"Aim at a high mark and you will hit it. No, not the first time, not the second time and maybe not the third. But keep on aiming and keep on shooting for only practice will make you perfect. Finally you’ll hit the bull’s-eye of success." -Annie Oakley
Phoebe Ann Mozee (Annie Oakley) was born on Aug. 13, 1860 in a cabin in Darke County Ohio. She was named Phoebe Ann by her mother, but called Annie by her sisters. Though When i searched I saw her name spelled many different ways, it seems Annie promoted the Mozee spelling of the family name. While it has been variously recorded as Mauzy and Moses, Mosey is the version most commonly found. As well as the spelling of her last name it was also confusing trying to find out how many brothers and sisters she had, all the reputable sites say she was the sixth of nine children, but I also saw other claims such as that she had 7 brothers and 7 sisters, hmm. Doing research on this woman got a little frusterating because of that, so hopefully all the information I'm giving is correct.
Annie Oakley is known for preforming with William Frederick Cody "Buffalo Bill", and being one of or possibly the first woman sharp shooter. I could hardly believe it when i read that she could shoot the head off a running quail when she was twelve years old! And later she could shoot a dime tossed in midair at 90 feet. In one day with a .22 rifle she shot 4,472 of 5,000 glass balls tossed in midair. wow.
Her Father died in 1866 at age 67, from pnuemonia, soon after Annie was sent to the county poor farm. In March 1884 the Indian called Sitting Bull adopted her, he nicknamed her watanya cicilla, whick means "Little Sure Shot". And she really was little, I read that she was only five foot and looked very young for her age, just like me! Sounds silly but i think that what finally made me decide I would write my blog about her. It's also really interesting to read all the debates about whether or not she was a feminist, I haven't yet decided that myself. What are everyone's thoughts on that?
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ReplyDeleteYou have a very interesting blog this week. I absolutely love Annie Oakley and find that the more I learn about her, the more interesting her story becomes. I just find it so amazing that someone would have the sharpshooting skills that she possessed. In reading about just how great of a sharpshooter that Annie one of the first things that caught my attention was from Cindy’s presentation this week when she said that Annie wasn’t allowed to compete in shooting competitions because she won all of them.
ReplyDeleteNow in response to the question you asked about whether or not Annie was a feminist or not, from what I have heard and read, she denied being one. I do however believe that some of the views that she processed were feministic in nature. For instance, she wrote a letter to the president about having a women militia in WWI. She also believed very strongly in women receiving equal pay in the work force as men did. One of the major feminist issues that Oakley did not come out to support was women having the right to vote. In other articles that I have read, it says that she didn’t march in any of the feminist parades or participate in any of the rallies.
To answer the question that you pose is Annie Oakley a Feminist. From all the reading that I have done. Annie did not consider herself a feminist. But if we look at some of her actions in what she did you would see that by today’s standards she would have been called a feminist in one of the books that I was reading Annie answered the question about being a feminist, she stated that she does not like those bloomers, and that she would not wear them or join them. Annie believed in equal pay for equal work but she did not believe that women should have the right to vote.
ReplyDeleteChristina, Nikki, and Cindy,
ReplyDeleteI was thinking this week about this question of whether or not Annie Oakley was a feminist. I attended Jessica Valenti's talk in Oxford on Wednesday--she's runs a feminist blog called Feministing--and she was talking about how "feminists" have always been portrayed negatively, and therefore many women are hesitant to adopt the term to describe themselves. The stereotypes of feminists that some people have today--that we hate men, that we're angry, that we're all lesbians--are the same ones that were perpetuated in the 19th century.
I wonder if that might have had a little bit to do with Annie Oakley's reluctance to call herself a "feminist," even if she believed in (some) feminist values.