One for you Old West history buffs

[PegLeg45]

Old text, new wrinkles: Did Butch Cassidy survive?

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Did Butch Cassidy, the notorious Old West outlaw who most historians believe perished in a 1908 shootout in Bolivia, actually survive that battle and live to old age, peacefully and anonymously, in Washington state? And did he pen an autobiography detailing his exploits while cleverly casting the book as biography under another name?

A rare books collector says he has obtained a manuscript with new evidence that may give credence to that theory. The 200-page manuscript, "Bandit Invincible: The Story of Butch Cassidy," which dates to 1934, is twice as long as a previously known but unpublished novella of the same title by William T. Phillips, a machinist who died in Spokane in 1937.

Utah book collector Brent Ashworth and Montana author Larry Pointer say the text contains the best evidence yet — with details only Cassidy could have known — that "Bandit Invincible" was not biography but autobiography, and that Phillips himself was the legendary outlaw.

More at link:
http://news.yahoo.com/old-text-wrinkles-did-butch-cassidy-survive-083206159.html

[tombogan03884]

I have heard stories that claimed both survived Bolivia.
Like Billy the Kid, and Jesse James it makes for interesting speculation, although the claims by relatives, including a sister, that he visited in the 20's and 30's make it a lot harder to put down to imagination.

[dipisc]

Hi;

     If true, just think of the sequel that Redford and Newman could have made !

[tombogan03884]

That reminds me, whatever became of Etta Place ?

[Timothy]

That reminds me, whatever became of Etta Place ?

She married Sam Elliott!

Oh!  You mean the real one!


 

[Sponsor]

[Pathfinder]

Etta? No one knows. She left, presumably on a steamer to San Francisco, and disappeared into history.

As for Butch and Sundance, recent excavations in Bolivia did find 2 bodies, but neither belonged to B&S. Some azzhole on FB claimed that didn't prove anything, as lots of people were buried in that cemetery and they didn't dig everyone up. He then said that the excavations didn't prove that they weren't buried there. Never did get the point I made that you cannot prove a negative. Ah, the idjiots on teh intertubes! It's clear that 2 Anglo bandidos are buried in that cemetery, just not B&S, whose ID was done by Pinkertons from "eye witnesses" well after the 2 were dead and buried.

I for one land on the side of them surviving if only because of the sister's testimony - on film - that Butch came to visit her and the artifacts that she had that can be traced to photographs of Butch wearing some of them. Not definitive to be sure, but compelling at the least.

[blackwolfe]

Redford wrote a book in 81 I think called The Outlaw Trail: A Journey Through Time.  If I remember corrctly it is a good read and he talked about Butch's sister.  If I rember correctly Butch's sister hunted and slept outdoors well into her senior years.  I think she carried a Winchester lever gun.

[blackwolfe]

I may have Butch's sisiter confused with Ann Bassett, his one time girlfriend.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Bassett

It was along time ago that I read the book.

[tombogan03884]

Butch Cassidy was just one of several Outlaws who's end, while reported  are still in doubt.
There were of course Billy the Kid and Jesse James, there was also my Fathers Great Uncle for whom he was named.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Bogan

Dan Bogan (1860 - after 1889) was an American gunfighter and outlaw of the American Old West, who today is considered to have been one of the most underrated gunmen of the 19th century west. He is included as one of twelve described in such a way, in the book "Deadly Dozen", by author Robert K. DeArment.

Much more at link

[twyacht]

Butch Cassidy was just one of several Outlaws who's end, while reported  are still in doubt.
There were of course Billy the Kid and Jesse James, there was also my Fathers Great Uncle for whom he was named.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Bogan

Dan Bogan (1860 - after 1889) was an American gunfighter and outlaw of the American Old West, who today is considered to have been one of the most underrated gunmen of the 19th century west. He is included as one of twelve described in such a way, in the book "Deadly Dozen", by author Robert K. DeArment.

Much more at link

I wonder how he felt about post Civil War politics Johnson, Grant, Benjamin Harrison?....and where's that apple? Right next to the tree?

Harrison, a Republican, was elected to the presidency in 1888, defeating Democratic incumbent Grover Cleveland. His administration is most remembered for economic legislation, including the McKinley Tariff and the Sherman Antitrust Act, and for annual federal spending that reached one billion dollars for the first time. Democrats attacked the "Billion Dollar Congress", and used the issue, along with the growing unpopularity of the high tariff, to defeat the Republicans, both in the 1890 mid-term elections and in Harrison's bid for re-election in 1892. He also saw the admittance of six states into the Union

My how times have changed..