“I ain’t goin’ to do no fancy shootin’. If he shows up yere I’ll bust him where he looks biggest.”
— Alfred H. Lewis, Wolfville Days
Posted on 10/28/2008 at 5:41:38 PM
Saturday’s Medicine Show cast with special guest Mr. Washington.
Saturday October 25 the Buffalo Elixir Medicine Show played the Brookridge Retirement Center’s Parking Lot Theater. The show was a first testing of our new sound system. It worked well, however we discovered windsocks will be needed for the mics. The expanded show, included in a sing-along of Oklahoma tunes which our audience had requested (and practiced) in advance.
Due to our dedicated show participants The Medicine Show Wagon, stage and other equipment was seamlessly transported and set up with ample time to spare. The Center generously provided a sit down lunch for our cast. Although we missed several of our regulars we were able to switch roles and adjust the script to accommodate the understudies and the sing-along.
After arrival of those rowdy Marauders, Doc Holiday took the stage to tell a little of the history of the Medicine Show. The sing-along followed starting with the Possum Song and Odie, the Marauder Song with Lee Hibbetts & Blaine in the lead and then on too Oklahoma Hills, Home on the Range and Oklahoma! Audience participation was quite fun for all.
Dr. Philmont took the stage to promote his famous Buffalo Elixir. With the help of his assistant, Miss Goodbody, he solved Iwanna B. Noddy’s love life problem, Mr. Boggs crippled hands allowing to be able to play the harmonica again, restored Miss Bubbles Vyktoria (of the Gotebo Follies) ability to dance and ridded Doc Holiday of his “dreaded tapeworm”. Other cast members gave the audience samples of Professor Philmont’s Famous Buffalo Elixir while the miraculous cures where happening.
A humorous interlude followed with Calamity Lee’s Hard Luck Tale of Woe accompanied by the sob sisters. As Professor Philmont was ended the show those two pesky outlaws accompanied by Iwanna B. Noddy came rushing up, and robbed the stage grabbing the show’s money bag. Marshal Payne and Marshal Odie rushed in and the outlaws hid in the audience. Rattlesnake put his hat on an innocent bystander to throw the law off their trail. The Professor and Miss Goodbody could only remember one was wearing a brown hat. As there were three people in the audience wearing brown hats, confusion reigned. Things were finally sorted out, the outlaws uncovered wherein the gunfight ensued. After running out of bullets in a gunfight the fled leaving behind the bag of loot. The law decided to help themselves to a reward but all they found was Wilber, the Marauder’s Rattlesnake mascott.
We posed for a few photo op pictures with special guest Mr. Washington a popular former cook at Medicine Park Music Hall. While we were loading the wagon and equipment, Iwanna returned a roll of tape to the Center. When she went in a woman stopped her and requested an encore of “Be My Little Bumble Bee”. Which she performed to the delight of those near by. Packed up we headed off into the sunset (okay it was just back to Medicine Park).
Posted on 10/15/2008 at 6:18:58 PM
On Sunday, Oct. 12, Seth Wright, along with Slim & Rattlesnake, rode into town looking for stirrin’ up a bit of trouble. Rattlesnake & Slim started things up a stoppin’ citizens as they rode peaceful-like down the street. After a bit they ratcheted up the fun by cuttin’ loose with a blast or two from Slim’s scatter gun. Before long wagons were backing up as traffic was stopped.
Marshal Payne, the only lawman on duty, was relaxing alongside the Leopard enjoying the warm, sunny day. The shotgun blast startled him from his afternoon siesta on a shaded chair. Hitchin’ up his gunbelt, he moseyed over to perceive what was all the commotion. Spyin’ only Slim and Rattlesnake annoying the good folks of the camp, the Marshal moved into the play. “I thought I told you outlaws to get out of the camp and stay out. Now haul yer freight on down the trail before I have to speed up your retreat with my Colt’s .45s.”
The two rabble-rousers declined to accept the Marshal’s invitation, and offered to up the ante with some gunplay of their own. Marshal Payne met their raise and called with a lead filled response. When the smoke cleared the contenders were all still standing, but cradling empty iron.
