Annie Oakley Career And Touring

Lyndsey

Out of my group of three people we have decided to talk about Annie Oakley. I decided to talk about her career and touring. So first I am going to talk about where she lived and who she lived with.
She was married to a man named Frank E. Butler. When Annie was growing up and before her actual career started she lived in Cincinnati. So that is of course where she met her husband Frank.
They ended up meeting when at first Annie was actually Frank’s assistant when he would be traveling and when he had his own shows. Then it ended up that Frank realized that Annie was a very talented young lady, so he actually became her assistant and business manager. As they grew in their friendship and business relationship they got closer in many ways it was more than a century.
Then both Annie and Frank both had joined Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show which took place in 1885. When she performed, Sitting Bull had seen her and then gave her the nickname of Watanya Cicilla.
When the Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show first started and people liked the entertainment that Annie was giving they loved it. Annie then had experienced a lot of professional rivalry with Lillian Smith the rifle sharpshooter. She was just like Annie except younger but she also was doing the same thing that Annie was. Lillian was younger than Annie so then she thought that she would be able to beat her and win. After all of that happened, Annie just temporarily left then came back to the Buffalo Bill’s show and then waited to return after Lillian had left.
Annie was mad that Lillian had made a big deal about her age difference, so Annie decided that she was going to remove six years from her age. She couldn’t take out any more years because then it would seem that she was born without her parents even getting married. Then her father had died then it would make it seem like that rumor was true. After she changed her age it messed everything up since people couldn’t really figure out her biographical events and when things in her life happened. Also in 1881 with the spring shooting match that was with Frank. That had actually only really occurred when Annie was only twenty-one years old. So after she changed her age it just kind of messed everything up and was confusing for her and everyone around her. Then people had made comments that a teen romance with Frank had happened before they were together.
In her lifetime she did some performances for a lot of famous people. For example, she performed for Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom and other dignitaries. When other people watched her performance they loved her and wanted her to come perform for them. The Prince of Prussia the future Kaiser Wilhelm wanted her to come and perform. She went and had the Prince hold a cigarette in his hand. Do you know what happened? She knocked the ashes off it. Can you believe it? Some people didn’t agree with her doing that because many believed that she would have shot Kaiser instead of the cigarette. So Annie had to be very careful with what she was doing to make sure that did not hit him under any circumstances. Many of the people that were against this were being sarcastic towards the Annie Oakley Foundation. So that is why more people were against it since they believed the sarcastic people.
Another thing that Annie decided to do, was to write a letter to President William McKinley on April 5, 1898 to try to promote the service of woman in combat operations for the United States armed forces. When she wrote the letter she was offering the government of the service of these women, who said that they would be able to provide their own ammunition and weapons. They wanted to be able to go to war with Spain but they ended up not accepting Annie’s offer with the Spanish-American War.
After her injury she left the Buffalo Bill Wild Show and decided to begin a quieter acting career in a play, “The Western Girl” that was made just so she would be able to be the main star. In the 1960’s more people were hearing about her, so more of them loved her and she then became a legend to people from her shooting experiences. All throughout the 60’s, her career kept on going great and strong.