The Gunfighter turned it down, despite having expressed a strong desire to play the part, because of his longstanding hatred for Columbia's president, Harry Cohn. Columbia sold the rights to Twentieth Century Fox, where the role went to Peck. Wayne's final film, "The Shootist" (1976), is often compared to "The Gunfighter" and contains numerous plot similarities. The script was loosely based on the purported exploits of an actual western gunfighter named Johnny Ringo, a distant cousin of the outlaw Younger family and a purported survivor of the infamous gunfight at the OK Corral against Doc Holliday and the Earp brothers. As in
Gunfight at the O.K. Corral 1988, his studio printed and sold a limited edition of 390 copies of the painting. John Gilchriese became friends with John Flood, who had been Wyatt Earp's secretary, confidante, and best friend for many years. When Earp died, Flood inherited many of his personal belongings. Flood in turn willed them to Gilchriese, who amassed over a number of years one of the largest collections of personal items belonging to Wyatt and Virgil Earp, along with many unpublished photos of them and their family. Gilchriese opened the Wyatt Earp Museum in Tombstone in 1966 and commissioned Western artist Don Perceval to