Jun 21, 2016 - Sale 2420

Sale 2420 - Lot 54

Unsold
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(ARIZONA.) Fly's Gallery. Cabinet card of Tombstone wrestler Ed Wilson, inscribed on verso. Albumen photograph, 5 3/4 x 4 inches, on original Fly mount with credit on recto and verso; several pinholes in corners, slight loss to two corners; inscribed on verso "To William Muldoon, with compliments of Ed. S. Wilson." Tombstone, AZ, circa 1880s

Additional Details

In frontier Tombstone, wrestling was the big spectator sport, and Ed Wilson was one of the local heroes. He is mentioned in sources like the George Whitwell Parsons diary and a December 1885 issue of the Daily Epitaph. The card was inscribed to William "Solid" Muldoon (1852-1933), the leading wrestler of his time, holding the world Greco-Roman championship from 1880 to 1890. The photograph was by Camillus Fly, Tombstone's leading photographer of this period.