Calamity Jane

For other uses, see Calamity Jane (disambiguation).

Martha Jane Canary
Calamity Jane in 1895 by H.R. Locke
Born	Martha Jane Cannary (1852-05-01)May 1, 1852 Princeton, Missouri
Died	Terry, South Dakota
Nationality	United States
Other names	Calamity Jane
Occupation	army scout, explorer, performer, soiled dove, frontier woman
Spouse(s)	Clinton Burke William P Steers
Children	Two daughters
Parent(s)	Robert Wilson Canary Charlotte M. Canary
Relatives	Five siblings

Martha Jane Canary or Cannary (May 1, 1852 – August 1, 1903), better known as Calamity Jane, was an American frontierswoman and professional scout, known for her claim of being an acquaintance of Wild Bill Hickok, and fighting against Native Americans. Late in her life, she appeared in Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, and at the 1901 Pan-American Exposition. She is said to have always exhibited kindness and compassion to others, especially to the sick and needy. This facet of her character, contrasted with her daredevil ways, helped make her a noted frontier figure. She was also known for her habit of wearing men's attire.

Early life

Marker east of Princeton indicating the most widely believed location of her birth. The site was later occupied by a Premium Standard Farms hog farm.

Much of the information about the early years of Calamity Jane's life comes from the autobiographical booklet she dictated in 1896, which was written for publicity purposes. She was about to begin a tour in which she would appear in dime museums around the United States, and the pamphlet was intended to help attract audiences. Some of the information in the pamphlet is exaggerated, or even completely inaccurate.

Calamity Jane was born on May 1, 1852, as Martha Jane Canary (or Cannary) in Princeton, within Mercer County, Missouri. Her parents, Robert W. and Charlotte (Burch) Cannary, were listed in the 1860 census as living about 7 miles (11 km) further northeast of Princeton in Ravanna. Her father Robert Wilson Cannary had a gambling problem and her mother mother Charlotte M. Cannary had spent time working as a prostitute. Martha Jane was the eldest of six children, having two brothers and three sisters. In 1865, Robert and his family moved by wagon train from Missouri to Virginia City, Montana. In 1866, Charlotte died along the way in Blackfoot, Montana, of pneumonia. After arriving in Virginia City in the spring of 1866, Robert took his six children on to Salt Lake City, Utah. They arrived in the summer, and Robert supposedly started farming on 40 acres (16 ha) of land. The family had only been in Salt Lake City for a year when he died in 1867. At age 14, Martha Jane took charge of her five younger siblings, loaded up their wagon once more, and took the family to Fort Bridger, Wyoming Territory, where they arrived in May 1868. From there, they traveled on the Union Pacific Railroad to Piedmont, Wyoming.

In Piedmont, Martha Jane took whatever jobs she could find to provide for her large family. She worked as a dishwasher, cook, waitress, dance-hall girl, nurse, and ox team driver. Finally, in 1874, she found work as a scout at Fort Russell. During that time, Jane also began her on-and-off employment as a prostitute at the Fort Laramie Three-Mile Hog Ranch.

In 1865 we emigrated from our homes in Missouri by the overland route to Virginia City, Montana, taking five months to make the journey. While on the way, the greater portion of my time was spent in hunting along with the men and hunters of the party; in fact, I was at all times with the men when there was excitement and adventures to be had. By the time we reached Virginia City, I was considered a remarkable good shot and a fearless rider for a girl of my age. I remember many occurrences on the journey from Missouri to Montana. Many times in crossing the mountains, the conditions of the trail were so bad that we frequently had to lower the wagons over ledges by hand with ropes, for they were so rough and rugged that horses were of no use. We also had many exciting times fording streams, for many of the streams in our way were noted for quicksands and boggy places, where, unless we were very careful, we would have lost horses and all. Then we had many dangers to encounter in the way of streams swelling on account of heavy rains. On occasions of that kind, the men would usually select the best places to cross the streams; myself, on more than one occasion, have mounted my pony and swam across the stream several times merely to amuse myself, and have had many narrow escapes from having both myself and pony washed away to certain death, but, as the pioneers of those days had plenty of courage, we overcame all obstacles and reached Virginia City in safety. Mother died at Black Foot, Montana, 1866, where we buried her. I left Montana in Spring of 1866, for Utah, arriving at Salt Lake City during the summer.

