"Wild Bill J.B. Hickok killed by the assassin Jack McCall in Deadwood Black Hills, August 2nd 1876. Pard, we will meet again in the happy hunting ground to part no more. Good Bye, Colorado Charlie, C.H. Utter."—Inscription on the original wood grave marker for legendary Western gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok
Three years and one day after Hickok (in the image accompanying this post) was shot in the back by Jack McCall, his buddy Charlie Utter, acting at the behest of their mutual friend Martha “Calamity Jane” Cannary, supervised the transfer of the sheriff/gambler's remains from Ingleside, the town cemetery in Whitewood Gulch, to Mount Mariah Cemetery. (Since new homes were needed for goldminers coming into the area, it was decided to move those buried in Ingleside to Mount Mariah.)
Thinking about the long stretches of desolate South Dakota territory, sometimes I ask myself: “Why on earth would anyone want to live there?” I still have that question, but at least I don’t wonder why people vacation there. For film and history fans, the area is a must.
After a year and a half of writing this blog, I’m surprised that I have written so little about the Wild West. The unbelievable number of myths that have accrued to its settlement obscures the fact that many unusual people did live there, acting in even more unusual ways.
I first came across the story of Wild Bill and Calamity Jane in the 1936 Western, The Plainsman. I remember at the time, when I was watching it as a youngster one Saturday afternoon on Channel 5 in the New York area in the early 1970s, that I was really taken with it.
Nowadays, knowing that it was directed by Cecil B. DeMille, one of cinema's great peddlers of unadultered hooey, I’d have severe reservations about the flick’s historical accuracy. And, in fact, while Abe Lincoln makes an appearance, Utter is nowhere to be found in the cast of characters.
Three years and one day after Hickok (in the image accompanying this post) was shot in the back by Jack McCall, his buddy Charlie Utter, acting at the behest of their mutual friend Martha “Calamity Jane” Cannary, supervised the transfer of the sheriff/gambler's remains from Ingleside, the town cemetery in Whitewood Gulch, to Mount Mariah Cemetery. (Since new homes were needed for goldminers coming into the area, it was decided to move those buried in Ingleside to Mount Mariah.)
Thinking about the long stretches of desolate South Dakota territory, sometimes I ask myself: “Why on earth would anyone want to live there?” I still have that question, but at least I don’t wonder why people vacation there. For film and history fans, the area is a must.
After a year and a half of writing this blog, I’m surprised that I have written so little about the Wild West. The unbelievable number of myths that have accrued to its settlement obscures the fact that many unusual people did live there, acting in even more unusual ways.
I first came across the story of Wild Bill and Calamity Jane in the 1936 Western, The Plainsman. I remember at the time, when I was watching it as a youngster one Saturday afternoon on Channel 5 in the New York area in the early 1970s, that I was really taken with it.
Nowadays, knowing that it was directed by Cecil B. DeMille, one of cinema's great peddlers of unadultered hooey, I’d have severe reservations about the flick’s historical accuracy. And, in fact, while Abe Lincoln makes an appearance, Utter is nowhere to be found in the cast of characters.
(I’m surprised that when it came to The Ten Commandments, DeMille didn’t come up with an alternative title that might have better suited himself and others in Tinseltown with a strong yen for adultery: The Ten Helpful Hints.)
But if there’s one rule about Golden Age Hollywood that you can take to the bank, it’s this: any film with Gary Cooper and Jean Arthur can’t be all bad.
A year or so ago, I tried to watch an episode of the HBO series Deadwood before giving up. I’m sure as I’m sitting here that the West featured spectacularly obscene characters, but I couldn’t help thinking that a little colorful language in this case would have gone a long way toward suggesting the whole. Delete only every other profanity and you still would have had an additional 10 minutes that could have been better spent on plot and character development.
Now, however, after researching this post and becoming more familiar with some of the real-life characters associated with the wild and woolly Western town, I wonder if it might be worth my time to go back and reassess the series. Comparing fact and fiction can be incredibly instructive.
