Gunfights at High Noon
Near Chloride, Arizona
On many Saturdays, the quiet of Chloride is broken at high noon by shouts, insults, and the crack of blank cartridges as costumed gunfighters stage an Old West shootout in the street. The reenactments are performed by local costumed troupes, who spin comic and dramatic tales of outlaws, marshals, and frontier justice for the crowd of tourists gathered along the boardwalk. Chloride also lays claim to something genuinely unusual in this tradition, what has been billed as the world's only all female gunfighting troupe, women who strap on holsters and trade the same swaggering banter and staged action as any group of men.
It is all theater, of course. No one is truly harmed, and the drama is played broadly for laughs and applause. But the performances tap into something real about a place like this.
Chloride was a rough frontier silver camp where guns were common, tempers ran hot, and the law was often far away. The staged gunfights are a way of keeping that memory alive, of turning the hard and sometimes dangerous reality of the mining frontier into a piece of living entertainment. If your visit lands on the right Saturday, find a shady spot and enjoy the show.
