Phoebe Ann Moses, aka Annie Oakley

This month we’ll be celebrating the birthday of Phoebe Ann Moses … If you don’t know who she is by the picture, it’s “Little Sure Shot,” Annie Oakley. Annie began trapping before age 7, and shooting and hunting by age 8, to support her siblings and her widowed mother. She sold hunted game to locals in Greenville, such as shopkeepers Charles and G. Anthony Katzenberger, who shipped it to hotels in Cincinnati and other cities. From the time she shot a squirrel for the family’s stew pot at the age of eight, she knew she had a special talent.

We all know about her talent, but what most people don’t know about is the love she and her husband had for each other, Frank Butler. Frank Butler was also a sharpshooter with his own traveling show. On Thanksgiving in 1876 they had a match, and Phoebe Ann Moses beat Frank. By June of the next year they were married in Oakley, Ohio. Phoebe Ann changed her name to “Annie Oakley”, and, as they say, the rest is history.

Even though over the years, Annie Oakley’s popularity far outdistanced her husband’s, Frank’s love for Annie grew even more. And they were always together. After injuries from a train accident and later an auto accident she retired, and Annie and Frank moved to Greenville, Ohio. Annie Oakley died in 1926 at the age of 66. Frank Butler was so devastated that he stopped eating and died 18 days later.