The Marvelous Mrs. Oakley

by | Aug 3, 2020 | Guns, History, Outdoors, Products You Need | 236 comments

The Marvelous Mrs. Oakley

The Wild West

The late 1800s were remarkable for many things in the United States, but one of those things was the advent of the traveling Wild West shows.  One of the greater of those shows was run by one William Cody, known otherwise as Buffalo Bill.  Cody’s show, Buffalo Bill’s Wild West, presented many entertainments, but chief among them were the trick-shot exhibitions, which did much to get small-town and city kids interested in shooting.

Chief among these trick-shot artists from 1885 on was a little slip of a girl, who none other than Sitting Bull gave the name Watanya Cicilla (Little Sure Shot).  Her name was Phoebe Ann (Annie) Butler nee Mosley, but on stage, she went by Annie Oakley, and her career in the shooting arts was nothing short of remarkable.

The Woman

Phoebe Ann Mosley (sometimes presented as Mosey, sometimes as Moses) was born in western Ohio on August 13, 1860, to an impoverished farm family.  She was the sixth of nine children born to her parents, Susan and Jacob Mosley.  When Annie was six years old her father died of pneumonia.  Susan Mosley remarried not long after Jacob’s death (the exact date is unclear) but her second husband, one Dan Brumbaugh, died shortly after that, leaving the family with nothing except another baby.

When Annie was about eight, she was sent to the Darke County Infirmary, where in exchange for a basic education, she helped take care of the orphaned and mentally ill children housed there.  The experience was evidently an unpleasant one, for in later years Annie referred to the couple who ran the Infirmary as “the wolves” and never revealed their real names.  When she returned home at age fourteen, her mother had remarried to a Joseph Shaw, but the family’s circumstances were still spare and then some.

Young Annie

The family needed income, and to help with that, young Annie turned to the only thing her late father had left her – an old muzzle-loading “Kentucky” rifle.  The Katzenberger brothers, who were grocers in nearby Greenville, Ohio, were engaged in the business of buying game from the locals for sale to hotels and restaurants in Cincinnati.  Annie took to this with a will, quickly developing into a crack shot.  Her hunting skill and marksmanship was good enough that, but the time she was fifteen, she had paid off the $200 mortgage on her family’s farm.

Word of her shooting skill eventually spread to the ears of Jack Frost, a Cincinnati hotelier who had bought a fair amount of the game Annie had brought to bag.  He invited Annie to participate in a shooting contest with a traveling trick-shooter named Frank E. Butler, and that invitation would change the course of young Annie’s life forever.

The Beginning

Butler, an Irish immigrant and experienced marksman, was a bit nonplussed when Frost presented his challenger, a teenaged girl with long curly hair.  After Butler made a side bet of a hundred dollars with Frost – a substantial sum in those days – the contest was arranged, twenty-five shots at twenty-five targets.

While many of the details of that contest, such as range, target size and so on, are not recorded, the outcome was.  Butler hit twenty-four of his twenty-five targets, while Annie turned in a perfect score of twenty-five.

This performance entranced Butler, and it seems Butler had something of a similar effect on young Annie, for the two began a romance that culminated in their marriage on August 23, 1876.  The two would remain married for the rest of their lives.

Henceforth, when Butler’s traveling marksman show took to the road, Annie accompanied him.

The Show

Frank Butler

Annie went on tour with her husband, but did not appear on stage until May 1st, 1882, when Butler’s partner in the exposition fell ill.  Annie, then twenty-two, took his place, holding targets for her husband to shoot at (!) and doing some shooting of her own.  Audiences loved the petite girl’s shooting skills, and so for the first time, Annie adopted the stage name Annie Oakley and became a primary performer in the show.

In 1884 the Butlers joined the Sells Brothers Circus, but only stayed with that group for a year before moving up to the Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show in 1885.  Now Annie Oakley hit the big time, as Bill Cody himself realized the potential in promoting a young woman as one of the show’s best exhibition shooters.

Annie therefore moved up to star billing, and her husband Frank graciously accepted the role of her manager.  The Butlers would remain with the Wild West Show for seventeen years, during which time Annie performed for Queen Victoria, King Umberto I of Italy, President Carnot of France and the German Kaiser Wilhelm II; that last royal deserves special mention, as during a personal performance he invited Annie to shoot the ashes from a cigarette he held in his mouth; Annie met the challenge with aplomb.  It was rumored that, after the outbreak of the Great War, Annie wrote to Kaiser Wilhelm asking for a second shot; the Kaiser wisely declined to reply.

In 1901, following a train accident that left her gravely injured, temporarily paralyzed and in need of multiple spinal operations, Annie was forced to leave the Wild West Show.  When she recovered, she resumed her performances on a smaller scale, including acting in a stage play called The Western Girl.  In her semi-retirement, she began training other women in marksmanship, stating “I would like to see every woman known how to handle guns as naturally as they know how to handle babies.”  It is reported that she tutored over fifteen thousand other women in the shooting arts.

The Guns

Through her career Annie Oakley used a variety of rifles and shotguns.

She was known to favor the Marlin lever-action .22 for much of her trick shooting.  Early in her career she used a Parker 12-gauge hammer double for much of her clay bird and glass-ball shooting, but regularly complained that the Parker was too long and heavy for her 5’ frame.  While on a tour in Europe she had occasion to meet London gunmaker Thomas Lancaster, who measured her and built another double to her specifications.  After that, Annie insisted on having all her guns altered to match the specifications of the Lancaster double.  The original Parker was given to her brother-in-law.  In 2012, this Parker double sold at auction in Dallas for $143,300.  The same auction also saw a Marlin .22 of Oakley’s sell for $83,650.

One of the most famous guns used by Annie, however, was an 1873 Winchester, custom-made by the Winchester company with a smooth bore.  In exhibitions, Annie used the Winchester to shoot a variety of flying and stationary targets, with custom-loaded shot cartridges firing a half-ounce of #7 birdshot.

