American sharpshooter and exhibition shooter
Pictured on one of a set of twenty 29 US commemorative postage stamps celebrating Legends of the West, issued 18 October 1994. A set of twenty 19 US postcards with pictures of the stamps was issued on the same date. Other persons honored in the two sets are William F. Cody (as Buffalo Bill), Bill Pickett , William Tilghman , Jim Bridger, Wyatt Earp , John C. Fremont, William Barclay Bat Masterson , Chief Joseph, Wild Bill Hickok, Kit Carson, Geronimo , Charles Goodnight, Nellie Cashman, Sacajawea, and Jim Beckwourth.
Sharpshooter/entertainer who was a major star with Buffalo Bills Wild West Show for many years.
For many years, the cause of Annie Oakleys death was given as pernicious anemia. A recent article in A&E Biography magazine, however, suggests that it may, in fact, have been the long-term effects of lead poisoning from handling so much live ammunition over a long career.
Her husband of almost a half century, fellow marksman Frank Butler, was so crushed by her death that he simply refused to eat afterwards, dying ten days later.
Her early life was the inspiration for Irving Berlin s play "Annie Get Your Gun" (and the subsequent movie, Annie Get Your Gun . Unlike the play, however, which portrayed Oakley as being loud and boisterous, the real Annie was privately a quiet, soft-spoken woman, who enjoyed relaxing with a book (her husband Frank Butler taught her to read) or giving shooting lessons.
During her time with the Buffalo Bill Show (see William F. Cody ), she was adopted by another performer with the show, Chief Sitting Bull , who named her Little Sure Shot. Reportedly, while she gave her shooting exhibitions, he would be standing off to the side, shaking his head in admiration of her talents.
Inducted into the National Womens Hall of Fame in 1993.
She was injured in a train accident in 1901 that ended her career with William F. Cody s (Buffalo Bills) Wild West Show.
Has a celebration in her honor called Annie Oakley Days. It is held outside of Greenville, Ohio, in the Great Darke County Fairgrounds.
She was inducted into the 2012 New Jersey Hall of Fame for her historical contributions in Nutley, New Jersey.
