St. Michaels Map and History

© John Norton

On the broad Miles River, with its picturesque tree-lined streets and beautiful harbor, St. Michaels has been a haven for boats plying the Chesapeake and its inlets since the earliest days. Here, some of the handsomest models of the Bay craft, such as canoes, bugeyes, pungys and some famous Baltimore Clippers, were designed and built. The Church, named “St. Michael’s,” was the first building erected (about 1677) and around it clustered the town that took its name.

For a walking tour and more history of the St. Michaels area visit https://tidewatertimes.com/travel-tourism/st-michaels-maryland/.

tore after him, leaving Frank alone with the audience.

Still stagestruck, Frank honed his marksmanship, aiming to cash in on the popularity of post-Civil War shooting acts. The Wild West was being tamed, but men were still judged by how well they handled a gun. Frank and a partner went on tour as Graham & Butler’s Rifle Team. Traveling sharpshooters often challenged locals to a match. Frank seldom lost these head-tohead contests. He proclaimed he could beat “anything living, save Carver and Bogardus,” two acknowledged champions. Frank met his Waterloo trap-shooting outside

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Cincinnati, Ohio, when a local businessman brought forward a slight girl with long chestnut hair and arresting blue-gray eyes. At fi fteen, she was barely as tall as her fi rearm. Frank later said, “I was a beaten man the minute she appeared.”

Realizing she was his challenger, he was initially bemused but was glad for an introduction. He’d noticed her arriving in a wagon with somber-garbed Quaker relations. Frank won the toss to go fi rst in an alternating 25-shot round. Both made their fi rst 24 before Frank missed his 25th shot. The girl stepped up, said “Pull” and nailed her target, taking a prize legend says was $100. Afterward, Frank escorted Annie to her family’s wagon

Frank Butler impressed Annie’s mother. If he gambled, it was only in a shooter’s and gave them tickets to his show line of duty. With her mother’s perwhile her brother collected the fam- mission, he and Annie married the ily’s side bets. following year and began their 50-

This scene has been immortal- year journey together. ized in movies and a Broadway mu- There came a day John Graham sical, “Annie Get Your Gun.” In life, was too sick to perform, so Annie Phoebe Anne Mozee (Mosey/Mo- went on stage to fill in, tossing obses) was a shy backwoods girl, not jects or holding them for Frank. One the brash competitor depicted by day when his aim failed him, heckBarbara Stanwyck, Ethel Merman lers called, “Let the little lady shoot.” or Betty Hutton. Nor is there any re- Smooth-talking male sharpshootcord of Frank Butler being abashed ers were no rarity, but Annie and by defeat. He was intrigued from her shooting ability charmed and the start and wooed Annie long- astounded audiences. Frank had distance for months. the good grace, as well as the good

Frank was years older than Annie sense, to relinquish the spotlight to and had previously been married, his remarkable wife, re-dubbed Anbut he was free of vices usually as- nie Oakley. sociated with showmen. He neither With his years of experience and drank, smoked nor cursed, which savvy, Frank lovingly tutored Annie, who had little formal schooling, into a polished, confident performer. He developed tricks to showcase her natural ability and athleticism. To ensure accuracy, he loaded every shot she fired. He tossed targets or held them for her. At barely five feet tall, Annie gained confidence and came to perform with aplomb. She and Frank traveled with Sells Brothers Circus but were ready for a more congenial showcase, preferably one with extended engagements. On their last stops in the 1884 season, Sells Brothers Circus and Cody’s Wild West were both in New Orleans. The prior year, Bill Cody had

gone on the road in a doomed show, partnered with national champion W. F. Carver. Cody and Carver competed as tipplers as well as marksmen. Carver got so ornery that one day when he missed a shot, he smashed his rifle down on his horse’s head, then took a poke at his assistant. He and Cody endured that one season together, flipped a coin to divide show equipment and parted. To regroup as Cody’s Wild West for 1884, the middleaged buffalo hunter approached Nate Salisbury, an entrepreneur and Civil War veteran (graduate of Andersonville Prison), who had the organizational skill and business acumen he lacked. Cody pledged to avoid alcohol, once he’d had one or two to steady himself.

In New Orleans, Frank approached Cody to extol Annie’s talents, hoping to join Wild West’s second year, but Cody thought he had no opening for another shooter. In addition to himself, he had the famed Adam Bogardus, the man probably more responsible than any other for the extinction of passenger pigeons. With prairie pigeons teetering on the brink, Bogardus patented a trap to throw glass balls or clay pigeons instead of live birds. For verisimilitude, the glass balls were filled with feathers.