Wyatt Earp is supposed to appear in more movies than any other American. His reputation has seesawed up and down over the years, with the first books and movies portraying him as a larger-than-life Western hero, followed by debunkers for whom Earp was a bully and con artist, followed by various nuanced presentations. This book is on the downside of the seesaw; author Frank Waters interviewed Virgil Earp’s widow, Alviria, in Los Angles in 1930 but didn’t get around to publishing until 1960. (Supposedly because Allie Earp threatened to sue Waters over distortions and inaccuracies, so Waters waited until after her death). Allie – or Waters – or both – portray Wyatt Earp as a pretty nasty character, mistreating his common-law wife Mattie, abandoning her for sultry Sarah Marcus, and having some sort of psychic hold over his brothers and Doc Holliday to get them to go along with his plans. There are extensive quotes of interactions between the Earps, the Earp women, and various other Tombstone characters – suggesting Allie, in her 80s when Waters interviewed her, had a remarkable memory for events 50 years earlier.

It's getting so each Earp book I read has a completely different perspective. Well, “when the legend becomes fact, print the legend” (and, ironically, I note that this line from gets frequently misquoted as “When the truth becomes legend, print the legend”, more of led the opposite of the original line). So take your choice with Wyatt Earp. See The Last Gunfight and Murder in Tombstone. ( )

The Earp Brothers of Tombstone and the famous fight at the O. K. Corral are well known to American history and even better known to American legend. This composite biography of Wyatt, Morgan, Virgil, James, and Warren Earp is based on the recollections of Mrs. Virgil Earp, dictated to the author in the 1930s, and amplified by documents he unearthed in 1959