The Tombstone walkdown is a unique tradition that has been around since the Earps, Clantons and McLaurys. This is the way that the people of Tombstone offer a final tribute to friends who have died.

"I think it is a great and a very unique way to show respect, but it is very emotional," said Darba Jo Butler who works at the Bird Cage Theatre and has lived in Tombstone the last five years.

New to Tombstone, Joel Ireland preaches part time at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, but his day job is working as an attorney in the law firm of Goldberg & Osborne.

Known in Tucson for his contentious 20-year tenure on the board of the
Tucson Unified School District (TUSD), Ireland completed his last term in December 2008 and decided not to seek re-election.

"Twenty years was enough," Ireland said.

Ireland was a key player in debates around TUSD's federal desegregation order and the increase of teacher salaries while a member of the TUSD board.

In 2004, the National Park Service listed Tombstone Historical District on its list of "threatened" landmarks, meaning that its significance as a historic location, the fruit of Tombstone's tourism economy, was in imminent danger. By 2006, the Park Service was able to reevaluate the situation and remove the threatened status.

Opened last October, Maryann Welch's shop is the culmination of a lifetime of training, and a whole lot of recipes from her family.

Though Welch grew up with eight siblings, her biggest influence was her mother, Rose Cupaiuolo, who emigrated to the U.S. from Italy as a child. Growing up in Philadelphia, Welch studied her mother's home-style Italian recipes and fell in love with cooking.

Welch's first job was cooking at a Philly cheesesteak shop where she eventually became manager. The unique East Coast delicacy was difficult to perfect at first and she had to take classes on perfecting the technique.

Still, Welch feels that her years of training have led to the perfection of a final recipe that is something truly special. Since moving to Tombstone five years ago with her husband and three children, she's been proud to offer her cheesesteaks to fellow residents and even travelers visiting from the east.

The Ghost Rider Outlaws will present the third annual High Noon speed shooting competition Feb. 10-14.

The livery stable has been hosting events for the Single Action Shooting Society (SASS) for the past three years and bringing 3,000people to Tombstone annually.

Although he sports a cowboy hat, boots, and a leather vest, W.F. "Bronco Bill" Pakinkis is not your average cowboy. In the '80s he worked in a rodeo and rode horses, but now the man who got his nickname from being flung off a horse and friends yelling "Nice going, Bronco!" has been domesticated. Bronco Bill, 65 years old and recently retired, has traded in his spurs for a soup ladle.

"I have always been passionate about cooking," Pakinkis said. "I really got into it, though, when I came out west for [Marine Corps Air Station] Yuma where I was stationed in the Marines. I got involved with lots of things, but especially cooking. I knew a lot of former cooks and they shared their so-called secrets with me, and then I started to create my own western food."

"Everyone's family quilted in those days. There was nothing else to do," Spencer said.

Quilting lessons started in the basement of her church when she was a child . She took some classes and fell in love with putting colors together to make patterns. "I met my best friend at a neighborhood quilting bee at the age of 6," said Spencer.
She chaired quilt shows for different organizations in the 70s. In the early 80s, Spencer moved to Tombstone with her husband for medical purposes. She continued to make quilts for family and friends, but started to enjoy making quilts to be raffled off for charities.

(Scroll to end of story for a slideshow of quilts on display at the Tombstone Art Association's 28th Annual Quilt Show.)

Working the night shift at a nuclear laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tenn., few people would have thought Traywick would go on to become the official historian of Tombstone.

She's the town's spelling champ.

Next up is prepping for the Cochise County Spelling Bee, all part of the goal to compete in the E.W. Scripps Co. National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C.

The sixth grader was one of 14 Walter J. Meyer Elementary students who participated in the town's first entry into the storied spelling bee contest.

A creative and lively girl, Gabby, as her friends call her – "Because I talk a lot" – enjoyed the first round of the competition. "I knew the words from reading," she said. Her winning technique is very visual. "It's like picturing the words in your head to spell it out," she said.

Even though retail and restaurant profits are down, the number of tourists who flock to Tombstone hasn't decreased over the past year as a result of the recession, according to Robert Carreira, the Center for Economic Research Director at Cochise College.

Revenue generated by accommodations within Tombstone from January 2009 to November 2009 increased by 2.3 percent since the same period in 2008, according to Carreira.

"Sometimes we'll have 50, 60 people on the boardwalk—two bags. Maybe a postcard and a small little memento book and that's it," said Andrea Grimaldi, owner of Doc Holliday's Emporium on Allen Street. "It shows the times and the economy the way it is."

"Due to the economics and everybody without a job—[business is] hurting," said Grimaldi. "The tourists don't have the money."

Roy Stockton Helday, 35, who works the ice cream and sandwich counter at the Silver Nugget Bed and Breakfast on Allen Street, said the bed and breakfast has been affected by the economic downturn in the last two years.