Annie Oakley
Sharpshooter, entertainer
Born: August 13, 1860, in Darke County, Ohio
Died: November 3, 1926, in Greenville, Ohio
Lived in: Nutley, New Jersey
New Jersey Hall of Fame, Class of 2012: History
Arguably America’s first female superstar, Annie Oakley parlayed her almost supernatural ability to hit rifle targets into global fame.
Born in a log cabin in western Ohio, Phoebe Ann “Annie” Mosey was the sixth of nine children. Her parents were Quakers of English descent. Annie’s father died of pneumonia when she was six, leaving the family in poverty. At age nine, she was “bound out” to a local family to care for an infant, but was instead treated – and abused – like a slave. She escaped her bondage after about two years and eventually made it back to her mother’s home.
Annie was still a youngster when she began shooting game to help support her family. She sold much of her kill to local hotels and restaurants. Soon she earned a reputation for her shooting prowess. When marksman Frank E. Butler came to town with his travelling show, he entered a shooting matching with Annie, who may have been as young as 15 at the time. Butler lost the contest – but later won Annie’s hand in marriage.
The couple began performing together, with Annie taking the new surname “Oakley.” In 1885, when Annie was 25, they joined Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show, vaulting Annie to stardom. The couple spent the next 17 years touring with Buffalo Bill, with Annie receiving top billing. She befriended fellow ensemble member Sitting Bull who gave her the nickname “Little Sure Shot.”
Annie wowed Buffalo Bill’s audiences with her shooting skills. According to biography.com, “She could shoot off the end of a cigarette held in her husband’s lips, hit the thin edge of a playing card from 30 paces and shoot distant targets while looking into a mirror.” Traveling the world, Annie performed for Queen Victoria and Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm II, who insisted the superstar shoot a cigarette from his lips.
In 1892, Annie and her husband moved to Nutley, where they lived until 1904. In 1894, film pioneer Thomas A. Edison made a 21-second kinescope of Annie shooting targets at his Black Maria studio in West Orange.
Injuries suffered in a 1901 train accident slowed Annie’s career. After recovering, she appeared in a stage play, “The Western Girl.” In the ensuing decades, she continued to shoot, adding to her fame and financial good fortune. She also taught thousands of women to shoot, largely in the interest of showing them how to defend themselves.
A century after her death in 1926, Annie Oakley can be appreciated as an early paragon of female empowerment. Indeed, she encouraged women to be independent and educated. A 1935 film starring Barbara Stanwyck added to her legend, as did the 1946 Irving Berlin musical “Annie Get Your Gun,” which starred Ethel Merman as Annie. In 1950, Betty Hutton played Annie in the film version of the musical. Over the years, such stars as Mary Martin, Geraldine Chaplin, Jamie Lee Curtis, Reba McEntire, and Bernadette Peters have portrayed Annie on stage and screen.