Chapter 1

Ann Olson was a good school teacher, she was just bored with life in Philadelphia. She had always been something of a tomboy and felt closed in by the limitations put on women. She couldn't do anything interesting with her life; her only choices were to get married, run a shop selling some sort of women's clothes, be a school teacher, or be a prostitute. She had no immediate prospects for the first, neither money or interest in the second, and too much of a fear of disease for the fourth, so that left the third option as the only one open to her.

She had attended Philadelphia Normal School for Young Ladies and graduated at the top of her class. This had gotten her a job teaching school, but the pay was so meager that she was living in near poverty. Ann decided that there was no place for her to be happy in the East, her only real chance for happiness was to go West. Therefore, Ann scrimped and saved her money until she had enough for a train ticket to take her somewhere west of the Mississippi River.

It was 1867, and the great war was over, so she was not too worried about her personal safety, though she had read of how uncouth ruffians were to be found in all parts of the west. Therefore, she realized that she would need some sort of personal protection, just in case. She did not know how to use a gun, but she figured that she could learn, so she went to a reputable gunsmith and asked for advice. At first, it was difficult to get the man to take her seriously, but she persisted. Finally, he recommended that she choose a Colt Pocket revolver in .31 caliber. He happened to have a used one in good condition that he would sell to her for $4.50, along with a bullet mold and 4 slugs of lead.

He recommended that she carry the weapon in a shoulder holster under her left bosom, since she was right handed; he just happened to have a suitable holster he could sell her for 75 cents. He taught her how to load the weapon, and she learned to shoot at his range. Actually, she got to be quite accurate with it, even though the gun had no sights. She spent about a month learning to shoot the gun, practicing every day; she even could draw quite rapidly, though she practiced this as a lark, never expecting this skill to be of any real use.

Ann finished out the school year, and, when spring came, gave up her one-room apartment and bought a train ticked for Kansas City, Missouri. She had only a vague idea of what she would do when she got there, but, whatever it was, at least, it would be done out West. The trip west was miserable, but it was finally over one hot day in late June, 1868. She picked up her carpet bag and headed for the hotel.

That evening after supper, she just couldn't bear to stay in her room. It was hot, and she was out West. There were no two better reasons to take a short walk outside the hotel. Since she was out West, she decided that it was appropriate that she wear her pistol. She went out the front door, never hearing the desk clerk's warning about the dangers of a woman walking alone at night on the streets of Kansas City.

She walked around for about 30 minutes, reveling in her new-found freedom, away from the restrictions of life in the staid East. Not paying too much attention to the fact, she had wandered a bit too far from the hotel and had wound up in a disreputable part of town. She walked past the mouth of a dark alley when she was grabbed by the arm and jerked into the Stygian gloom.

Ann was so startled at first that she just went along the way she was pulled, not knowing what else to do. However, she soon came to her senses and began to fight against the man who was pulling her into the depths of the alley. The man continued to pull her and another man grabbed her other arm and also pulled her toward a partially open door.

Ann was dragged into a room, possibly more properly called a shed, and thrown to the floor. When she hit the floor, her gun fell out of the holster and lay on the floor at her side. In their excitement, her two captors ignored the gun lying there and proceeded to pull at her clothes. She was wearing a skirt and a blouse, so the two men had no trouble ripping them to pieces as they pulled her clothes off. The weather was so warm that her only underclothes were a petticoat and light shift, which were also destroyed as the men pulled them from her.

Once she was virtually naked, the men stopped pulling at her and turned to removing their own clothes. She saw her chance when they both were struggling to remove their boots. Ann had regained command of her mind and body and knew what she had to do. Her pistol was there right beside her, so she calmly picked up the pistol and shot both the men in the head. At a range of less than 10 feet, there was no way that she was going to miss, and she quickly put an end to the struggles with the boots.

Her question was: Now what? She was naked except for her shoes and her gunbelt, so she certainly couldn't walk back to her hotel undressed like this. Her clothes were in tatters, so she had nothing to put on. Then she realized that she was close enough in size to the men who had attacked her that she could wear their clothing until she got back to her room. She stripped the men and put on the better of the shirts and pants. She thought about it for a moment and decided: in for a penny, in for a pound, so she tried on their boots and found that one pair was a pretty good fit. She took a hat and was fully dressed.

She had not and did not feel the least qualms about killing the two men. After all, they were about to rape her and possibly murder her, so she had simply protected herself. In fact, she decided that neither man had any further use for any of his possessions, so she took everything that she could carry with her back to her room.

She sorted through what she had looted and found guns, knives, and some money, as well as a few other items which she might sell. One of the guns was a Remington .44 caliber Army revolver; she knew that it was quite valuable and considered by many to be the finest pistol in the Army's entire arsenal. It was large and heavy, but reputed to be the best gun one could carry. She tried hanging it on her hip, the way the man had worn it, but that was just not practical for her. She swapped the holster in her shoulder rig to take the Remington and found that it would be workable. As long as she was wearing trousers, she could wear her old pistol at her right hip. When she added the bowie knife, she felt like a regular desperado—oh, such delicious fun!

She looked at herself in the mirror and realized how much she looked like a man in this outfit. Ann was 5'-4"tall, and slim, without overly prominent breasts or buttocks. Her face was pleasant looking, but not beautiful. What few discrepancies there were in her resemblance to a man should be hidden by the two pistols she was wearing. Right then, she decided to become a man! She was limited by being a woman, but she would not be limited in any way if she became a man. As of this moment, she was no longer Ann Olsen, she was ... Sandy Olsen. As soon as she could find a barber shop, she would have her hair cut in a man's style. She now had money, so she would take the $12.42 she had taken from her erstwhile rapists and buy an new outfit. Sandy Olsen would start life in style!

That night, she had a hard time sleeping, she was so excited at her new prospects. Why, she could even go into a saloon without attracting attention; man, this was heady stuff! The only thing that worried her at this stage of her new adventure was how she was going to learn to piss standing up like a man does.

The next morning, Sandy went to a barbershop before she even ate breakfast. The barber never looked twice at her, he just cut Sandy's hair short the way she wanted it and only charged the usual 5 cents. Sandy asked him what he knew about job prospects, and he suggested Sandy ask some bartenders at various saloons, since they usually knew the latest gossip in things like that. Sandy thanked him and went to breakfast.