Seth, who had been sitting out the play, dealt himself in by steppin’ behind the Marshal with a full hand of six .45s. With nothin’ left in his Colt to add to the game the Marshal holstered his empty revolver and handed over his chips. I do believe it was the first time the outlaws had caught a lawman, and they were bit befuddled as what to do. A meeting was called and after mulling the situation over a bit, there was a move made fer hanging. Which was quickly seconded and the crowd voted aye. But the Marshal cut the deal and said they just could not hang him as it was too nice a day for a hangin’. And besides, the Marshal observed, there was no rope to be had.
Lacking the main tool of the hangin’ trade, the gang decided to lock the Marshal up in a shop that was a front for the Seth Gang. They figured he could be exchanged later for a bag of loot. Seth marched Marshal Payne inside and quickly rejoined his cohorts in harassin’ the town folk. A carelessly left key allowed the Marshal to make his escaped. Seth had left a box of bullets sitting on a table to which the Marshal helped himself. With a fresh load restin’ in his .45 Marshal Payne moved out to confront that bunch of hooligans again.
The gang was taken aback by the sudden reappearance of the lawman they thought was out of the game. The Marshal informed the gang they were just too ignorant of the business of locking a gent up, and confirmed his hand by shaking out a round from his six-gun. Them outlaws had a whole new meaning of the word ‘ignorant’ and were right pleased with the call. So much so they settled right down and thanked the Marshal for being so nice. Why they even ask the lawman to step in with them for a round of picture taken by the crowd. Which ended the hostilities for the day.
Posted on 10/5/2008 at 8:44:31 PM
The Medicine Park Marauders where out at the Spirit of Survival Marathon Saturday. Pack Mule, Marshal Payne, Little Britches Odie and Rattlesnake all meandered over to take in the action and stir up a bit of trouble. There was a suspicious looking character dressed in Santa’s summer suit that looked a lot like Seth Wright hanging around.
Pack Mule, Payne, Rattlesnake and Odie got the Kid’s Marathon off with a bang as they all coughed a round out their shootin’ irons when the announcer said it was time for them varmints to haul their freight on down the road. It was no time at all when that bunch of youngsters started comin’ back into the camp. So we holstered our iron and gave all the racers a reward medal for showing such spirit and making it all the way.
Weren’t too long after that when we notice they had another bunch lined up to be run out of town. This time it was the Spirit Walk. So we sauntered over and decided to give this bunch a rousing send off as well. When the speaker counted down to one we all let loose with another round from our .45s to speed them on their way.
While we was running that bunch out of town Little Britches was over at the kid’s corral telling tales of Skamper Prairie Dog. As it was a might windy she got Wilber to act as paperweight. He did right good job of attracting visitors as well as keeping the paper work in place.
We all decided to head over to the Mexican Cantina that had set up shop by Town Hall for a some grub when Doc Holyday and Mamie Fossett came a headin’ into the camp. They decided to go with us to the cantina. They were serving up some might good pork tacos, which soon disappeared inside the Marauders.
Back to the race camp the Marauders took over the buffalo chip tossin’ contest. The crowd was thin at the sign up so some of us when out to herd some tossers over. An announcement was made about the buffalo chip toss and a Marauder shootout which brought the strays in. Around 24 folks signed up to try their hand a slinging a buffalo chip. An argument broke out over whether the outlaws or the lawmen had the fastest chip slinger. As the opposing sides came together Odie toss a buffalo chip at the outlaws and they obliged him with a couple of refrains from a six-shooter. Which, of course, quickly degenerated into an all out gunfight. With empty six-guns the two adversaries decided to let the chips fall where they may and come together to judge the chip tossin’.
