Trailhead
at Gunsmoke
March
21-24,2002
Once a year most of the larger SASS Clubs
have a big meet. Texas Historical Shootiest
Society at Gunsmoke has a big meet called
Trailhead. The 11th Trailhead was March 21 thru 24, 2002.
This was our first. Below is the report with pictures from our point of
view.
Remember all the thumbnail pictures can be clicked to
enlarge.
Our Cover Photo of Year
Country
Girl Linda & Danny Ringo with "Flame" painting by Country Girl
Linda
Trailhead
2002 Report by Country Girl Linda
Danny Ringo and I (Country
Girl Linda) joined the Cowboy Action Shooters club called Texas Historical
Shootist Society (THSS) at Gunsmoke, Texas near Columbus, Texas, which is an
affiliate to Single Action Shooters Society (SASS). Gunsmoke
is a little western1860-1899 period town built by the club for their meets or
shoots as they are sometimes called. The
club meets once a month for regular shoots.
Trailhead is the once a year meet where all clubs from all over the US,
Australia and England are invited. There is
an area of Vendors that sell Western Cowboy and Victorian garb, guns and they
have food. Most
of the members participate in the shooting competitions with period guns using
cowboy scenarios, dress in period dress, all in the spirit of fun. Some
prefer not to shoot. I am a non shooter that concentrate on costumes and taking
photos. I have
been sewing costumes for Danny Ringo and myself for this event since January. Here
is a report on the weekend activities.
Danny was going to enter the competition
but he had one of his guns being worked on so he didn’t compete.
Instead he help out with all the chores that need to be taken care of. This
will mean my report will be more about costumes than it will be about shooting
this time.
Danny
& I set up a vendor booth with Major Photography. Artie & Sexy
Sadie Fly were nice to share their tent front with us. I had barn wood
frames, photo memory albums, and bandanas.
Danny
Ringo and I met a nice lady friend on SASS message board and invited her as a
house guest for the 4 days of Trailhead. Silver Dollar was from Florida.
She brought this friend Charlie. Charlie is her parrot. Charlie sat on my
shoulder some of the home time. She was planning to take her to the shoot but
decided against it. I was trying to teach Charlie to call "Brutus",
our Chihuahua dog, but she just looked at me and said "Hello Charlie"
and "Come in". I was just waiting for her to start barking. Ha. We had
a great time.
Country Girl Linda, Silver Dollar, Sassy Hatter photo taken at
Banquet on Sat night
The
first day, Thursday, at Trailhead , I wore my riding outfit with the cowboy hat
I made with fabric to match my skirt and added feathers with a small deer buck
head. I got some attention with this hat.
We met SASS #1 Judge
Roy Bean and SASS #2 General U.S. Grant and had our pictures with them. They
were really nice cowboys.
Country Girl Linda (in riding costume), General U.S. Grant SASS # 2, Danny Ringo,&
Judge Roy Bean SASS #1
On
Friday, I
wore my War dress that Scarlett wore in GWTW. She wore this dress in more scenes
than any other dress but it was the least recognized. Eighteen of these
dresses were made in different degrees of tattered for the movie. Danny wore his civil war uniform. I
didn't make it but I helped him put together some of his accessory for all of
his costumes. It was so cold (40 degrees and high of 50 but sunny) that I
had to wear a coat over it at least half of the day so I didn't get to show it
off till in the afternoon. There was a lot of traffic at stations #9-Curls
Saloon, #10-The stagecoach, #11- The goldmine and #12- OK Corral which were
across the street from our vendor booth so we got to watch shooters like
Tequila, General US Grant SASS#2, Judge Roy Bean#1, and Justice Kate #1000. There
were over 240 shooters participating this year. Silver Dollar got up close, but not to close, and
took pictures.
Country
Girl Linda (in Scarlett war dress) & Slow Pokahanes
Saturday morning I wore
the walking day dress I made from my printed bedroom curtains.
It was dark blue with little pink roses. I made the fancy white satin hat
with pink roses with antique hand made lace, pink ribbon and toile, to match the
dress. It got even more attention. I had my picture with Kate & Judge
Roy Bean. Kate & the Judge are engaged to be married at Mule Camp in
California in April.
Ph1:
Kate SASS 1000, Country Girl Linda SASS#42589
&
Judge Roy Bean SASS#1
Ph2
General
U.S. Grant SASS #2 and Country Girl Linda (in
day walking dress and hat)
We had 7 guests that came
at our invitation. Sassy Hatter and Two Shot Tex are members of SASS from San
Antonio area. The other 5 were neighbors. They all descended on us at the same
time so we all had a nice lunch together. We had a good time showing them around
the 40 venders. Sassy noticed that it was easier walking at Gunsmoke than it is
at Tin Star (another CAS club near Fredericksburg) cause it is all grass but you
have to watch out for the cow paddies left from off weeks when longhorns and
horses roaming the town.
The others noticed the nice little western buildings and all the period
correct costumes and guns.
"Flame" Oil painting by Country Girl Linda
I am a artist by
trade. The board of Gunsmoke commissioned me to paint a Saloon girl
painting for the Trailhead Banquet and to later decorate Curl Saloon or to hang
in the Marlin House at Gunsmoke. The model I used had red curly hair and green eyes. My model for the body was
Rose from Titanic. The head was from another model with some variations. The
bright colors
in the painting were green and purple pillows, gold couch and red drape curtain
behind. Flame
was draped with a white almost transparent throw that helped the painting become an acceptable painting for
family viewings if you know what I mean. As
we arrived at the banquet the painting greeted us just as we entered the
door. We along with many others used it as a prop for photo
moments.
Ph1: Country Girl Linda, Ph2: Star and Henrietta Ashe, Ph3: Shot
Glass, Ph4: Country Girl Linda with Texas Jack Daniels (Shot Glass's
husband), Ph5: Tequila, All with "Flame".
We had a nice band, some
dancing, great food, gambling and the awards program. We took lots of pictures
with different cowboys and cowgirls, dressed as gamblers, saloon girls,
Victorian ladies, western and civil war movie characters and fantasy characters.
I dressed as Scarlett O'Hara and Danny dressed like Rhett Butler but looked very
much like Gus McCray from Lonesome Dove with his mustache, don't you think?
"Guess What", I won 1st place as Ladies SILVER SCREEN COSTUME WINNER.
Wow, was I very surprise and happy. I got a nice plaque I will cherish
forever. The cover photo from the Cowboy Action Shooters page is from
the banquet and was taken by Sassy Hatter.
Clementine & Sweet Pea Sallie presenting Country Girl Linda with
award plaque for
Best Lady's Silver Screen Costume
Sunday was a quiet day in comparison to Sat. They had some Side Matches,
Couples, and Long Rifle Matches. Sassy Hatter and Two Shot came back for a while. We
made plans to meet before next shoot at Gunsmoke for a practice session at our
home. We packed up our booth about noon. We were really tired but agreed it was
a great weekend.
