He knew them, their families, wives and some of the off-spring. Glenn spent A LOT of time down in Tombstone after he left the Air Force, he lugged his famous two reeler tape deck down there and recorded everything. He had every letter that transpired between the relatives, and between the family members and him. A pile of them.
It took a long while for them to open up to him, they did, and he respected. Here's one I share with you. He and I toured the countryside where the cowboy gang roamed when Earp and the posse chased them. In their gang was among others , the Clantons, Curley Bill, and John Ringgold). Glenn always bugged me to use his full last name - Ringgold.
Glenn and I rode down an old wagon trail parallel to Turkey Creek and stopped short of a clearing. of to the right was a clearing, where Glenn said Ringo parked his horse, sread his blanket one night and was literally going to the bathroom, trap door down.
Earp and Holliday horsebacked it up the same road we were on, saw him, Wyatt yanked his rifle and began shooting at him. As Ringo ran, one hand on his shorts, the other on his pistol towards the other cowboys with him, he was hit twice by Wyatt and
keeled over.
Earp and Holliday commenced shooting, the other cowboys fled or died and Ringo was punctuated with rifle and pistol shot within the next ten minutes.
Now, get this. He was such a famous pistolero, and Holliday a darkly comic personality, he suggested spiking the body in the arms of a nearby tree trunk, but first, he insisted to strap the gunman's pistol belt on - UPSIDE DOWN. Holliday thought that a devastating funny joke. No one got it, none of the papers back east even printed it.
My friend, Glenn Boyer was one of the most assiduous researcher of western history that I know. He wouldn't release a piece unless he had three (3) references who could swear to the accuracy.
This I know.
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