Best Of The West Little House Museum An Intriguing Visit

Ever get to wondering whatever happened to Ike Clanton?

Although he earned a permanent niche in Western lore as one of the participants in the gunfight at the O.K. Corral - and lived to tell about it - he just sort of rode off into the sunset of history after that.

The fight occurred in Tombstone on Oct. 26, 1881, when Ike and his brother, Billy, teamed with Tom and Frank McLaury to face the Earp faction - brothers Wyatt, Morgan and Virgil, and Doc Holliday. Historians say it lasted 30 seconds with 34 shots fired.

When it was over, both McLaurys were dead, and Billy Clanton was dying from six bullet wounds. Morgan and Virgil Earp were seriously wounded. Doc Holliday suffered a crease. Only Wyatt Earp and Ike Clanton came out of it untouched by flying lead.

Then Ike Clanton’s time in the limelight faded. He hasn’t been completely forgotten because he keeps popping up in Wyatt Earp movies as the leader of the bad guys who got theirs in the shootout. But with the exception of “My Darling Clementine,” a heavily fictionalized account filmed in 1945, he saddles up and rides off after the gunshots fade. (In that flick, Ike was portrayed by Grant Withers and got himself mortally shot during the fight. It is one of several misappropriations of fact in the movie.)

Other actors who have played Ike include Lyle Bettger in “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral,” 1957; Robert Ryan in “Hour of the Gun,” 1967; Steven Lang in “Tombstone,”1993; and Jeff Fahey in “Wyatt Earp,” 1994. They all lived.

So really, what happened to Ike?

Well, he died rather unexpectedly.

Gunshot.

Had it coming.

The details are all in the Little House Museum, seven miles west of Eagar in one of those delightful settings that you find, then hesitate to tell others about because it might get too popular.

To get there, turn south off Arizona 260 on County Road 4124, travel through some spectacular countryside for three miles to South Fork Highway, take a right, drive past the South Fork Resort, and there it is, nestled down in a little valley next to South Fork Creek, light-years from the hustle of the city.

If small-town museums were rated on a scale of 1 to 10, this one would be a 36.

Technically, it’s about 10 years old, but its roots go back to the 1880s, when Apache County was, in many respects, not a very nice place. Cattle rustling was an accepted occupation; murder was almost a way of life.

A newspaper editor of those times pleaded for an end to the lawlessness and killing when he wrote: “Permit a few of our citizens to live and die of natural causes so as to show the world what a magnificent healthy country this is.”

The museum has four buildings. The first was a log cabin built around 1885 by James Hale, who was killed by gunfire in 1886. John T. Butler acquired Hale’s property and moved the cabin onto his X Diamond Ranch.

Winkie Crigler, Butler’s granddaughter, now owns the ranch and founded the museum. She was born there and has never left except to earn degrees from Arizona State University and the University of Arizona. She taught school in Eagar for 25 years, but when her husband, Oscar, died in 1985, she turned her attention to the museum.

“At first, it was just going to be a place to display all the awards my husband won at horse shows,” she said. “But once I got into it and started researching the Butler family, others got interested.”

Soon, she had enough donations from “people who thought … their heritage was worth preserving” to move a second log cabin onto the site. Then a new cabin was added and, finally, an art gallery and salon.

The museum deals mostly with the history of Apache County, such as this episode, reported in another clipping from the “St. Johns Herald”:

“Falsehoods and thievery abound in Apache County, but there is not enough of either or both to defeat C.P. Owens (a lawman who was running for sheriff). Slanders uttered against him are traced in every instance to the lips of thieves, but they are merely the death-rattle in the throat of an expiring iniquity.”

Some modern-day heroes also receive attention. The newest addition to the museum, a large log cabin, originally was meant to house a carriage given to the Criglers by actor John Wayne, whose 26 Bar Ranch adjoined theirs. And the horse-show display contains photographs and several references to actor Ben Johnson, another family friend.

The buildings contain 1880s fashions, tools, ranching gear and other items; ancient Native American pottery found on the ranch; and a good collection of written material about those wild and woolly days.

And the museum is emerging as a cultural center. Rockwell Jackson, a Tucson artist, has taken up full-time summer residency in one of the original cabins; the other is filled with old musical instruments, including a magnificent turn-of-the-century creation that uses forced air to play 11 instruments.

During the second annual Cowboy Cow Pasture Golf Association tournament at the ranch earlier this year, 10 Arizona artists worked and exhibited in the salon.

Crigler says the art exhibition will be bigger at the third annual CCPGA event, scheduled for next June 21.

The museum draws tourists and schoolchildren on field trips - as many as two buses a day in the summer.

Crigler and her sister, Sug Peters, conduct the tours, run the ranch and tend to the needs of visitors who occupy three guest cabins.

Although the museum’s prime time is May 25 through Labor Day, winter tours may be arranged by calling (520) 333-2286.

So back to Ike Clanton.

After the shootout in Tombstone, he migrated to Apache County and took up rustling.

But his career came to an abrupt end June 1, 1887, when J.V. Brighton of Springerville shot and killed him while serving a warrant for his arrest.

The “Phoenix Weekly Herald” described it:

“This ended the wild career of poor deluded, misguided Ike Clanton. He sowed to the winds and harvested the whirlwind and his harvest is gathered into a narrow house six feet by two, and the panther, wolf and bear growl a fitting requiem over his grave. His end was typical of his life - swift, rough and the hardest that could be the fate of any mortal man.”