Pistol Pete, Veteran Of The Old West

Book excerpt: “The autobiography of Frank “Pistol Pete” Eaton, a one–time cowboy, scout, Indian fighter, trail rider, and Deputy United States Marshall Frank Eaton died at his home in Perkins, Oklahoma, at the age of 98. As a youth, Frank Eaton avenged his father’s death when he was shot in cold blood by the Campseys and Ferbers, former Confederates who called themselves Regulators. Eaton witnessed his father’s murder in 1868. In the intervening 19 years, Frank finished the job of gunning down the last of his father’s murderers. At the age of 15, the post commander at Fort Gibson. Indian Territory, dubbed Frank Eaton “Pistol Pete” when he out shot everyone at the fort. In 1923, “Pistol Pete” gave permission for Oklahoma A & M College to use his photograph in a design of a college emblem. Today “Pistol Pete” is the model for the “Cowboy” caricature at Oklahoma State University, New Mexico State University. and the University of Wyoming. Frank Eaton, in Pistol Pete–Veteran Of The Old West, tells about the constant struggle between law and crime and the result of crime which in those times ended with a rope or bullet. His memoirs offer a colorful, humorous, violent, and moving picture of law and lawlessness in Indian Territory.”-Print ed.