Accounts from that period described Martha Jane as being "extremely attractive" and a "pretty, dark-eyed girl." Martha Jane received little to no formal education and was illiterate. She moved on to a rougher, mostly outdoor, adventurous life on the Great Plains.

Acquiring the nickname

1885 photos of Calamity Jane

Martha Jane was involved in several campaigns in the long-running military conflicts with American Indians. Her unconfirmed claim was that:

It was during this campaign [in 1872–1873] that I was christened Calamity Jane. It was on Goose Creek, Wyoming where the town of Sheridan is now located. Capt. Egan was in command of the Post. We were ordered out to quell an uprising of the Indians, and were out for several days, had numerous skirmishes during which six of the soldiers were killed and several severely wounded. When on returning to the Post we were ambushed about a mile and a half from our destination. When fired upon Capt. Egan was shot. I was riding in advance and on hearing the firing turned in my saddle and saw the Captain reeling in his saddle as though about to fall. I turned my horse and galloped back with all haste to his side and got there in time to catch him as he was falling. I lifted him onto my horse in front of me and succeeded in getting him safely to the Fort. Capt[.] Egan on recovering, laughingly said: 'I name you Calamity Jane, the heroine of the plains.' I have borne that name up to the present time.

As reported in the Anaconda Standard (Montana, April 19, 1904): Captain Jack Crawford, who served under both Generals Wesley Merritt and George Crook, stated that, Calamity Jane "...never saw service in any capacity under either General Crook or General Miles. She never saw a lynching and never was in an Indian fight. She was simply a notorious character, dissolute and devilish, but possessed a generous streak which made her popular."

It may be that she exaggerated, or completely fabricated, this story. Even during her lifetime, not everyone accepted her version as true. A popular belief is that she instead acquired it as a result of her warnings to men that to offend her was to "court calamity". It appears possible that Jane was not part of her name until the nickname was coined for her.

It is certain that she was known by that nickname by 1876, because the arrival of the Hickok wagon train was reported in the Deadwood newspaper, the Black Hills Pioneer, on July 15, 1876, with the headline: "Calamity Jane has arrived!".

Another unverified story in her autobiographical pamphlet is that in 1875, her detachment was ordered to the Big Horn River under General Crook. Carrying important dispatches, she swam the Platte River and traveled 90 miles (140 km) at top speed while wet and cold to deliver them. Afterwards, she became ill. Calamity said that after recuperating for a few weeks, she rode to Fort Laramie in Wyoming, and in July 1876, she joined a wagon train headed north. The second part of her story is verified. She was at Fort Laramie in July 1876, and did join a wagon train that included Wild Bill Hickok. That was where she first met Wild Bill Hickok, contrary to her later claims, and that was how she happened to come to Deadwood.

Deadwood and Wild Bill Hickok

Calamity Jane accompanied the Newton–Jenney Party into Rapid City in 1875, along with California Joe and Valentine McGillycuddy. By that time (or shortly thereafter), her youthful good looks were gone; her skin was leathery and tanned by sun and wind exposure on the high plains, she was muscular and masculine, and her hair was stringy and seldom washed.

In 1876, Calamity Jane settled in the area of Deadwood, South Dakota, in the Black Hills. There, she became friends with, and was occasionally employed by, Dora DuFran, the Black Hills' leading madam. She also became friendly with Wild Bill Hickok and Charlie Utter, having traveled with them to Deadwood in Utter's wagon train. Jane greatly admired Hickok (and, much later, others alleged she was attracted to him to the point of infatuation, and even claimed she was obsessed with his personality and his life).

McCormick claim

On September 6, 1941, the U.S. Department of Public Welfare granted old age assistance to a Jean Hickok Burkhardt McCormick (third married), who claimed to be the legal offspring of Martha Jane Cannary and James Butler Hickok, after being presented with evidence that Calamity Jane and Wild Bill had married at Benson's Landing, Montana Territory (now Livingston, Montana), on September 25, 1873. The documentation was written in a Bible and presumably signed by two ministers and numerous witnesses. However, McCormick's claim has been vigorously challenged because of a variety of discrepancies.

