At its , peak Tombstone, Arizona had a saloon every 100 inhabitants and a gambling hall for every 700 people.
In five years’ time, between 1879 and 1884, 52 people died from gunshots or knifings within city limits. Someone living in Dodge City during its heyday between 1876 and 1885 had a 1-in-61 chance of being gunned down—1.65 percent of the town’s entire population was murdered in those 10 years. Add to these statistics accidents, disease, criminals executed, suicides, lynchings, Indian attacks and deaths during childbirth, and the American frontier during the time of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday was indeed a dangerous place.
Because of a result of moralistic ambiguity mixed with a cocktail of bravado and Wild West whiskey, the outlaws and cowboys who rode the trails, drove…