Annie with the Parker

In 1910, Annie and her husband signed a contract with the Union Metallic Cartridge company to promote their products, receiving in return an unending supply of ammunition.  This arrangement, as far as I can determine, lasted for the rest of Annie’s life.

Throughout her career Annie Oakley was vociferously against using what she referred to as “cheap” guns, but she owned and used a variety of pieces from many manufacturers, including Parker, Remington, Winchester, Stevens, Marlin and Colt.

Any firearm of any kind found today to have once been owned by Annie Oakley, like the aforementioned Parker and Marlin, are sure to command some fancy prices on auction.

The Legacy

In 1922, Annie began planning a return to the show circuit, but it did not last long.  She attracted large crowds in a few shows and was planning a motion picture about her life, but in late 1922 she and her husband Frank Butler were severely injured in an automobile accident.  She started performing again in 1924, but she never fully recovered her health, and by 1925 she was forced to stop touring.  Annie and Frank moved back to Ohio and attended some shooting matches in that area.

Annie Oakley, or as she preferred to be known in her personal life, Mrs. Frank Butler, died on November 3rs, 1926.  Her husband followed her only three weeks later, on November 21st.  The cause of death for both was listed as natural causes.

Annie Oakley was a true American legend.  Throughout her life she advocated for marksmanship training for women, and personally oversaw the training of thousands of young women in the shooting sports.  During the Spanish-American War and later, the Great War, she advocated for a corps of women sharpshooters to enter the combat zones, which advocacy was ignored both by Presidents Roosevelt and Wilson as well as the War Department, but that disregard did not stop Annie Oakley from her continued advocacy for women learning to shoot, and to shoot well.

That is an example we would do well to remember today.  The marvelous Mrs. Oakley’s impact on the American shooting scene has few equals, male or female.

Annie, as we remember her.

About The Author

Animal

Animal

Semi-notorious local political gadfly and general pain in the ass. I’m firmly convinced that the Earth and all its inhabitants were placed here for my personal amusement and entertainment, and I comport myself accordingly. Vote Animal/STEVE SMITH 2024!

236 Comments

  1. Brochettaward

    I tried to walk away. I tried to leave this game behind. But you wouldn’t allow it. You clamored for more. So back by popular demand, I First again. I have unretired from the Firsting game.

      • Brochettaward

        It was everywhere I went. People would ask me, “Bro, why would you retire?” They’d tell me that what the world needs most right now is my Firsts.

      • UnCivilServant

        You don’t go anywhere. Stop making stuff up. Or at least make up stuff that’s entertaining.

      • Not Adahn

        It was a typo. He meant “poplar” demand.

      • Ozymandias

        You guys are killing me. Just what I needed on a bumpy flight back from Orlando and Universal Studios weekend with the family. That Hagrid’s Motorcycle Ride is a kick-ass roller coaster. Clever as hell – 3 minutes long, too. You get your wait’s worth and my kids did it 5 or 6 times each. Great time. Too many masks, but people were generally cool. The Volcano Bay water park was a blast. Holy shit, they have some water slides there. My wife did the 125′ drop one, where they flush you down the toilet (trap door drops you down a water tube slide). She loved it.

      • UnCivilServant

        I’m glad you and your family had fun, and that you found some amusement in these comments.

      • juris imprudent

        Shhh – don’t interrupt the voices in his head.

      • Ted S.

        They’re saying “Don’t look back, you can never look back”?

  2. kinnath

    Another profile in toxic masculinity?

    • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

      These days, her testosterone levels would’ve probably gotten her a surgically constructed dick at age 11.

      • Hyperion

        Probably twice as high as most college ‘men’ today.

      • Animal

        I’ve often said that my own Mrs. Animal has more balls than plenty of men I know.

        As evidence, I offer that she’s been able to put up with me for almost thirty years.

      • Fourscore

        Two great stories in the same article. Thanks Animal. Give the Mrs my best for lasting 30 years with you, she is the Annie Oakley of the Glibs for that achievement alone.

      • Gender Traitor

        “Balls are weak and sensitive. If you wanna be tough, grow a vagina. Those things can take a pounding.”

        – Betty White

      • Brochettaward

        Hyperion would know. His homosenses allow him to detect a man’s testosterone levels even at great distances. If you’re too manly such as myself he’s liable to start tugging at your pants in his attempts to get at your penis.

      • Hyperion

        But at least Hyperion knows being first only counts on links, which Broketard has never managed.

  3. Count Potato

    “It was rumored that, after the outbreak of the Great War, Annie wrote to Kaiser Wilhelm asking for a second shot; the Kaiser wisely declined to reply.”

    LOLOLOL

  4. Not Adahn

    The late 1800s were remarkable for many things in the United States, but one of those things was the advent of the traveling Wild West shows.

    Having been born and raised in one of the last territories to become states, I didn’t understand how other parts of the country viewed the whole “cowboys and Indians” thing. I never encountered cowboy shooting until I came up here, and while there were “Western Wear” shops catering to people heading out to country music dance halls, I never saw “cowboy” stores… until I moved to NY. I guess this is the place that the fictionalized stores of western gunslingers took hold as opposed to those places where said legendary figures actually lived.

    And thanks once again for elevating the tone of this place Animal.

  5. robc

    The 1876 marriage may not have been valid. There is another date, in 1882, in Canada.

    Apparently Butler’s divorce from his first wife was not yet finalized in 1876.

  6. EvilSheldon

    Annie Oakley’s smoothbore Winchester 1873 is resident in the Frasier Museum of American History in Louisville, Kentucky, along with many other historic firearms from Owsley Brown Frasier’s collection. It’s a spiffy museum, worth checking out if you’re in town.

    • robc

      All the years I lived there, I never went. I meant too, it just didnt happen. I didnt attend the derby until the month after I moved away.

