Soapy Smith shootout mural found behind a wall in Skagway, Alaska.

Photo by Andrew Cremata, Skagway News
Painting by Bea O’Daniel

(Click image to enlarge)

hootout on Juneau Wharf mural found hidden behind a wall.

This is a post from my original blog, dated December 31, 2007. 

"Restoration of a gold rush era building recently sold uncovered a mural this last October [2007]. After paneling was removed from the walls of Moe’s Frontier Bar, a mural by Bea O’Daniel (now Lingle) completed in May 1951 was revealed. The painting stretches around the perimeter of the main bar room and includes a detailed panoramic scene of Skagway in 1900 and separate pieces showing gold seekers ascending the Chilkoot Trail’s Golden Staircase and a Canadian Mountie on horseback atop a mountain. The above portion shows the Soapy Smith/Frank Reid gunfight. The mural was covered up in the late 1960s or early 1970s. There are currently no plans to salvage it."

It is not known if the mural was saved, but the image above has found a good home on the Gunfight Art page of the Alias Soapy Smith website.

"He was sprawled out with his Stetson lying there, but nobody dared put his feet together or place his hands over his heart. They didn’t dare show sympathy for fear somebody would pull out a gun."

—Bobby Sheldon, Alias Soapy Smith, p. 537.

DECEMBER 18

1787: New Jersey becomes the third state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.

1796: The Monitor of Baltimore, Maryland is published as the first Sunday newspaper.

1856: Lieutenant James Witherell of Company C, 2nd Cavalry, and two officers from the 8th Infantry, battle with a party of Apache Indians while scouting by the Rio Grande from Ft. Clark, Texas.

1862: The first orthopedic hospital, the Hospital for Ruptured and Crippled, is organized in New York City.

1865: Slavery is abolished in the United States with the ratification of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

1894: Soapy Smith and John Bowers are arrested in Denver on complaint from Thomas Moody. Soapy pays a $300 bond to get them out of jail.

1898: A new automobile speed record is set at 39 mph.

1899: President McKinley commutes the sentence of Soap Gang member “Slim Jim” Foster in the robbery of John D. Stewart in Skagway, Alaska, after one year due to his having contracted consumption.

1903: The Panama Canal Zone is acquired 'in perpetuity' by the U.S. for an annual rent.

1912: The discovery of the Piltdown man in East Sussex is announced. It will be proved a hoax in 1953. Bad man Soapy Smith had a petrified man found in 1892. It was not proven to be a hoax until 2012, when it was determined that the corpse was intentionally mummified.