Belle Starr- The "Female" old west outlaw from Oklahoma
Belle Starr is most remembered by Western History fans as the wild-west shootem-up fans as the gal with two pistols that rode horses, held up stage coaches, shot down citizens and generally hell raisers in central/south Oklahoma and northern Texas.
There is a town called Chekotah in the bowels of Oklahoma, you'll remember a brand of clothing years back by the same name. This jerk-water town by a lake nearby housed a resort called Fountainhead.
For a brief period in my unfortunate career I managed the sales and marketing, and part of the operations of that resort. Sort of like herding ducks, if you will. Anyway, nuff about that - on the weekends, I used to drive through the underbrush of Oklahoma and search out Jesse James hide-outs, Belle Starr homes, and other wild-west talking points.
First off, whatever your thoughts of the "Queen of the west" Starr, forgettabout it. She was as ugly as the horse she rode. And, meaner than most of the snakes around her ranch, which - fortunately - were just a few miles from said resort where I was ensconced.
Starr's ranch is still there, vacant and untouched. The madam was meaner than hell, had a scorched earth policy to just about anyone that got within feet of her, husband and two sons included. I mean EVERYONE hated her. Stories abound locally, that even the country Sheriff (at the time) wound have shot her if he could have done so surreptitiously.
There is a deep well in the front yard of Starr's ranch house which is 50 yards from the road way passing by her house. History records that her sons hated her so much, one of them gunned her down as she sat on her horse by that well. The impact of the gunshots it is reported knocked her off the nag, propelling her downward into the well.
The sons were so vindictive, the locals say, they left her there. Her husband, Capt. Henry Starr, made no notable comment for the history books as he was supposedly on the run from the law at the time.
No one has lived in that house for at least a century.
In central Oklahoma, small villages proliferate, rumors, legends, and folklore flourish. It is common to enjoy cocktails with some of the neighbors who might brag about their family trees as far back to the original Apache Kid, or some local Indian Chief who figured in Oklahoma's history causing mass casualties just for the love of money, mayhem and murder.
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There is a town called Chekotah in the bowels of Oklahoma, you'll remember a brand of clothing years back by the same name. This jerk-water town by a lake nearby housed a resort called Fountainhead.
For a brief period in my unfortunate career I managed the sales and marketing, and part of the operations of that resort. Sort of like herding ducks, if you will. Anyway, nuff about that - on the weekends, I used to drive through the underbrush of Oklahoma and search out Jesse James hide-outs, Belle Starr homes, and other wild-west talking points.
First off, whatever your thoughts of the "Queen of the west" Starr, forgettabout it. She was as ugly as the horse she rode. And, meaner than most of the snakes around her ranch, which - fortunately - were just a few miles from said resort where I was ensconced.
Starr's ranch is still there, vacant and untouched. The madam was meaner than hell, had a scorched earth policy to just about anyone that got within feet of her, husband and two sons included. I mean EVERYONE hated her. Stories abound locally, that even the country Sheriff (at the time) wound have shot her if he could have done so surreptitiously.
There is a deep well in the front yard of Starr's ranch house which is 50 yards from the road way passing by her house. History records that her sons hated her so much, one of them gunned her down as she sat on her horse by that well. The impact of the gunshots it is reported knocked her off the nag, propelling her downward into the well.
The sons were so vindictive, the locals say, they left her there. Her husband, Capt. Henry Starr, made no notable comment for the history books as he was supposedly on the run from the law at the time.
No one has lived in that house for at least a century.
In central Oklahoma, small villages proliferate, rumors, legends, and folklore flourish. It is common to enjoy cocktails with some of the neighbors who might brag about their family trees as far back to the original Apache Kid, or some local Indian Chief who figured in Oklahoma's history causing mass casualties just for the love of money, mayhem and murder.
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