  7. DEG

    The same auction also saw a Marlin .22 of Oakley’s sell for $83,650.

    According to the write-up for this rifle, she had two.

      • DEG

        Why not?

      • DEG

        Well played.

        I think we need the applause GIF here.

        I have only three .22s: Ruger Mk IV, Ruger 10/22, Lee-Enfield No. 2 Mk IV*.

      • Sean

        I have only three .22s: Ruger Mk IV, Ruger 10/22, Lee-Enfield No. 2 Mk IV*.

        Do better.

      • juris imprudent

        S&W Model 17, Ruger Single Six (half-cock action), Browning Buckmark, Marlin XT22VR and 60, and a Winchester 52C.

      • Not Adahn

        Yeah, even I have four. Though the M9-22 is still in gun jail 🙁

      • DEG

        It’s my purpose in life.

        I’ve had an account there for a while. Lost on everything I bid on.

        Amoskeag Auction company is another good one.

      • UnCivilServant

        I have never won an auction… anywhere.

      • juris imprudent

        Yes you have – you didn’t overpay for something you had a momentary urge for.

      • UnCivilServant

        Momentary urge? What sort of bidder do you think I am?

      • juris imprudent

        A pretty damned disciplined one.

        Or would you prefer I just think you cheap?

      • UnCivilServant

        Oh, I’m a cheap bastard.

      • DEG

        Most of my gun auction winnings I don’t regret. The firearm was worth it to me..

        My estate can deal with selling them.

      • R C Dean

        As Pater Dean used to say, he learned at livestock auctions that the “winner” of an auction is the only person in the building who thinks its worth that much. Maybe they should think about that.

    • pan fried wylie

      That’s way to much to pay for sunglasses, I don’t care who the previous owner was.

  8. Pine_Tree

    Anecdotally, I’ve always thought that girls were more likely to be “natural shooters” than guys. I don’t know how much of it’s that they’re just wired differently, or whether they’re just not trying as hard so they’re more relaxed, or whatever. But it’s something.

    • EvilSheldon

      I don’t know about ‘natural’ shooters, but women are often quicker to pick up shooting than men.

      As we all know, men all pop out of their mom’s twat knowing everything there is to know about shooting a gun, driving a car, and satisfying a woman. Women generally lack those cultural hangups.

      • Chipwooder

        The last time I went to the range to qualify in the Marines, the high shooter from our group was a nineteen year old female PFC who was 5 feet tall and maybe 110 pounds soaking wet.

      • R C Dean

        When Mrs. Dean took the NASCAR driving course, the instructors said the same thing. I think its because men tend to have heads full of . . . ideas . . . about driving (and shooting), making them less amenable to instruction.

      • Not Adahn

        Is it because men are the students, or because they also have male teachers? I know I have a knee-jerk reaction to contradict men I disagree with, probably out of some sort of competitive instinct. I don’t have that problem with women.

        OTOH, when I am actually competing with women, I can’t let up on them like I could with a man who knows he’s been beaten.

    • Drake

      The only recruit to ever shoot a perfect score on the Known Distance course at Parris Island was a female (as of 1989). Girls are move flexible and less likely to “muscle” the gun.

      • CatchTheCarp

        I was high shooter in my platoon at MCRD San Diego, shot a 225. Not particularly great but good enough for an expert rifle badge and few were awarded in our platoon.
        The high shooter was supposed to get a stripe at graduation. Didn’t work out that way, once our senior drill instructor found out I was a reservist he gave the stripe to the next highest score. He told me there was no way was he giving a meritorious promotion to a weekend warrior.

      • leon

        He told me there was no way was he giving a meritorious promotion to a weekend warrior.

        You mean Service member with a Real Job?

      • CatchTheCarp

        I’m still salty over that……

      • Drake

        Heh – I never let that cat out of the bag in Boot Camp.

        Had a couple of guys shoot 240+ in my platoon. One was former Army, the other a Maine kid who had shot Olympic style .22 matches as a teenager.

      • CatchTheCarp

        There were higher scores in the other platoons, a few 230’s if I recall. I didn’t volunteer that info, he found it on his own.

      • Ozymandias

        I was a reasonably consistent low 230s guy, with an occasional upward departure to high 230s on a good day.
        I got better as I got older (and shot more).
        I once got a 375 on pistol as a Reservist when I was shooting a bunch, right after 9/11 (not coincidentally). You just have to put in the time at the range. I mean, you also have to train smart, but it takes a bunch of rounds downrange. No mystery there – just like piano, and jiu jitsu, and driving motorcycles, and…

  9. Not Adahn

    I wonder what Mrs. Butler would think of this

  10. The Late P Brooks

    Don’t stand too close to those goal posts, you might get run over

    260 employees in Georgia school district have tested positive for Covid-19 or been exposed

    ——-

    The situation in Gwinnett is fluid, GCPS spokeswoman Sloan Roach told CNN in an email Sunday evening.
    “As of last Thursday, we had approximately 260 employees who had been excluded from work due to a positive case or contact with a case,” Roach said. “This number is fluid as we continue to have new reports and others who are returning to work,” she added.

    The district — which is in the metro Atlanta area and is the largest in the school system in the state — is set to reopen with online learning on August 12.
    Despite the high case count and the confirmed community spread, some parents held a protest last week demanding that children be allowed to return to in-person learning.

    “I read about a guy who got sick, in the paper. I better not come to work. Just keep sending the checks.”

    What do those parents know? Are they certified public health experts, or degreed educators?

    I thought not.

    • Drake

      So 260 employees now immune to the virus? Good, right?

      • invisible finger

        It’s only good if the government goes out of its way to give it to you, certain death from any other type of exposure..

  11. Brochettaward

    Annie Oakley…

    Would.

  12. leon

    You gun nuts are disgusting. So into creating a mythos of women being subjugated by your dicks, that you fantasize about a woman trapped into performing for you with the very embodiment of your dick.