McCormick later published a book with letters purported to be from Calamity Jane to her daughter. In them, Calamity Jane says she had been married to Hickok and that Hickok was the father of McCormick, who was born September 25, 1873, and given up for adoption to a Captain Jim O'Neil and his wife. During the period when the alleged child was born, Calamity Jane was allegedly working as a scout for the army, and at the time of Hickok's death, he had recently married Agnes Lake Thatcher.

Although the father's identity is unknown, Calamity does seem to have had two daughters. In the late 1880s, she returned to Deadwood with a child she claimed was her daughter. At her request, a benefit was held in one of the theaters to raise money for her daughter's education in St. Martin's Academy at Sturgis, South Dakota a nearby Catholic boarding school. The benefit raised a large sum. Calamity got drunk and spent a considerable portion (but not all) of the money that same night and left with the child the next day. Estelline Bennett, who was living in Deadwood at that time and had spoken briefly with Calamity a few days before the benefit, thought Calamity honestly wanted her daughter to have an education and that the drunken binge was just an example of her inability (which Bennett saw as typical of her class) to curb her impulses and carry through long-range plans. Bennett later heard that Calamity's daughter did in fact "get an education, and grew up and married well".

After the death of Wild Bill Hickok

Jane also claimed that following Hickok's death she went after his murderer Jack McCall with a meat cleaver, since she had left her guns at her residence in the excitement of the moment. However, she never actually confronted McCall. Following McCall's execution for the capital crime, Jane continued living in the Deadwood area for some time, and at one point she helped save numerous passengers in an overland stagecoach by diverting several Plains Indians who were in pursuit of the vehicle. The stagecoach driver, John Slaughter, was killed during the pursuit, and Jane took over the reins and drove the stage on to its destination at Deadwood. In late 1876 or 1878, Jane nursed the victims of a smallpox epidemic in the Deadwood area.

Final years

In 1881, Jane bought a ranch west of Miles City, Montana, along the Yellowstone River, where she kept an inn. After marrying the Texan Clinton Burke and moving to Boulder, she once again made an attempt in the inn business. In 1887, she gave birth to a daughter, Jane, who was adopted by foster parents.

In 1893, Calamity Jane started to appear in Buffalo Bill's Wild West show as a storyteller. She also participated in the 1901 Pan-American Exposition. At that time, she was depressed and an alcoholic. Jane's addiction to liquor was evident even in her younger years. For example, on June 10, 1876, she rented a horse and buggy in Cheyenne for a roughly one mile joy ride to Fort Russell and back, but Calamity was so drunk that she passed right by her destination without noticing it and finally ended up about 90 miles (140 km) away at Fort Laramie.

Death

In the spring of 1903, when Jane returned to the Black Hills, brothel Madame Dora DuFran was still running her business. For the next few months, Jane earned her keep by cooking and doing the laundry for Dora's brothel girls in Belle Fourche. In late July, Jane traveled by ore train to Terry, South Dakota, a small mining village near Deadwood. While staying at the Calloway Hotel on August 1, 1903, she died at the age of 51 (or 53 or 56). It was reported that she had been drinking heavily while on board the train and became very sick to her stomach. The train's conductor carried her off the train, a bartender secured a room for her at the Calloway Hotel, and a doctor was summoned. She died almost immediately afterward, on Saturday, August 1, 1903, from inflammation of the bowels and pneumonia.

Allegedly, found among her few belongings was a bundle of unsent letters to her daughter. Some of these letters were set to music in an art song cycle by 20th-century composer Libby Larsen called Songs From Letters. (Those letters were first made public by Jean McCormick as part of her claim to be the daughter of Jane and Hickok – but the authenticity of these letters is not accepted by some, largely because there is no non-McCormick document supposedly written by Jane, and there is ample evidence that Jane was functionally illiterate.)

