Annie Oakley!

Phoebe Ann Moses' family had no idea when she was born in August of 1860 that she would become one of the most famous performers of the wild west. They would have never guessed that she would perform in front of royalty such as Queen Victoria of England. She also became close friends with the famous Indian Sitting Bull who beat General Custer in the battle of Little Bighorn.  If you have never heard of Phoebe Ann Moses, maybe you have heard her stage name, Annie Oakley.

Annie was born in Ohio and had six brothers and sisters. When she was 6 her dad died. It was hard for her mom to care for them all. So she got remarried. Annie’s stepfather died soon after and knowing that she couldn’t take care of all of her children she gave Annie to an orphanage. She was 9 years old. When Annie was about 14 her mom got married for the third time. She moved back home, but her family was still poor. To help out Annie began to hunt for the food they ate. She was so good at hunting that she started selling the extra meat she got and began paying her mother’s bills.

When Annie was 15 she was invited to enter a shooting contest against a man named Frank Butler. He was older than her and was a sharp shooter. Annie beat him by one shot. A year later when Annie was 16 she and Frank got married. He was in a show where he and a partner would do trick shooting. Annie joined the show. She and Frank traveled together to a show in St. Paul, Minnesota and that is where she met Sitting Bull. They were very good friends. Both of them joined Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show to perform. 

Annie got to meet Queen Victoria in 1887 when the show traveled to Europe. The British loved the show but they especially loved Annie. Two years later she got to go back to Europe and perform with the show at the Paris Exposition. The Wild West Show was very popular. Everyone loved Annie so much that the King of Senegal tried to buy her. The group toured Europe for five years and Annie Oakley came back to the United States as a superstar.

There have been books, television shows, movies and songs made about Annie Oakley. In 1994 she even had a United States postage stamp made of a drawing of her. The girl from Ohio that never thought she would be anything is still a star almost 150 years later.