Gun laws were tougher in old Tombstone

Cowboys Chris Wheeland and Cecilia Barron pose outside the OK Corral site in Tombstone. In Old West days, guns had to be checked at a hotel or the sheriff's office; today any adult in Tombstone can carry one. (Tim Gaynor, Reuters / January 9, 2011)

No need to check your firearm today in the Arizona town famed for the gunfight at the OK Corral.

By Bob Drogin,
Los Angeles Times
January 23, 2011

Reporting from Tombstone, Ariz.

A billboard just outside this Old West town promises "Gunfights Daily!" and tourists line up each afternoon to watch costumed cowboys and lawmen reenact the bloody gunfight at the OK Corral with blazing six-shooters.

But as with much of the Wild West, myth has replaced history. The 1881 shootout took place in a narrow alley, not at the corral. Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday weren't seen as heroic until later; they were initially charged with murder.

And one fact is usually ignored: Back then, Tombstone had far stricter gun control than it does today. In fact, the American West's most infamous gun battle erupted when the marshal tried to enforce a local ordinance that barred carrying firearms in public. A judge had fined one of the victims $25 earlier that day for packing a pistol.

"You could wear your gun into town, but you had to check it at the sheriff's office or the Grand Hotel, and you couldn't pick it up again until you were leaving town," said Bob Boze Bell, executive editor of True West Magazine, which celebrates the Old West. "It was an effort to control the violence."

(More here.)