Calamity Jane was buried at Mount Moriah Cemetery, South Dakota, next to Wild Bill Hickok. Four of the men who planned her funeral (Frank Ankeney, Jim Carson, Anson Higby, and Albert Malter) later stated that since Wild Bill Hickok had "absolutely no use" for Jane while he was alive, they decided to play a posthumous joke on Hickok by giving Calamity an eternal resting place by his side. Another account states: "in compliance with Jane's dying requests, the Society of Black Hills Pioneers took charge of her funeral and burial in Mount Moriah Cemetery beside Wild Bill. Not just old friends, but the morbidly curious and many who would not have acknowledged Calamity Jane when she was alive, overflowed the First Methodist Church for the funeral services on August 4 and followed the hearse up the steep winding road to Deadwood’s boot hill".

Additional information

Calamity Jane was a frequent visitor to and sometimes resident of Livingston, Montana and towns in the Paradise Valley, Montana.

She came up from a very hardscrabble life, unacquainted with bourgeois notions of decorum; she probably never knew financial security, but even in poverty she was known for her helpfulness, generosity, and willingness to undertake demanding and even dangerous tasks to help others. She was afflicted with alcoholism and wanderlust (and, perhaps, promiscuity) but, as someone remembered her, "Her vices were the wide-open sins of a wide-open country – the sort that never carried a hurt".

Autobiography

"Calamity Jane", as she eventually became known, lived a very colorful and eventful life but often claimed questionable associations or friendships with notable American Old West figures, almost always posthumously. For example, years after the death of Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer, she claimed that she served under him during her initial enlistment at Fort Russell, and that she also served under him during the Indian campaigns in Arizona. However, no records exist to show that Custer was assigned to Fort Russell, and he did not take an active part in the Arizona Indian campaigns; he was given the task of subjugating the Plains Indians.

In 1896 she joined the traveling Kohl & Middleton Dime Museum as a performer, and a 7-page souvenir booklet was sold by that circus, titled The Life and Adventures of Calamity Jane by Herself; it was almost certainly written by someone else, as there is no reliable evidence that Jane could read and write. The booklet misstates her birth name (as "Marthy Cannary"), her birthdate, and misspells "Missouri" repeatedly. Several of the stories in the booklet are either unsupported or contradicted by reliable evidence.

Unlike Annie Oakley, her performances did not involve sharpshooting or roping or riding, merely Jane appearing on stage in buckskins and reciting her adventures—"which metastasized with each telling"—in colorful but clean language; however after about six months her increasing drinking and profanity ended her career as a stage performer.

Her reputation for embellishing her accomplishments, and the willingness of some others to attribute to her even more fanciful adventures (even during her lifetime she was used as a character in works of Western fiction), have made it very difficult to determine the "true facts" of her life. Historians have been unable to locate sufficient information to determine the truth about disputed events, and in many instances independent sources completely contradict her own accounts.

Major media representations

Films

• The Plainsman is a 1936 film starring Gary Cooper as Wild Bill Hickok and Jean Arthur as Calamity Jane.
• In Young Bill Hickok with Roy Rogers (1940), she was portrayed by Sally Payne.
• Calamity Jane was played by Frances Farmer in the 1941 Western The Badlands of Dakota.
• Calamity Jane was played by Jane Russell in the 1948 comedy The Paleface.
• Calamity Jane and Sam Bass was a 1949 film; Calamity was played by Yvonne De Carlo, Sam Bass by Howard Duff.
• Calamity Jane was a 1953 musical-western film from Warner Bros. starring Doris Day and Howard Keel as Wild Bill Hickok. It won the Best Song Oscar for "Secret Love", by Sammy Fain and Paul Francis Webster.
• In the 1975 movie Death Race 2000, Calamity Jane was the name of one of the racers and was portrayed by Mary Woronov.
• In the 1984 made-for-TV film, Calamity Jane, she was portrayed by Jane Alexander
• In the 1995 Disney movie Tall Tale: The Unbelievable Adventures of Pecos Bill she was portrayed by Catherine O'Hara as a mythic figure, acquainted with Paul Bunyan and John Henry, and as Pecos Bill's jilted sweetheart and as a sheriff or deputy of some sort.
• In the 1995 film Wild Bill, Calamity Jane was portrayed by Ellen Barkin.
• In the 1995 film Buffalo Girls, Calamity Jane was portrayed by Anjelica Huston.
• Jane was portrayed by Sylvie Testud in the 2009 French movie Lucky Luke.