The Marauders lined up along the tossing zone and the contestants came up one at a time to let fly. With the Marauders the puns were flying faster then the buffalo chips. Headliner and first tosser was our own Miss America, Lauren Nelson, not afraid to get her hands dirty, she was the top flinger for just the first round. After a few near misses we told ‘em if any marauder got hit he, or she, reserved the right to shoot back. From then on the photographer was the target and he got winged in the side by rather hefty chip. Odie decided to give tossin’ chips a try which gave Marshal Payne a good chance to try some wing shootin’ with Odie’s shotgun. Odie, as usual, had left the safety off so when Marshal Payne tried to shoot he flipped the safety on which threw his timing off and he missed. The chip flew and just about hit Little Britches who swore to get even. The winning toss was 109 feet 4 inches. After the top three tossers collected hteir winnings it was announced the others cold keep the rest of the chips. However they snuck off and left them.
Posted on 9/21/2008 at 6:45:25 PM
Geronimo, OK. September 20.
Saturday, Sept. 20th, the Medicine Park Marauders crashed Geronimo’s birthday party. (Okay so we were invited to perform, but I couldn’t resist using crash the party.) We arrived early enough to set up a table peddling or Marauder Wares. While Miss Prim (Lee Sabine) took a break from her school marm duties to work the booth the rest of us wander around prepping the crowd. We handed out small wanted posters of the outlaws and the kids had a great time finding them and trying to claim the reward. We told them we could not pay as we were out of our jurisdiction and they would have to go to Medicine Park to collect.
The Show
At high noon, the Marauder Outlaws, Little Britches, Slim and Rattlesnake along with their leader Seth robbed the Buffalo Elixir Medicine Show and made off with the loot to Geronimo. Arriving in the area the gang hid most of the loot in a fresh dirt pile on the edge of town and went on into Geronimo looking to spend some of their ill gotten gains. (Little did they know the pile of dirt was the construction site for the new Geronimo School and the loot was soon covered with concrete.)
On into Geronimo the gang started harassing the local citizens. But Marshals Payne and Odie were hot on their trail. Along with Prof. Philomena Philmont, the Medicine Show business manager, Ned Nickel, and special deputy Doc Holyday. As the lawmen neared Geronimo, Mamie Fossett, visiting deputy Marshal, spotting them and cried out to scare the outlaws from harassing the local citizens. But her tactic backfired and gave the outlaws enough warning to hide in the crowd.
With Doctor Philomena Philmont bemoaning the loss of her stock in trade, Odie recognized Little Britches in the crowd from the picture on a wanted poster. Her hat was a dead give away. The law quickly moved in a arrest her. But it turned out to be a trick as she had switched hats with an innocent bystander for a disguise and they nabbed the wrong person. Prof. Philmont spotted the ruse. (As the bystander was a tall man and Little Britches is as the name indicates is knee high to an armadillo and a woman it was and easy to tell the difference.) The law then threatened to hang him anyway unless he told us where he got the hat. He quickly pointed out another man in the back, the wrong person. But a little more threatening with the hanging rope and he divulged where Little Britches was hiding.
Taking her into custody the law again used the threat of shooting her to get the rest of the Seth Gang to surrender. The gang was disappointed that the loot they had lugged all the way was bottles of elixir and not rolls of gold coins from the Medicine Show’s sales. Dr. Philmont was delighted with the return of her Buffalo Elixir so the Medicine Show could go on. But the bags did not contain all the stolen elixir and the law again threatened to shoot Little Britches. But, since she was the only one of the outlaws who could read, Seth told us where they hid the rest of the elixir.
With enough evidence to sent the whole Seth Gang off to the hoosegow for a long stretch the law was ready to march the gang back to Medicine Park for a not so fair trial. But Little Britches stomped on Marshal Payne’s foot and got loose as he hopped away hollering. In the ensuing confusion she, and the rest of the gang made a break. With blazing six-guns they made a clean get away as Odie shouted, ” Blast it all we’re out of bullets again!”
Posted on 9/1/2008 at 11:28:16 PM
The Medicine Park Marauders manned the beer booth for the 2nd annual Mayors Blues ball for Labor Day weekend. Peddling beer instead of Buffalo Elixir, volunteer Marauders started early Saturday setting up tents, tables and filling coolers with beer & ice. Calamity Lee and her sidekick, Scooter Hibby, took the first shift from high noon to 2:00. With Calamity doing the “ice running”. Doc Holyday and Miss Vycke worked the booth from 2:00 until 4:00 with Little Britches, Marshal Payne and Tulsa Sue relieving them at 4:00. They were joined shortly by Ma Scotty & Danger Dan & daughters who arrived in their Model T Ford. An occasional OOGA OOOOGA from the Model T attracted more people and attention to the beer booth.
