Annie Get Your Gun (musical) Annie Get Your Gun (musical) Annie Get Your Gun is a musical with lyrics and music by Irving Berlin and a book by Dorothy Fields and her brother Herbert Fields. The story is a fictionalized version of the life of Annie Oakley (1860–1926), a sharpshooter who starred in Buffalo Bill's Wild West, and her romance with sharpshooter Frank E. Butler (1847–1926). The 1946 Broadway production was a hit, and the musical had long runs in both New York (1,147 performances) and London, spawning revivals, a 1950 film version and television versions. Songs that became hits include "There's No Business Like
History of rodeo West Shows and Fourth of July celebrations with Buffalo Bill Cody, Annie Oakley, and other charismatic stars lending their glamour and prestige to the spectacle. Oakley was a sharpshooter in Cody's Wild West show (rather than as a rodeo performer), but she created the image of the cowgirl and appeared as the first cowgirl in a western film shot by Thomas Alva Edison in 1894. In the early decades of the twentieth century, rodeo became a spectator sport with round ups, frontier days, and other themed exhibitions attracting regional audiences. In the 1920s, Madison Square Garden and Boston Garden drew