Documentary

• Calamity Jane : Wild West Legend, directed by Gregory Monro (2014)

Games

• In Call of Duty: Black Ops (2010) Zombies Mode, the Pack-a-Punched CZ 75s are called Calamity & Jane
• Fallout 3 (2008) includes a reference to Calamity Jane by talking with the sheriff in Megaton.
• In the Facebook application FrontierVille there is a suitlike outfit for female characters called the "Calamity Jane Outfit."
• She appeared as a side character in the computer RPG Worlds of Ultima: Martian Dreams (1991).
• Parasite Eve II (1999) includes a reference to Calamity Jane when users check a portrait on one of the motel rooms, once the user acquires the master key.
• In the KingsIsle Entertainment game Pirate 101 Calamity Jane is one of the Magnificent 7.
• Calamity Jane appeared as a side-main character in the videogame Wild Arms (1996).
• Calamity jane appeared in the mobile online game "Fate/Grand Order" as an Archer-class Servant able to be summoned by the main character (2015).
• There is a minor appearance of her name and possibly a reference to her in Fallout: New Vegas where a Ghoul changes jobs and names,and the year 2287 she is a scientist with the name of "Calamity".

Plays

Productions:

Calamity Jane the Play by Catherine Ann Jones:

• Empire State Theatre, Albany, New York
• Promenade Theatre, New York, NY, with Estelle Parsons
• Santa Paula Theatre, Santa Paula, CA
• Wimberley Players, Wimberley, Texas
• Plaza Playhouse, Carpenteria, CA

Calamity Jane the Musical by Catherine Ann Jones:

• South Jersey Regional Theatre, Somers Point, New Jersey
• Ojai Arts Theatre, Ojai, CA
• Camino Real Theatre, San Juan Capistrano, CA

Literature

Books

• Calamity Jane was an important fictional character in the Deadwood Dick series of dime novels beginning with the first appearance of Deadwood Dick in Beadle's Half-Dime Library issue #1 in 1877. This series, written by Edward Wheeler, established her with a reputation as a wild north vacation heroine and probably did more to enhance her familiarity to the public than any of her real life exploits. (There is no evidence that she was consulted by Wheeler or approved the Deadwood Dick stories, so the character in the stories was entirely fictitious – as were the events described, but the fictional adventures were muddled in the public mind with the real Jane.)
• Calamity Jane was the title character in an serial published in New York's Street & Smith's Weekly (1882) under the title, Calamity Jane: Queen of the Plains, by the author "Reckless Ralph".
• The science fiction writer A. Bertram Chandler included a character named Calamity Jane Arlen in his far future novels set on the frontier Rim Worlds, a space analogue of the Old West.
• A fictitious fight between Calamity Jane and an impostor is depicted in Thomas Berger's novel Little Big Man (1964).
• Jane is the central character in Larry McMurtry's book Buffalo Girls: A Novel (1990).
• Jane is a central character in Pete Dexter's novel Deadwood (1986), which was the basis for the HBO series Deadwood.
• J. T. Edson features Calamity Jane as a character in a number of his books, as a stand-alone character and as a romantic interest of the character Mark Counter.
• An alternate universe version of Jane is a character in the short story "Deadwood" in Corsets and Clockwork (2011), a steampunk anthology. The story also features Jesse James.
• In Calamity's Wake (2013), a novel of historical fiction written by Natalee Caple, Martha, or Calamity Jane, is one of two main narrators; the other is Jane's daughter Miette.
• Calamity Jane is the name that James Bond gives to his putter in the novel Goldfinger, by Ian Fleming, due to its inaccuracy.
• Calamity Jane : Mémoires de l'Ouest, written by Gregory Monro (2010), is the only French biography to this day.

Comics

• Calamity Jane figures as a main character in an album of the same name of the Franco-Belgian comics series Lucky Luke, created by Morris and René Goscinny. Also, she features in the album Ghosthunt, created by Morris and Lo Hartog van Banda.

