NationStates Jolt Archive

Answer this poll about your favorite gunfighter. State it, then discuss why he's your favorite. And please, make it a REAL gunfighter, not a fictional one.

The Cisco Kid. (Gene Wilder, Blazing Saddles) Need I say more?

Oooohhh!!!! Nice question! :) (I'll wait for the poll before I answer.)

State it, then discuss why he's your favorite. And please, make a REAL gunfighter, not a fictional one.
Meany.

Wild Bill Hickcock. He was faster than most with "inferior" guns (he used Cap & Ball revolvers even when people hd moved to cartridge guns.)

Modern would have to be (Edit) Bill Jordan (Elmer Keith was never a true "gunfighter".)

Wyatt Earp - he's a distant relative of my wife. (2nd cousin 6 times removed, to be precise.)

:p

I'm disappointed there's no "Han Solo" option, oh well...

I'm disappointed there's no "Han Solo" option, oh well...

Looks like someone needs to start a poll for favorite fictional gunfighter. That someone will not be me, however.

(Um, you did know that Han Solo is fictional, right? Right?)
:p

(Um, you did know that Han Solo is fictional, right? Right?)
Say it ain't so, Joe. Say it ain't so... :(

Those are all USian, no?

For gunfighter, I gotta go with Doc Holiday.

For Stungun Fighter, I gotta go with my buddy, Jeff. He got in about two zaps on each of us for every one he got. Very crafty with those things. :p

Those are all USian, no?
How about this one?

http://www.possentisociety.com/history.asp

St. Gabriel Possenti was a Catholic seminarian whose marksmanship and proficiency with handguns single-handedly saved the village of Isola, Italy from a band of 20 terrorists in 1860.

The Savior of Isola

In 1860, a band of soldiers from the army of Garibaldi entered the mountain village of Isola, Italy. They began to burn and pillage the town, terrorizing its inhabitants.

Possenti, with his seminary rector's permission, walked into the center of town, unarmed, to face the terrorists. One of the soldiers was dragging off a young woman he intended to rape when he saw Possenti and made a snickering remark about such a young monk being all alone.

Possenti quickly grabbed the soldier's revolver from his belt and ordered the marauder to release the woman. The startled soldier complied, as Possenti grabbed the revolver of another soldier who came by. Hearing the commotion, the rest of the soldiers came running in Possenti's direction, determined to overcome the rebellious monk.

At that moment a small lizard ran across the road between Possenti and the soldiers. When the lizard briefly paused, Possenti took careful aim and struck the lizard with one shot. Turning his two handguns on the approaching soldiers, Possenti commanded them to drop their weapons. Having seen his handiwork with a pistol, the soldiers complied. Possenti ordered them to put out the fires they had set, and upon finishing, marched the whole lot out of town, ordering them never to return. The grateful townspeople escorted Possenti in triumphant procession back to the seminary, thereafter referring to him as "the Savior of Isola".

I got to go with Doc Holliday too. I didn't even see him in the poll...no one calls him "John".

I got to go with Doc Holliday too. I didn't even see him in the poll...no one calls him "John".

You edited that quickly, you sneaky bugger! I was about to make fun of you. ;)

You edited that quickly, you sneaky bugger! I was about to make fun of you. ;)

:p Gotta love that high-speed connection!

:p Gotta love that high-speed connection!

Not that it usually does one much good with Jolt's servers...

elfego baca

he was a local socorro man who at age 19, the age my son is now, decided he needed to kick some ass when texans were roughing up the locals in a town about 100 miles from here. adventures ensued and he ended up surviving a 36 hour battle with 4000 rounds being fired into the cabin he holed up in. (turned out the cabin had a dug out floor so the bullets didnt have much chance of hitting him)

"I never wanted to kill anybody," Elfego Baca told me, "but if a man had it in his mind to kill me, I made it my business to get him first."

Elfego Baca belongs to the six-shooter epoch of American history. Those were the days when hard-shooting Texas cowboys invaded the territory of New Mexico, driving their herds of longhorns over the sheep ranges of the New Mexicans, for whom they had little liking or respect. Differences were settled quickly, with few words and a gun. Those were the days of Billy the Kid, with whom Elfego, at the age of seventeen, made a tour of the gambling joints in Old Albuquerque. In the words of Kyle Crichton, who wrote Elfego Baca's biography, "the life of Elfego Baca makes Billy the Kid look like a piker." Harvey Ferguson calls him "a knight-errant from the romantic point of view if ever the six-shooter West produced one

from a wpa project interview of elfego baca. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/wpa/20040209.html

Annie Oakley is a real favorite of mine, but if you want to get picky that she was more of a gunslinger than a gunfighter, Belle Starr would be on my list of favorites. On the given list, probably Wild Bill Hickok.

Overall, I'm going with Ned Kelly. The whole armor plate bit is just too classic. For gunfighters from the US, either Tom Horn, Sam Bass, or Doc Holiday - too hard to choose.

The Waco Kid.

Overall, I'm going with Ned Kelly. The whole armor plate bit is just too classic. For gunfighters from the US, either Tom Horn, Sam Bass, or Doc Holiday - too hard to choose.

Ned Kelly, good on you! :)

Ned Kelly, good on you! :)

Thanks. I've loved the story since I first heard it. I grew up on outlaw and gunfighter stories back home in Texas, but Ned Kelly is just so much more of a mythic figure. Plus, like I said, the suit of armor was way cool. (And I have to love a country who's national mythos can be boiled down to dreamtime, bush rangers, and ANZACs.)