      • pan fried wylie

        Man, if you think normal ammo takes time to produce, forget the cannon that fires hams.

    • EvilSheldon

      Oh, I’m *way* more disgusting than that…

  13. pan fried wylie

    She’s ugly. Congress? Exploitation of buffalo.

    Boo all around.

    • Ted S.

      Perhaps you’d prefer Barbara Stanwyck or Betty Hutton?

  14. Rebel Scum

    Would.

  15. Viking1865

    When missing leads to hunger, you learn fast not to miss. I had not heard that her childhood was so deprived.

  16. Grummun

    What’s the provenance of the painting at the end of the article? Random web image search, or is that a print available for purchase somewhere?

    • Grummun

      To answer my own question: Morgan Weistling. A *print* is $345. Unfortunate.

      • pan fried wylie

        Everybody is so focused on 3d printing while large format 2d printing of any quality falls by the wayside. STILL PLENTY OF NEWSPRINT THOUGH, WOO!

      • Grummun

        If I could get a decent hi-res digital copy, I have access to a wide-format printer… that no one is using these days… because no one is printing posters… because all the conferences have been cancelled. Seriously, it’s like I’d be doing the company a service by printing personal documents, I’m preventing the ink cartridges from getting gummed up from non-use :: tugs collar:: yeah that’s it

  17. Viking1865

    Sports ratings.

    https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2020/08/02/ratings-crash-nba-mlb-after-protest-filled-debut/

    ““To be fair since I compared MLB vs NBA return night 1, here is night 2,” (July 24) he wrote, adding:

    MLB (last Friday, ESPN)
    Mets-Braves (4p) – 922K
    Brewers-Cubs(7p) – 1.0M
    Angels-As (10p) – 797K”

    Here’s the numbers from last year: https://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2019/10/15/2019-mlb-regional-tv-ratings-in-prime-time-remain-solid/#633bda043f89

    Now, I might not be understand how ratings work, but if the numbers are the same in both links, that means the average game in The New Woke Era is pulling about the same ratings as the Marlins did last year.

    • UnCivilServant

      Were the marlins particularly well-watched?

      • Viking1865

        No, the Marlins were the worst team in the league last year, and were basically doing it on purpose, so the fans were super pissed off at them.

  18. CatchTheCarp

    Annie Oakley, what an interesting life she lived. It seems Frank and Annie were extremely devoted to one another. It would be difficult for such a romance to blossom today, a 29 y/o man dating a 15 y/o girl would probably result with the man being arrested and spending a lifetime on the sexual offender list.

    • juris imprudent

      Particularly if the man was already married!

    • Hyperion

      “It would be difficult for such a romance to blossom today, a 29 y/o man dating a 15 y/o girl”

      Although she has an advantage over all the other girls, if one came around she’d just shoot them.

      • Pine_Tree

        In some ways, that option may be less available for her, since she couldn’t claim it was an accident as credibly as a normal person.

      • Hyperion

        Wild wild west, you just say they challenged you to a duel and lost.

  19. LemonGrenade

    Excellent article as always, Animal. Thanks.

    • Hyperion

      Gah, my eyes!

      “COVID-19 cases skyrocketing across the country”

      Raging all around us I tell you.

      • pan fried wylie

        “demonstrating understanding of neither the sky or rockets….”

      • mikey

        At this point only mentioning number of cases is lying by omission
        Especially wailing that the new cases are young people. This is actually good news.

    • Mostly Peaceful JaimeRoberto

      In other words, no worse than a BLM protest. If those are OK, then this is too.

  20. Mojeaux

    Girls with guns.

    Stories like this make me realize how I’ve totally wasted my life.

    Thanks, Animal!

      • UnCivilServant

        Seven hundred and Thirty-Six Pages?!

      • Mojeaux

        Yeah, that’s all. I had to fit all those words in 740 pages and it was a struggle, let me tell you.

        For reference, there are 3 full-length romances in that book, so that works out to about 90,000 words each romance. That was the minimum word count of the Harlequin line I taught myself to write for (because it was my favorite) (90,000-120,000) and those 3 romances were written at a time when I could still keep myself from going over 120,000 words.

        Now I don’t have to.

      • UnCivilServant

        Aren’t you worried about the weight of all those bytes of data breaking devices?

      • Mojeaux

        I broke Smashwords with that book.

        Twice.

      • Not Adahn

        My favorite non-pictures superhero story

        1.7M words.

      • UnCivilServant

        Someone needs an editor.

      • Not Adahn

        I like big books and I can not lie.

      • UnCivilServant

        *looks up Omnibus*

        400,000 words… for four novels. Sounds right.

      • pan fried wylie

        *read in Pace Picante, “NEW YORK CITY?!” voice*

      • Mojeaux

        You too?

      • Hyperion

        Without doubt my least favorite Tommy Shaw tune.

      • Mojeaux

        Aerosmith isn’t my favorite (I wore myself out on them in high school), but I really like that song.

    • Hyperion

      “We can’t have kids go to school and learn”

      Surely you’re not talking about public school.

      • Ownbestenemy

        That aside, do not call me Shirley.

        With no electives, I have looked into other avenues for my two teens to learn something they always wanted to learn. One I think wants to do a cooking class, but I fear the lil’rona will stop that and the other, well, I don’t know what he wants to do.

      • Mojeaux

        XX is going to trade school this year for “IT Professionals” (have no idea what the curriculum is) and she gets off an hour early (with credit) because she works nearly full time. The only thing she HAS to take at school is marketing, as a correlate to her working.

        She enjoys her job at Walmart and she really likes her managers. Her managers seem to really like and depend on her. She’s not supposed to work 40 hours a week (32 for under-18), but somehow she manages to do it.

        I’m really really hoping she can make a career out of Walmart.

      • Hyperion

        “XX is going to trade school this year for “IT Professionals”

        Probably depends on what you want to do. Programming, security, network, some of the choices.