Music

• Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickok are featured in the song "Deadwood Mountain" by the country duo Big & Rich
• Some of her purported letters were set to music in an art song cycle by 20th-century composer Libby Larsen, called "Songs From Letters"
• Soprano Dora Ohrenstein commissioned five pieces compiled under the title Urban Diva, the second piece, Ben Johnston's Calamity Jane to Her Daughter is a theatrical setting of selected letters.
• Calamity Jane is referenced in a song by Bob Schneider called "Getting Better"
• Calamity Jane is referenced in a song by The Magnetic Fields called "Two Characters in Search of a Country Song"
• "Calamity Jane" is a song by Grant-Lee Phillips on "Virginia Creeper" (2004).
• "Calamity Jane" is a song by Kiya Heartwood on Wishing Chair's Underdog CD (2005)
• Alain Bashung, Chloé Mons, Rodolphe Burger released the album La Ballade de Calamity Jane (2006) based on Jane's letters to her daughter
• "Kalamity Jane" is a song by Czech rock band Kabát
• Calamity Jane is mentioned in the song "To the Dogs or Whoever" by Josh Ritter.
• Calamity Jane is referenced in a song of the same name by French pop singer Camélia Jordana from her self-titled debut album.
• "Calamity Jane" is a song by Chris Anderson on his album "The Crown" (2004)

Television

• The name "Calamity" is given to the children's character played by Nancy Gilbert in the 1955–1956 syndicated television series, Buffalo Bill, Jr., with Dick Jones as the fictitious Buffalo Bill, Jr., and Harry Cheshire as Judge Ben "Fair and Square" Wiley.
• In the episode "Calamity" (December 13, 1959) of the ABC/Warner Brothers western series, Colt .45, Dody Heath is cast as Calamity Jane and Joan Taylor as a woman doctor, Ellen McGraw. In the story line, series character Christopher Colt, played by Wayde Preston, hires Calamity Jane to drive the stagecoach containing Dr. McGraw and the vaccine needed for the smallpox outbreak in Deadwood. Colt is unsure if Calamity can handle the job because miners and Indians seek to steal the valuable medication.
• Season 5 of Have Gun, Will Travel included an episode called "The Cure" (first broadcast on May 20, 1961) with an alcoholic Jane (Norma Crane as "Martha Jane Conroy") seeking revenge from a promoter who had replaced the "real" Jane with a younger woman.
• In an episode of Bonanza, "Calamity Over the Comstock" (1963), Stefanie Powers plays Calamity Jane, who visits Virginia City along with Doc Holliday. In this primarily comedic episode, she is rescued by Little Joe, who at first thinks she is a male. She becomes infatuated with him, and he receives threats from Doc, who covets Jane for himself. At her urging (and threat), Doc demurs from facing-down Joe, and Jane and Doc exit town. No official or unofficial documentation exists suggesting that Doc Holliday and Jane ever met during their lifetimes. It is highly unlikely that they met considering the geographical distances between them during their lives.
• The television movie Calamity Jane (1984) featured her life story, including her alleged marriage to Wild Bill Hickok and the daughter she purportedly gave up. Actress Jane Alexander portrayed Calamity and was nominated for an Emmy in 1985 for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Special. The show also featured an early performance of Sara Gilbert as Calamity's daughter, Jean, at age 7.
• Jane is the central character in Larry McMurtry's book Buffalo Girls: A Novel (1990), and in the 1995 TV adaptation of the same name, Jane is played by Anjelica Huston , with Sam Elliott as Wild Bill Hickok.
• In 1997 a cartoon series on Kids' WB called The Legend of Calamity Jane depicted a young Jane (voiced by Barbara Weber Scaff).
• Jane, portrayed by Robin Weigert, was an important character in HBO's 2004 television series Deadwood.
• In 2012, the cartoon My Little Pony mentioned a character named Calamity Mane, meant to be a spoof of Calamity Jane.

See also

• List of female explorers and travelers

External links

• Works by Calamity Jane at Project Gutenberg
• Works by Calamity Jane at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)