At 5:50 a pair of shady looking outlaws, Seth Wright & Rattlesnake Bill, meandered over to the beer booth and proceeded to harass the Marshal & Little Britches. Both were busy poppin’ tops for customers so Marshal Payne called for reinforcement from Marshal Odie to take care of those two ruffians. But the outlaws tempted Odie to join their side in taking over the booth by pointing out they would get all that beer. Marshal Odie took a looooong look at the coolers full of beer and removed his badge. The three approached the beer booth demanding we hand it over to them. Marshal Payne dropped the beer bottle opener and pulled his .45 and the gunfight erupted. Out numbered by four six guns and a shotgun Marshal Payne’s one gun was soon out of bullets. Forced to flee, the booth was left to the dastardly trio. Reinforced by Calamity Lee, the Marauder late shift held on until the crowd moved to the other end of town for the last blues band of the night.
Sunday we restocked the coolers with ice and beer for day two of the Blues Ball, and followed the schedule of Saturday for manning the booth with the edition of good looking sweet talkin’ Quick Change Donnavan. By the end of the day the Marauder beer hustlers were exhausted and held a discount sale to get clear out the last few bottles of beer. The coolers were dumped and stowed away and we wandered down to catch a bit of the last blues band of the festival before heading home to collapse.
It was good weekend with a great crowd and healthy sales. The Marauders/Medicine Show will receive a nice chunk of the beer sales profits to buy more blanks and restock the Medicine Show. Here’s to you who bought the beer so we can shoot another day.
Posted on 8/25/2008 at 2:44:47 AM
A group from BrookRidge Retirement Community visited the Winery of the Wichitas on Friday, Aug. 22 for a little wine tasting. Five Medicine Park Marauders, all playing outlaws, showed up to add a taste of the old West. When the van from arrived Marshal Payne & Rattlesnake Bill got into a short gunfight over who got the loot this time. It ended when they decided to split the take.
The Marauders helped group from BrookRidge into the winery. Luckily the seniors were not packing iron as an argument broke out of who got to use one of the wheelchairs. The dispute was settled when the contestants ran out of bullets.
A couple of Floozies, Miss Vycke and Little Britches decided to stake a claim on the menfolk of the BrookRidge Gang much to their delight. One woman was issuing orders so we dubbed her the boss of the BrookRidge Gang. Another of their gang said; “She’s not the boss, she’s just German.” Another we called princess and chief wine taster (her glass could not be refilled fast enough). Princess was hording all of their gold. She said she had a golden leg. In order to get the gold we needed a hostage.
Miss Vycke packing a small gun in her needlework purse and Doc Holyday lead the Marauder’s in taking the hostage. They singled out the activity coordinator as the perfect target, a young lady just turned 27. With that as clue we looked for her in the group. The first one picked said that could be her age, but Little Britches though she might have switched the two numbers. The right person was uncovered and we swore her in as a Marauder, then decided to take her out and shoot her any way. It might be enough to get the rest to hand over the gold. Alas it did not work we got no gold, and the hostage was only a bit startled by the noise of the blanks.
When ask if any of them had been here in the past one gentleman said he used to come out a lot, but spent most of the time in the Wildlife Reserve. In 1935, and at the age of 10, he climbed Mount Scott. This was before the road to the top was built. He commented on how long it took and Rattlesnake Bill said; “When he got back down he was 12.” This brought a chuckle from all.
In the end the Brookridge Gang made out with a tasting of the fine wines and a free ticket to the Buffalo Elixir Medicine Show performance at BrookRidge Retirement Community on Oct. 25.
Posted on 8/24/2008 at 12:56:22 PM
On this page there will be postings of our Marauder Shows. This will be a synopsis of shows we have done for those of you who like to follow our marauding.
Medicine Park Marauder Blog by
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Medicine Park Marauders