      • Ownbestenemy

        That’s excellent Mo. I tell my kids, if you show up on time, don’t smell like a foot, put your phone away unless it is needed for work, and dress appropriately, you are better than 99% of your co-workers. Keep an open mind and understand you will be asked to do things outside of your “job description” and you will be the top employee wherever you work at your age.

        My two 15 1/2 year old teens are itching to work but most places here in Vegas won’t hire until 16. The one is burnt out working with his mom and their relationship was suffering so he no longer does that.

      • Mojeaux

        The one is burnt out working with his mom and their relationship was suffering so he no longer does that.

        That would be tough, I agree. No blame on either side, just family rubbing elbows and getting in each other’s way too much.

        XY wants to get a job (and I want him to), and some places around here hire at 14 (parents and school have to sign off on it), but he hasn’t found one yet that’s actually hiring 14-year-olds even when they say they do.

        Right now he does odd jobs and he’s saving for his own lawnmower (which I should have made him do last summer).

      • Grosspatzer

        I tell my kids, if you show up on time, don’t smell like a foot, put your phone away unless it is needed for work, and dress appropriately, you are better than 99% of your co-workers.

        So much this, it is why I made sure my kids started working as soon as they were old enough (16 here). Teaching responsible behavior is something public (and many private) schools don’t do, and no amount of talent or schooling will compensate for irresponsibility (ask me how I know).

        And good for your kids, Mojeaux. Sounds like they are on the right track.

      • DEG

        Good for her! I think she has a bright future.

  21. CatchTheCarp

    I can’t believe my eyes…. our local news actually showed, briefly, a graph of CV-19 deaths by age. You know the graph, it plainly shows those who die from the plague are overwhelming 70+ with 1 foot in grave.

    • Viking1865

      Back in May the one I saw had 44% being 85+, and over 90% of it being people over 65. But you say that to people, and they don’t believe you.

      • invisible finger

        90% of the people watching TV news are over 65.

    • pan fried wylie

      Well, that production assistant is fired.

  22. juris imprudent

    Alright, knowing full well the peril, I will ask some advice (no ZARDOZ, not that kind of advice).

    It appears my son may be settling into Chicago for the long run. He hints that as a grandparent, it would be nice if I lived within a half-day’s drive. I figure that gives me options in western Michigan, southwest Wisconsin and northeast Iowa (I believe that would be Allamakee county). Any strong recommendations for/against? Mrs. JI is adamant about not living in a flood zone. We’re thinking rural, 10+ acres (horse property) but ideally within an hour or two of a decent city.

    • Animal

      and northeast Iowa (I believe that would be Allamakee county).

      Can confirm. Allamakee is the northeasternmost county, although I could also recommend Winnesheik, Clayton or Fayette counties.

      • Hyperion

        I had an uncle lived in Iowa, right outside of Burlington. I also have a friend who lives way down south there near Iowa City. Worst freaking lightning storms I have ever seen in that state, for whatever reason.

    • Hyperion

      As someone who lived in the Midwest, about 75 miles from Chicago, all I can tell you is the climate in that area sucks balls. Like one old guy I knew from Kentucky told me, I hate Indiana because every time I go up there, my hat blows off.

      People are really friendly in Iowa, not so much in Indiana and I haven’t really hung out too much in MI. You will freeze you ass off in winter and all your stuff will blow away in the barely 4 month frost free days.

      Sorry if I come off as all negative with that, but I don’t know what else to say… do you like cornfields and smelly hogs? If you do, you’ll be good. There’s a lot of fishing if you like that. Huge corn fed deer the size of moose that will totally eat and kill every damn thing you try to plant on your property.

      • robc

        As a Kentuckian, I naturally hate Hoosiers, but honestly, Indiana is a good option. For one thing, you can ship guns to Chicago.

        As finger mentions below, Louisville is within range too. 5 hours to Chicago up I-65. And the Ohio River blocks snow for some reason. Far less just below the river than just above.

      • banginglc1

        I’ve heard before that Indiana has quite a different culture than the surrounding states (minus Kentucky). This is attributed to Indian being settled mostly from the south (Kentucky) and Ohio, Michigan, and Illinois being settled from the east. I have no idea how true it is, but I’ve heard it multiple times.

      • robc

        South of Indianapolis is more like KY than the rest of the midwest, unless you get too far west. Evansville is Cincy Jr.

      • Hyperion

        Every single person living in Indiana, or their descendants, are from Prestonsburg, KY, except for the ones from Paintsville. If they tell you any different, they’re lying Hoosiers.

      • juris imprudent

        My one grandmother was from Goshen, but I’ve got no clues what branch of the family tree might still be around there.

      • UnCivilServant

        Your grandmother was (((Eygptian)))?

      • juris imprudent

        Welsh. I’m assuming there must’ve been tin or coal mines in Northern Indiana.

      • Hyperion

        I’m a barely Buckeye, I was born right across the river there in Sicoto County, unofficially part of northern KY.

      • The Other Kevin

        It depends on where you live in Indiana. Lake County (in the Northwest) is solid Democrat and might as well be part of Chicago. Indianapolis is a typical city and it has very rich suburbs. I live in Porter county (just East of Lake County), and I like it here. It’s a nice combination of suburb and rural. It takes me about an hour and a half to get to Chicago (not in rush hour). But the kids still have “Christmas” parties at school and the girls wear cowboy boots to dances, and property taxes are very low. LaPorte county (the next county East) is the same way. My wife calls this the “guns and bible belt”.

      • juris imprudent

        Fishing (and hunting) matter a lot for my retirement. Richland county WI seems promising for that, as does NE Iowa.

    • kinnath

      Welcome to Iowa.

    • invisible finger

      Western Michigan gets lots of snow.

      Kentucky from Louisville and to the west is also an option.

