For the past couple of days, we’ve been delving into the movie Tombstone. Now We’d like to show you what some of the people portrayed in the film actually looked like:

Fred White (c. 1849 – 1880)

Curly Bill Brocious (c. 1845 – March 24, 1882)

Tom McLaury (June 30, 1853 – October 26, 1881)

And last, but not least:

Wyatt Earp (March 19, 1848 – January 13, 1929)

Those are just a few of the people portrayed in Tombstone.  Now for a more general view of some of the inhabitants of Arizona during the 1880s:

Sheriff and associates, c. 1880s.

Three cowboys from John Slaughter’s Ranch outfit. The men are identified on the reverse in pencil as, “Wake Benge, Tad Roland, and Jeff Lewis – Cowboys for John H. Slaughter in July 1879 all came to Arizona with Mr. Slaughter’s first herd.” Photographed by C.S. Fly.

Cowboys from John Slaughter’s ranch, c. 1885

The above pictures give an idea of how people actually looked during the period. Original photographs are in invaluable source of information for researching costume information but they should be used judiciously- often times, people dressed up especially for the camera and this may not reflect their “everyday” clothes. Also, photographers often maintained all manner of props so people could look like someone they weren’t (like say, a cowboy :-)). We encourage people to do their own research, there are hundreds, if not thousands of pictures out there. 🙂