Gunfight at the O.K. Corral and temporary policeman Doc Holliday on the other side. All three Earp brothers had been the target of repeated death threats made by the Cowboys, who objected to the Earps' interference in their illegal activities. The four law men faced five Cowboys. Billy Clanton and both McLaury brothers were killed. Ike Clanton claimed that he was unarmed and ran from the fight, along with Billy Claiborne and Wes Fuller. Virgil, Morgan, and Doc Holliday were wounded, but Wyatt Earp was unharmed. The shootout has come to represent a period of the American Old West when the frontier was virtually an
Gunfight at the O.K. Corral history due to the personal nature of the feud between the Earps and the McLaury and Clanton brothers and the symbolism of the fight between lawmen and the Cowboys. The Cowboys maimed Virgil and murdered Morgan but escaped prosecution, and Wyatt's extra-legal campaign for revenge captured people's attention. The gunfight and its aftermath stand for the change overcoming America as the Western frontier ceased to exist, as a nation that was rapidly industrializing pushed out what had been a largely agrarian economy. The town of Tombstone has capitalized on interest in the gunfight. A portion of the town is a