      • mindyourbusiness

        Been through Paducah several times (my sister lives not far from there). Nice town and right on the Ohio; not far from the Land Between the Lakes. Pretty.

    • PieInTheSky

      Have you considered Canada?

      • juris imprudent

        Grandfather was from there, so I suppose I could claim repatriation. But that is more than a half-day drive from Chicago.

      • PieInTheSky

        a really really fast boat?

  23. leon

    Racism will exist until we abolish the color white from everything

    A few months back, before Covid-19 kept us in our homes and George Floyd made us take to the streets, I was walking with a friend, her daughter, and my twin sons. My friend is White and I’m not — something I’d never given a second thought until we reached a crosswalk. “Remember, honey,” she said to her daughter as we waited for the light to turn green, “we need to wait for the little White man to appear before we can cross the street.”

    I realize that White people like to exert control over nearly everything everyone does, I thought, but since when did this literally include trying to cross the street?

    Of course he explains later why that color was chosen for the light:

    Close. It’s “lunar white,” according to the FHWA: a shade of white with yellow and grey accents that mimics the color of the moon. Lunar white wasn’t chosen because it sounds cool. According to FHWA research, the agency spokesperson says, moonlight offers “the peak sensitivity for the rod cells in the human retina.” In other words, our vision is predisposed to favoring the clarity and intensity of moonlight.

    But that doesn’t matter:

    In the end, it’s not that the Walking Man is so super-duper white. Rather, his true competitive edge is that he’s super-duper bright. “The use of bright colors… offers the greatest contrast against a dark background,” the FHWA spokesperson says. “They do not lend themselves to confusion with other colors [and] are thought to provide the greatest level of comprehension and safety.”

    And there you have it: The government-approved origins of the “little White men” telling us to cross the street at corners across New York. Thanks to help from the FHWA, I am now convinced that technology and necessity, rather than some anti-Black conspiracy, propelled the shift from verbal crosswalk cues to a lunar-white Walking Person. But my heart still sinks at the specter of teaching my sons to ask a White man for permission to do — well, anything. Because so much of the world already insists that we do.

    • Ownbestenemy

      I keep asking to get off this planet, but no one seems to have the ability to accommodate that.

      • robc

        Have you tried contacting the Vogons?

      • UnCivilServant

        He’s still on hold with customer service.

        The hold poetry is legendary.

      • Ownbestenemy

        I have a call into the Thermians actually. To increase my chances, I have redecorated my garage to look like the deck of NSEA Protector but so far, all I get is weird looks from my neighbors

      • robc

        Do you have the smasher thing somewhere on the back deck?

      • Ownbestenemy

        Yes along with a cancel button that stops at 1 second left no matter how early to push it.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Elon can help you

      • Ownbestenemy

        Nah, I am American and his recent comments lead me to believe he is once again leaning towards the CCP.

        “China rocks in my opinion. The energy in China is great. People there – there’s like a lot of smart, hard-working people. And they’re really — they’re not entitled, they’re not complacent, whereas I see in the United States increasingly much more complacency and entitlement especially in places like the Bay Area, and L.A. and New York.”

        Thing is, China aside, his statement isn’t factually wrong about the US and certain areas within it.

    • Animal

      Well, that’s the stupidest thing I’ll read all day.

      • CatchTheCarp

        Definitely a contender but the day is still young. I for one am optimistic that a far stupider thought will be put down in words before the day is over.

    • Hyperion

      There are some countries in Africa with not many while people. Zimbabwe may be nice.

    • Drake

      If only those Southerners had picked their own cotton and tobacco. (Or bought Irish to do it)

      • Hyperion

        I think they tried that, but they’d find the Irish passed out in the field at around noon every day.

      • UnCivilServant

        Not enough shade for my translucent gene-kin.

      • pan fried wylie

        my translucent green skin.

        *blinks* oh, nm. I thought he was doin that authorbook stuff agin’.

      • Rebel Scum

        That and they don’t have souls whereas the later option has extra soul…

      • PieInTheSky

        I think that probably US would have been better off with 0 slaves in the long run…

      • Drake

        The million dead in the last civil war probably agree.

      • PieInTheSky

        to rephrase that, obviously no slavery is always better, but what I mean is many make the argument that the US wealth / economic development was due to slavery which I find silly so I have to clarify economically better of in the long run. The rights / liberty issue goes without saying.

    • pan fried wylie

      My friend is White and I’m not — something I’d never given a second thought…

      Second thought: I realize that White people like to exert control over nearly everything everyone does, I thought, but since when did this literally include trying to cross the street?

      What would figuratively including look like?

      I say we change the signs to black. I hope it kills millions. Millions of children.

      • Mojeaux

        I hope it kills millions. Millions of children.

        Planned Parenthood does not want its monopoly on killing black children to be disrupted.

      • Hyperion

        I’m not sure how all these insane people think that starting some type of race war is going to turn out well for anyone. The person who wrote that drivel is not well and needs help.

    • Rebel Scum

      Better people not be able to see the signal as well and have a greater chance of walking into traffic. You know, for equality and shit.

  24. UnCivilServant

    How do I disable contactless pay on a bank card without disabling normal payment methods? My old card expired this month and the new one they sent me has that bug (“feature”). I don’t want it.

    • leon

      Is that like paying when you don’t have your corrective lenses in?

      • UnCivilServant

        No, that’s being able to be charge due to accidental proximity while you’re trying to get the preferred card out.

      • Timeloose

        Faraday cage wallet. I have one with a RFID shield built in. Other than that, hammer.

      • pan fried wylie

        See if they’ll send you a card that isn’t broken?

    • PieInTheSky

      call the bank? Or in your mobile banking app?

      • UnCivilServant

        What sort of reckless fool uses a mobile banking app? That’s begging to have your bank info stolen.

