David K. Stone (American, 1922 - 2001) "The Shootout" Signed lower right. Original Oil painting on Canvas.

Provenance: Collection of James A. Helzer (1946-2008), Founder of Unicover Corporation.

This painting originally appeared in the Fleetwood Trails West Collection of Fine Art Prints as "The Shootout" published in 1983.

"Three Men Hurled into Eternity in the Duration of a Moment," read the headlines. The Tombstone Epitaph blazed the story of the famous shootout which took place at the livery stable known as thh O.K. Corral. Tombstone, Arizona, the town "too tough to die," had chosen Virgil Earp city marshal along with his brothers Morgan and Wyatt and their hard-drinking cohort Doc Holliday. Rancher Ike Clanton, his clan and friends, had been labeled as rustlers, "fractious and ... much-dreaded cow-boys" as the Epitaph had called them. Earp had been warned that Clanton was "thirsting for blood" and had made threats to "shoot him on sight." When the two factions met, Virgil Earp commanded that the Clantons give up their guns. At that moment, two shots were fired simultaneously and only sixty seconds later the shootout was over with three of the Clanton group dead. The law of the frontier was quick and self-proclaimed, and lawmen were often quick to kill. They had to be, because, as everyone knew "there's no law west of Kansas City, and west of Fort Scott, no God." With outlawry running rampant in the mining camps, railroad camps, and on the cattle trails, despairing businessmen hired tough gunfighters for protection of the citizenry. Indeed, it was the reputations of lawmen -- such as the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday -- that helped to finally tame the Wild West.

Size: 21 x 18 in.
Unframed.
(B07577)

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