Consider the following facts about one of the show’s characters, Utter, nicknamed “Colorado Charlie” for his trapping and prospecting days in the state:
* Talking about dandies—this guy was dressed to kill: long blond hair, luxuriously groomed moustache, hand-tailored fringed buckskins, fine linen shirts, beaded moccasins, a big silver belt buckle, and a pair of revolvers mounted in gold, silver and pearl. (When playwright George S. Kaufman saw friend Moss Hart attired similarly nearly sixty years later, he remarked: “Hi-yo, Silver!”)
A year or so ago, I tried to watch an episode of the HBO series Deadwood before giving up. I’m sure as I’m sitting here that the West featured spectacularly obscene characters, but I couldn’t help thinking that a little colorful language in this case would have gone a long way toward suggesting the whole. Delete only every other profanity and you still would have had an additional 10 minutes that could have been better spent on plot and character development.
Now, however, after researching this post and becoming more familiar with some of the real-life characters associated with the wild and woolly Western town, I wonder if it might be worth my time to go back and reassess the series. Comparing fact and fiction can be incredibly instructive.
Consider the following facts about one of the show’s characters, Utter, nicknamed “Colorado Charlie” for his trapping and prospecting days in the state:
* Talking about dandies—this guy was dressed to kill: long blond hair, luxuriously groomed moustache, hand-tailored fringed buckskins, fine linen shirts, beaded moccasins, a big silver belt buckle, and a pair of revolvers mounted in gold, silver and pearl. (When playwright George S. Kaufman saw friend Moss Hart attired similarly nearly sixty years later, he remarked: “Hi-yo, Silver!”)
* After reading Larry McMurtry’s Lonesome Dove, my friend Ann was prompted to remark about the powerfully bad smell emitted by Gus McCrae, Woodrow Call and their company. Utter would have been distinctly out of place among them. Highly unusual for the time, he actually bathed every single day. God help you if you ventured into his tent during his hygienic process. Even Wild Bill—who, as we know, was a pretty fair hand with a pistol—knew better than to try it. I think Utter actually expected women to be attracted by this! (If so, it worked—in the 1860s he caught the eye--or, in this case, perhaps atisfactorily stimulated the olfactory senses--of a teenager named Tilly Nash, subsequently marrying her.)
* Utter demonstrated how commerce was as much the business of the West as shooting. In fact, in one instance—his mail-express service from Deadwood to Cheyenne—he dealt in both, since he and his fellow employees had to cross mile upon mile of plains—filled with Native Americans who knew that he represented encroachingwhites, and weren’t too thrilled about it—on their appointed rounds. In fact, the 38-year-old Utter wasn’t around to steer Hickok away from trouble the day of his shooting because he had to take care of the business.
* Utter was brought back to Deadwood in 1879 because of legal difficulties with another business. He got tripped up for selling liquor without a license and was forced to watch the saloon he’d purchased earlier in the year close because of accusations that it was a nuisance dance hall.
A legend from the moment he was murdered, Hickok benefited from the care that not only Utter but Deadwood took to look after his grave. Twelve years after his removal to Mount Mariah, a bust was erected by Hickok's grave; in 1893, Capt. Jack Crawford engaged in a most ungunslinger-like activity—a poetry reading—to raise funds for stone work and an iron fence around the grave.
In the next decade, a life-size statue of “The Plainsman” was placed on the site, followed by wire fences around it to protect against vandalism. (The head of the bust had been knocked off—with as much concern for Wild Bill as Jack McCall had shown—by vandals.)
And Utter? He gradually slipped into the mists of history. Legend says that, after operating another saloon and gambling den, he journeyed down to Panama, where he became a doctor and druggist. A friend maintained that he’d seen him outside his pharmacy down there as late as 1910.
One hopes that “Colorado Charlie” made it to the “happy hunting ground” eventually with Wild Bill—who at least now can be content to have Calamity Jane lying by his side in Mount Mariah. (She had asked to be buried there when she passed on in 1903.)
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