      • PieInTheSky

        that is a small price to pay for a bit of convenience

  25. The Late P Brooks

    Apocalypse porn fap fappity fap

    How did it come to this? A virus a thousand times smaller than a dust mote has humbled and humiliated the planet’s most powerful nation. America has failed to protect its people, leaving them with illness and financial ruin. It has lost its status as a global leader. It has careened between inaction and ineptitude. The breadth and magnitude of its errors are difficult, in the moment, to truly fathom.

    In the first half of 2020, SARS‑CoV‑2—the new coronavirus behind the disease COVID‑19—infected 10 million people around the world and killed about half a million. But few countries have been as severely hit as the United States, which has just 4 percent of the world’s population but a quarter of its confirmed COVID‑19 cases and deaths. These numbers are estimates. The actual toll, though undoubtedly higher, is unknown, because the richest country in the world still lacks sufficient testing to accurately count its sick citizens.

    Despite ample warning, the U.S. squandered every possible opportunity to control the coronavirus. And despite its considerable advantages—immense resources, biomedical might, scientific expertise—it floundered. While countries as different as South Korea, Thailand, Iceland, Slovakia, and Australia acted decisively to bend the curve of infections downward, the U.S. achieved merely a plateau in the spring, which changed to an appalling upward slope in the summer. “The U.S. fundamentally failed in ways that were worse than I ever could have imagined,” Julia Marcus, an infectious-disease epidemiologist at Harvard Medical School, told me.

    ——-

    The U.S. has little excuse for its inattention. In recent decades, epidemics of SARS, MERS, Ebola, H1N1 flu, Zika, and monkeypox showed the havoc that new and reemergent pathogens could wreak. Health experts, business leaders, and even middle schoolers ran simulated exercises to game out the spread of new diseases. In 2018, I wrote an article for The Atlantic arguing that the U.S. was not ready for a pandemic, and sounded warnings about the fragility of the nation’s health-care system and the slow process of creating a vaccine. But the COVID‑19 debacle has also touched—and implicated—nearly every other facet of American society: its shortsighted leadership, its disregard for expertise, its racial inequities, its social-media culture, and its fealty to a dangerous strain of individualism.

    Reckless, insouciant individualism and self-gratification is what dunnit. And kkkapitalism.

    And- you’ll never guess whose grubby fingerprints are all over this giant failure. He gutted (GUTTED) our public health infrastructure!

    • pan fried wylie

      showed the havoc that new and reemergent pathogens could wreak.

      None?

      When I stop showing up with jokes no one finds funny, i’ll be in jail for murdering someone like this.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Get in the helicopter (disclaimer: the cuddly physical remover helicopter, not the other one).

    • leon

      and its fealty to a dangerous strain of individualism.

      The dangerous strain of individualism is the one that leads to Rationalistic Central Planning and communism.

    • grrizzly

      and even middle schoolers ran simulated exercises to game out the spread of new diseases.

      Middle schoolers? Really? From what I’ve read, social distancing (lockdowns) is based on a high-school science project.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Reagan? Bush? Trump? Nixon? Koch bros? Milton Friedman? Grover Norquist?

      Keep forgetting who the bogey man for shrunken government is these days.

  26. Annoyed Nomad

    My ancestors settled in Darke County in the late 1800’s. They owned a farm near where Annie Oakley grew up and may have known her.

    • Ownbestenemy

      “CovidPass commits to mandatory carbon offsetting for each flight passenger, to preserve the environmental benefits of reduced air travel during the crisis.”

      • pan fried wylie

        Just convert airliners into gas chambers, birds, stones, etc.

        #EveryOneDiesBy2021

    • pan fried wylie

      by “travel” I assume it means “leave your house”.

    • Hyperion

      Walls closing in, circling the wagons…

  27. beer league keeper

    Thanks for the interesting read!

    “Annie Get Your Gun” is a fun show – for musical theater – and includes the gem “I’m an Indian, Too”

  28. beer league keeper

    “Annie Get Your Gun” is really musical theater at its best, and includes this gem of a number: youtube.com/watch?v=xEpmkqWZgT8

  29. Semi-Spartan Dad

    Thanks Animal for the great read. I’m looking forward to introducing my daughter to shooting as soon as she gets just a bit older. I got some good recommendations here on child .22 rifles not too long ago.

    My wife’s a very good shot despite rarely shooting. We have our own makeshift 3-gun competition and fishing date planned in a couple weeks. We’ll see who wins.

    • UnCivilServant

      Now you’ve reminded me that I’ve never actually shot my baby rolling block. (It was apparently made for teaching children how to shoot)

    • Not Adahn

      Like this?

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        It’ll probably end that way. I sent on to the wife.

  30. Ownbestenemy

    Nothing to do at work, so I listen to streaming music from Fallout 3/NV/4 and DLCs to pass time.

    • Hyperion

      The Death Stranding soundtrack is really good.

  31. PieInTheSky

    I tried to watch an NBA game as it is an accessible hour. It is annoying. Instead of cheerleaders stupid sjw messages.

    • PieInTheSky

      I never understood the mispronouncing names is racism thing. Who the fuck cares? How the fuck is someone supposed to pronounce every stupid name out there? Hell Saoirse Ronan is sort of white and still her name got mispronounced all the time, to give an example.

      • Not Adahn

        lol

        “There was also a whole segment about the Oscar statuette and its crotch,” she also wrote. “It was gender essentialist and transphobic.”

    • Fatty Bolger

      particularly diverse year… all-female slate

      All female is particularly diverse. Got it.

      • Not Adahn

        Diverse = non-white. That’s all the word means in this context.

  32. UnCivilServant

    Question for those familiar with my Tarnished Sterling books, or who at least read Ink and Infatuation. Should Xiv have any of his powers in Human form? All we know (from the fall off the porch) is that he doesn’t have wall-crawling or flight.

    • R C Dean

      Hmm. There would need to be a reason why he has some, but not all, his powers in Human form, that would line up with what powers he retains.

