rifle at quarry and little Lucius Clay pigeons . During her career , she teach thousands of women to shoot , even offering to train women for the U.S. government before the Spanish - American War .
Oakley and Butler continue to jaunt the earth with Buffalo Bill ’s Wild West , finally exit the show concisely after the turning of the century . Oakley keep with shooting exhibition , off and on , into her LX . She died in Greenville , Ohio , Nov. 21 , 1926 . Butler , her husband of 50 year , go just 18 24-hour interval after . The two are inhume together in Greenville .
In 1984 , Oakley — who expend much of her grownup aliveness in Maryland and New Jersey — was initiate into theNational Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Famein Fort Worth , Texas .
