Who Would You Like to Meet?

My article on the hanging of George Smiley was published in the latest issue of The Journal of the Wild West History Association. The story is not so much about George, but about Navajo County Sheriff Frank Wattron, who wanted nothing to do with the execution of ol' George which he was going to be forced to perform. I believe Wattron had a moral qualm about the execution. Not that he was opposed to capital punishment. Wattron had just seen to many men convicted of like crimes, have their sentences commuted to life imprisonment, and then be pardoned after a few years in the penitentiary. He likely thought George did not deserve to have his neck stretched for a crime others had served short sentences for.

Not long ago, some western-oriented site I subscribe to asked the question, 'Who would you most like to meet?' Most the responses were for famous/infamous characters - Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, Jesse James, Calamity Jane, Billy the Kid, etc. Fairly prosaic, and the decisions of the responders based far too much on pop culture representations of these men and women, and not from the historial record. From all I have read, I have concluded Holliday was a mean-spirited drunk. Who really wants to have dinner and a conversation with a person like that?

After giving the question some serious consideration, I came up with three people from that era and that locale who I would actually want to meet and have dinner and a conversation with - Madame Eva Blanchard, Madame Jennie "Belgian Jennie" Bauters, and Frank Wattron. Blanchard and Bauters I respect for being strong women in an era when the patriarchy was so overt. I must agree with John Steinbeck (East of Eden) who wrote ""Every town has its celebrated madams, eternal women to be sentimentalized down the years. There is something very attractive to men about a madam. She combines the brains of a businessman, the toughness of a prize fighter, the warmth of a companion, the humor of a tragedian. Myths collect around her, and, oddly enough, not voluptuous myths." I too may have overly romanticized ideas about these women.

Frank Wattron interests me for different reasons. I first ran across him while working on my biography of Commodore Perry Owens. Wattron wrote numerous letters to the editor of The St. Johns Herald, and, later, The Holbrook Argus in which he eviscerated the local politicians and others who were held in high regards by their contemporaries. Legend has it, Wattron was educated by the Jesuits. We know his uncle who raised him after he was orphaned was a reverend, and presumably an educated man. Allegedly, he ran away at a young age, and when he arrived in Holbrook, all he had was a deck of cards to his name and his wits. Wattron would go on to become a druggist, had his own drugstore, and served as City Marshal for years. His weapon of choice was a large shotgun, but there is no evidence he ever killed anyone with it.

However, it is these writings - his letters to the newspapers - which really give an insight as to who he was. Scathing and sardonic, he rarely pulled his punches (and often signed them with self-effacing aliases, like "Nimrod"). This is most evident from the infamous invitation he penned for the execution of George Smiley, in which he stated "the latest improved methods in the art of scientific strangulation will be employed and everything possible will be done to make the proceedings cheerful and the execution a success." Wattron was not simply being glib, but was opposed to having to execute Smiley, and this was how he chose to express his displeasure. It certainly got people's attention, including that the of the Territorial Governor and the President of the United States, though they did not understand his motives or reasoning.

I think Frank Wattron would be the person from the Old West era I would most like to meet, as I think his intelligence, education, and wry sense of humor would make for an interesting conversation.