      • UnCivilServant

        He made no remark about any of his supernaturally acute senses having dulled with transformation, which would suggest that he still sees, hears, and smells as well as he does in half-dragon form.

        Reason for not changing? *shrug* no idea as yet.

      • Not Adahn

        Since the change was wish-fulfillment, what powers does whatshername want him to keep?

      • UnCivilServant

        I get the impression Carol didn’t write out any specifics about that, so it’s up to the pen to decide.

      • kinnath

        I don’t recall. Did she wish him to look human or become human. The first option keeps all his powers (which may be limited by his change of form). The second option should strip all his powers.

      • UnCivilServant

        Going back to the source:

        Sitting down, she found the first clear spot in the notebook.

        “After his initial distress, Xavier calmed down and realized he had not been transformed by an outside force. A little focus allowed him to control how human or dragon he was…”

      • UnCivilServant

        I could read that sentence to justify letting him pick which powers still work.

    • kinnath

      I would suggest not. It’s cleaner to be one or the other.

      • UnCivilServant

        His list of known powers isn’t that long to begin with – Fire/Frost breathing; flight; wall climbing; super-senses.

        He’s not even depicted as having the super strength or toughness every other dragon-derived character displays.

        Come to think of it, in Ink and Infatuation, it was explictly stated that it wasn’t even his wings that provided the flight in the first place, and he only used them to steer.

      • kinnath

        Well then, you can have him fly only to find out he can’t control it.

      • UnCivilServant

        You can still do interesting things with being able to fly but not steer. I mean, unless the direction is random, which I don’t think it would be. And if there’s any control over the magnitude, that opens up a lot of acrobatics depending upon what objects are nearby to use to change direction.

      • Not Adahn

        That’s pretty much Spider-Man’s method of travelling.

      • UnCivilServant

        I thought he left unidentified white goo in his wake.

      • kinnath

        That’s what I was thinking. Useful, but not the same as before.

    • PieInTheSky

      is that guy trying to be funny?

      • Gustave Lytton

        No, i think the NFAC guy is actually serious.

    • Hyperion

      Guns go off by themselves. Only Indiana guns though.

  33. robc

    Me: Its raining hard, but no wind.

    Wind: you called?

    I think the real storm just moved in. Still a Tropical Storm, but supposed to by a Hurricane again before 8 PM. By then, it should be past here.

  34. leon

    RCP has a really good graphic up that plots Trumps Performance vs Biden against his performance against Hillary:

    What this shows is that trump is polling 3% below what he was polling against Hillary at the same time. He had an early over performance, but Biden has rallied. We’ll see what happens if there is a debate.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      When people get fired and deplatformed for being Trump supporters the polls aren’t going to be reflective of reality. I’m not saying they’re incorrect but don’t take them as gospel.

      • leon

        I know, i still find them interesting, and i think the shifts in the aggregates give some interesting data.

        I’m a firm believer that any polling outside the two weeks of the election, really serves to show how a candidate needs to position themselves. Elections aren’t a done deal 3 months out.

    • Fatty Bolger

      Hillary should have hid out in a bunker, too. She might have won.

  35. Stinky Wizzleteats

    “Minneapolis Fed President (as well as former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Financial Stability under the Bush and Obama administrations, former PIMCO and former Goldman Sachs employee) Neel Kashkari said the only way to save American lives from COVID-19 is to fully lock down the entire nation and all of its inhabitants.”

    https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/kashkari-says-only-way-save-economy-lock-it-down-really-hard-6-weeks

    Fuck off cue ball.

    • Gustave Lytton

      DO IT! I fucking dare you, cheese dick.

    • leon

      To top it all off, Kashkari believes he can convince the general public that having their businesses shut down and forcing people to stay at home with no pay will somehow get the economy bustling again when in all actuality the diabolic plan makes no sense and even JPMorgan now advising against a broad lockdown, to wit:

      In our opinion, re-imposing city lockdowns at this stage might be not be the ideal solution to control infection, from a cost/ benefit perspective, especially for developed countries. Even for developing countries, an overall cost-benefit analysis indicates that, in a potentially bigger second wave, lockdowns may not be the ideal approach.

      When you’ve lost the bankers, as a Fed President, you’ve really stepped in it.

      • Gustave Lytton

        I’m sure he’d be ok with zeroing out Fed presidents’ salaries, retroactive to Jan 1. He can just get by on his own savings.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Nah, negative consequences are for little people.

    • Fatty Bolger

      Hard to argue with such flawless logic. But, um, I do have just one little question, the same question I had back in March… what happens after 6 weeks? Does the virus just give up and go away?

      • leon

        Duh. It worked in Europe, and they handled it way better than the US. It’s not like the enourmous Size of the US caused the virus to rip through the states at different times giving the appearance of “second” waves when other states had never had them.

      • Ownbestenemy

        That is my brother’s view. If we were to go into hard lock-down and no one went outside, it would just disappear.

      • UnCivilServant

        And huge numbers would starve – In a country that if it isn’t the biggest producer of food in the world, then a contender for the crown.

      • Hyperion

        When the globalists started on that shit about reducing the world population to 500 million people, did you think they were just kidding?

        “And huge numbers would starve ”

        Feature, not bug.

    • R C Dean

      Speaking of our idiot masters, yesterday I took a cruise through some ammo sites.

      Holy balls. There’s practically nothing on the shelves. Worse than the last time I checked a couple of weeks ago.

  36. The Late P Brooks

    what happens after 6 weeks? Does the virus just give up and go away?

    Without victims on which to feed, the monster starves and dies. And then everybody comes out of their hiding places and dances merrily, and we all live happily ever after.

    • Hyperion

      But only after bad orange man goes away.

  37. hayeksplosives

    I know this article is dormant now, but I wanted to thank the author and editors for sharing.

    Animal, I like your storytelling style. Kudos.

  38. Homple

    Now do the Fabulous Topperweins.