I have been on the trail of a gunfighter. Wyatt Earp, arguably the most famous frontier character who ever appeared on both large and small screens, has been the focus of my research, and during the past few months I have uncovered some interesting items in my travels. I wish I could show them to you, but that will be explained in a moment.
In November of 2017, I went to Los Angeles, California where I visited with Ms. Kate Edelman, the daughter of Louis Edelman who produced the television series “The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp. Kate was very gracious and invited me to her home after she learned I had been exchanging emails with Hugh O’Brian, the star of the show, shortly before his death in 2016. We had a very pleasant hour together in her comfortable home where I scribbled furiously as she answered my questions.
My next stop was the Huntington Library in Pasadena, California, where I reviewed the papers of Stuart N. Lake, the author of Wyatt’s 1931 biography and a consultant for the television show. Here is where I first realized that the stereotypes of archivists portrayed as fussy obstacles to researchers are sometimes true. The staff insisted that I could not take pictures of any documents lest I silenced the very quiet shutter noise the electronic camera makes when making an exposure. When I could not do it, the attendant took the camera and fiddled with it mightily, changing all kinds of settings and still failing to silence the click. I finally took it back, went into the lobby, and carefully reviewed the options until I found a way to quiet it. (Why this should even matter in their cavernous reading room is anyone’s guess.) I was also cautioned with what seemed to be severe legal repercussions should I dare to display any document images on the internet, which is why you only see my picture of the impressive grounds of the institution.
Once I gained admission to Huntington sanctum, I was informed that material would only be paged on the hour, that I had missed the first hour, and that only a few boxes would be paged at a time and only one serviced at a time. In essence, these restrictions guaranteed that one could only review a fraction of a collection on any given day. I was also “busted” for chewing gum, which made me feel as if I was still in the third grade. (I would not have been surprised if the clerk had held out her hand and demanded I spit out the offending item just as Mrs. Kubista did back at the Steven T. Mason Elementary School in 1963). An overall unpleasant research experience, but I have only myself to blame. You would think by this time I would be adept at conforming to whatever rules a particular institution insists on, and I failed to do my homework at the Huntington.
My next research trip was to New York City in December where the Billy Rose Theater Archives had for inspection an original screenplay of the television show written by Frederick Hazlitt Brennan. Since I knew the title ahead of time, I was able to watch that particular episode and compare it to the document. The archivists at this lonesome place were more personable, but a byzantine system of requesting an item at one desk, being referred to a second desk to submit it in written form, and then waiting in the reading area until my name should appear on a display monitor seemed overly complicated. My name never did appear on the monitor, but after waiting fifteen minutes and inquiring at the reading room desk I was handed the folder.
My last journey took me to the Arizona Historical Society where I was allowed to review the accession file of the Frank Waters “Tombstone Travesty” manuscript. Here the system was much more informal, and the reference archivist swiftly and efficiently produced the material with a minimum of fuss. Perhaps this is because I have been good friends with the former archivist there and had emailed in advance my precise request to which they answered in the affirmative. An added treat was visiting the museum afterwards and seeing an actual handgun owned by Wyatt Earp on display.
