An Underappreciated Heroine, a Trivia Quiz, and a Really Bad Joke

Annie Oakley ROCKED. Here’s why:

• She outgunned famous sharpshooter Frank Butler in a shooting match when she was just 15.

• She was courted by a dog. Frank Butler fell for Annie, but Annie fell for his standard poodle, George. Frank, being an imaginative fellow, sent Annie affectionate letters signed “George.” The ploy worked. Annie eventually turned her affections from the dog to the man. They were happily married for fifty years.

• The great Hunkpapa Lakota Chief Sitting Bull was so impressed by Annie that he wrote to ask her for a signed photograph, enclosing $65. She returned the money and visited him in person to deliver a photograph. He was so impressed by Annie that he “adopted” her, giving her the Lakota name Watanya Cicilla, which means Little Sure Shot. "He had asked me to take the place of the daughter he lost shortly after the Custer massacre,” Annie wrote in her autobiography. “She had made the moccasins he wore in the fight -- in the struggle where he pitted his brain against that of the white man. He fought justly, for his people had been driven from their God-given inheritance and were living upon broken promises. Sitting Bull's daughter was about my age at the time of my adoption, when he gave me the moccasins he so prized." The two remained fast friends for all their lives.

• And my favorite story: After a command performance of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West in Britain, Annie was presented to Prince Edward, who stretched out his arm to shake hands. Knowing that the prince was a notorious womanizer who often flirted in public,  Annie instead took the hand of his wife, Princess Alexandra, saying, “You’ll have to forgive me, I’m an American, and in America, women come first.” Ha!

Why am I telling you all this about Annie Oakley? Because until I did the research behind Ivy Get Your Gun,everything I knew about her was from Annie Get Your Gun—and most of it was wrong. As Ivy says, “They took this amazingly strong woman and made her a simpering husband-hunter who gave up her integrity for a man.” (Great music, though.)

In Ivy Get Your Gun, which just became available again, Ivy fights for Annie’s honor by telling the real story of her life, while also solving murders, dodging danger, and tailing a renegade pack of Chihuahuas (of course).

For some reason, my previous reviews are not linked to this Amazon version. Sigh. If you’d like to read them, they’re here (the underlined word is a link even though it doesn’t look like one).

And since I’m trying to publish newsletters more often, the usual features may appear in separate ones. In other words, don’t worry, I’m still finding places to hide the bodies!

Trivia Quiz

Ethel Merman played a famously brash version of Annie (Donald O'Connor, who played opposite her, blamed his hearing problem on her voluble performance). Many other famous actresses played the role. Which of the following never made it to the stage or silver screen (but came awfully close)?

• Betty Hutton

• Reba Mcintyre

• Patti Lupone

• Bernadette Peters

• Judy Garland

• Doris Day

(answer at the end of the newsletter)

A Silly Bit from Ivy Get Your Gun

(In which Ivy learns to mix drinks)

“What’s Campari?” I sniffed the bottle. “It smells like medicine.” 

“Tastes like it too,” said Uncle Bob. “But some sophisticates like it.” He grinned at his girlfriend, who did look awfully sophisticated with her expensive haircut and nice clothes, especially next to Uncle Bob with his two-day beard and Day-Glo orange Hawaiian shirt.

“No making fun of my cocktail choices.” Bette poured a measure of the liqueur into a glass of ice, then topped it with fizzy water. “Campari and soda is a perfectly fine drink.”

Pink took a drink from the glass Bette offered him. “I like it. And I’m not sophisticated.” He belched just to prove his point, though the ink stain on the pocket of his short-sleeved shirt was already a pretty good indicator. 

“Campari is an aperitif,” I read from a library book I picked up on the way to Bob’s house. “Helps with digestion.”

Pink belched again. “See?”

“This is the guy you want to me to fix up with my girlfriend?” Bette asked Bob.

We were all gathered around Uncle Bob’s kitchen table, which was filled with an array of bottles. Bette had picked up the Campari, but most of the liquor came from Uncle Bob and Pink (Detective Pinkstaff). I contributed tequila, peppermint schnapps, and something called Mama Walker’s Bacon Maple Breakfast Liqueur (left over from a cast party). Oh, and a lime.

“What is this?” Uncle Bob picked up the aforementioned fruit. “A kiwi? What kind of drink do you make with a kiwi?” Okay, so the lime was a little brown.

“No,” said Pink. “I think it’s some sort of dog toy.” He threw it against the floor. It actually bounced a little.

I grabbed it before it rolled behind the refrigerator. “No making fun of my lime either.”

“Or she’ll slip it into your drinks,” Bette said.

“I think throwing it at us would do more damage,” said Uncle Bob.

Pink belched again. That Campari was good stuff.

There’s a new sheriff in town—and she can sing! When Gold Bug Gulch’s actor-gunslinger Mongo winds up shot for real, actress and part-time PI Ivy Meadows goes undercover as the ingénue in the tourist town’s melodrama. Unfortunately, she’s distracted by a pack of marauding Chihuahuas, a problematic love life, auditions for Annie Get Your Gun, and a personal mission: to show people the real Annie Oakley.

What’s more, the no-good, yellow-bellied varmint who killed Mongo isn’t finished with the Gulch—or with Ivy. Will our heroine prove she can get a man with a gun—before the killer gets her?

Ivy Get Your Gun is just 99 cents through Dec. 8, as is Macdeath, the first in the Agatha-nominated Ivy Meadows mystery series.

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Random Stuff That Makes Me Laugh

Trivia Quiz Answer

Judy Garland was the original star of MGM’s movie version of Annie Get Your Gun, but was fired being for being “responsible for substantial delays.” She was replaced by Betty Hutton.