Episode 22: Trial at the O.K Corral
The Earp-Holliday Case
In 1881, the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday faced the Clantons and the McLaurys in the Old West's most famous showdown: the gunfight at the O.K. Corral. When the smoke cleared, three men lay dead. Some called it Western justice. But would Western justice suffice as a defense when one of the survivors took the Earps and Holliday to trial for murder?
Episode Resources
Episode Transcript
Works Cited/
Referenced
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Allan Barra, “When Referee Wyatt Earp Laid Down the Law,” The New York Times, November 26, 1995.
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Les Carpenter, “The forgotten story of…Wyatt Earp and the ‘fixed’ heavyweight title fight,” The Guardian, July 22, 2015.
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Sean Crose, “The Fight That Haunted Wyatt Earp,” The Fight City, December 2, 2023.
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“The Death of Ike Clanton,” True West Magazine, November 11, 2020.
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“Decision of Judge Wells Spicer after the Preliminary Hearing in the Earp-Holliday Case,” November 30, 1881, via Famous Trials.
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Mark Dworkin, “The Spicer Hearing Testimony of H.F Sills as it appeared in the Tombstone Daily Epitaph, A detailed comparison with the Tombstone Nugget and the Turner version,” via Famous Trials.
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Andrew C. Isenberg, “Was Wyatt Earp a Horse Thief?” True West Magazine, July 9, 2013.
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Stuart N. Lake, Wyatt Earp: Frontier Marshal (Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1931).
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Douglas O. Linder, “The Earp Trial: Selected Maps” and “The Earp Trial: Selected Images,” Famous Trials.
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Steven Lubet, Murder in Tombstone: The Forgotten Trial of Wyatt Earp (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004).
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Bill Lynam, “The Facts of Virgil Earp’s Connection to Prescott,” Sharlot Hall Museum, October 13, 2001.
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“Morgan Seth Earp,” “Nicholas Porter Earp,” “Virgil Walter Earp,” and “Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp,” FamilySearch.
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Kieran Mulvaney, “The fight, the foul and the lawman,” ESPN, October 26, 2013.
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Richard Rule, “A Desperate Street Fight,” Daily Nugget, October 27, 1881.
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Lee A. Silva, “The Mysterious Morgan Earp,” HistoryNet, January 16, 2018.
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Ron Soodalter, “The Untold Story of Wyatt Earp in Missouri,” Missouri Life Magazine, January 31, 2023.
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Testimony in the Preliminary Hearing in the Earp-Holliday Case, from The O.K. Corral Inquest, edited by Alford Turner (1992), via Famous Trials.
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“Tombstone Courthouse State Park,” Tombstone Chamber of Commerce, 2024.
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Marshall Trimble, “What Happened in the Billy Allen–”Doc” Holliday Fight Over $5?” True West Magazine, May 4, 2018.
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“William Rowland McLaury,” FindAGrave.
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J. Craig Williams, “The Wild West in Court: Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday’s Fight for Freedom After the O.K. Corral,” In Dispute: 10 Famous Trials That Changed History, Legal Talk Network, September 17, 2024.
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“Wyatt Earp,” transcript, American Experience, PBS, January 25, 2010.
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Elaine Young, “Wells W. Spicer,” Washington County Historical Society.
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Eric Zotcavage, “How prospector Ed Schieffelin found his Tombstone,” 3TV/CBS5, last updated March 4, 2019.