There were a number of colorful female characters in the early days of Texas. Lottie Deno was the nickname of a woman who appears in fictional tales and historical accounts of the Old West. In reality, she appears to have been Carlotta Thompkins Thurmond (1844 – 1934). She is widely mentioned to have been the inspiration for Miss Kitty, a character on radio and television in the two series, both named “Gunsmoke,” that each ran for many years. In Texas, she is also mostly associated with the shanty town that grew up around Fort Griffin on the Clear Fork of the Brazos River.
Frontier forts attracted their own communities to provide legitimate and illegitimate services to the soldiers who served at the forts. Fort Concho had “Over the River,” Fort Richardson had “Black Ankle,” Fort McKavett had “Scabtown” and Fort Griffin had the “Flat.” Their businesses included saloons, gambling houses, dance halls, bordellos and the like. Lottie Deno is usually associated in Texas with Fort Griffin, in north central Texas.
Carlotta J. Thompkins was reputed to have been born to a wealthy family on April 21, 1844 in Warsaw, Kentucky though her publicly available genealogy is sketchy. Some accounts have her coming to Texas around 1865, moving through San Antonio, Fort Concho (where her moniker was “Mystic Maude”), Jacksboro, Denison Fort Worth and finally Fort Griffin. In all, she is believed to have spent around a dozen years in Texas before moving further west. She was known for her skills at gambling. Specifically at Fort Griffin, she is said to have once gambled all night and bested Doc Holliday. Her tenure at Fort Griffin, near the current town of Albany, coincides with characters like Holliday, another female known as Big Nose Kate, Wyatt Earp and others and the location usually noted was called the Bee Hive Saloon.
She was a fixture at Griffin and remained there about three years, renting a shack in the flat and gambling at night, holding her own with the men. She was described as being well dressed and having a mane of red hair. She is believed to have left Fort Griffin abruptly and moved to New Mexico with a man named Frank Thurmond about 1877, also a gambler whom she knew from her early residence in San Antonio. Lottie later gave up gambling and was often mentioned in the social news of the area, but they were still gamblers when they initially moved to the territory of New Mexico. The couple first lived in Silver City but finally moved to the Deming area. They ran saloons, hotels and restaurants before moving into other lines of business. They were also said to be founding members of Deming’s St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. The couple had no children. Frank died and was buried in Deming in 1908 after a long illness, presumed to be a malignancy of some nature in his neck or nasal passages. His obituary in the June 5, 1908 issue of The Deming Light was quite complimentary and included this paragraph.
“Deceased came to Deming in ’81, and during his long residence here had been prominently and actively identified with the interests and growth of the town, being at the time of his demise vice president of the Deming National bank, and also having other business interests in this country. He was highly respected and his death has caused sincere sorrow throughout the city. A sorrowing wife is left to mourn his loss. He was 69 years of age.”
Lottie survived him over twenty-five years until her own death in 1934. They are buried side by side in the Mountain View Cemetery there in Deming. Her obituary is below:
Lottie is often mentioned in fictional accounts of life during the wild days of Fort Griffin. As noted above, it is likely not possible to verify it but she is often mentioned as having been the inspiration for the character “Miss Kitty” Russell in “Gunsmoke.” It was first a radio series that ran from 1952 to 1961. It was intended to be a western radio series for adults to run as an alternative to the somewhat lighter series like “The Lone Ranger.” In “Gunsmoke” the setting was Dodge City, Kansas. The featured character was Matt Dillon, who was voiced by veteran actor William Conrad. The other continuing characters were Doc Adams and Miss Kitty who was played by Georgia Ellis. The relationship between Dillon and Kitty was intentionally ambiguous but Kitty was a saloon employee who was worked into the various plots. One of the main writers was John Meston (1914 – 1979) who is credited with creating 183 of the radio scripts. He had a long and successful career in radio and television, including the television adaptation of “Gunsmoke” and other well known series, including “Leave it to Beaver.”
The success of the radio program quickly attracted television promoters and it was later produced for that medium. James Arness was cast as Matt Dillon and Amanda Blake as Miss Kitty with numerous other continuing characters. The television series was likewise a great success and ran from 1955 to 1975. One of the standard locations was Miss Kitty’s Long Branch saloon. Miss Kitty was the proprietor and a possible worker in the saloon, and again, her relationship with the Dillon character was intentionally somewhat obscure. The program was such a success that most of the actors with regularly recurring roles became known mostly for their work in the series.
Lottie was also fictionalized in one episode of “Death Valley Days,” a long running television series in the western genre. The Lottie Deno episode was called “Lottie’s Legacy” and carried the subtitle “A preacher’s fiance is not who he thinks she is.” Robert Taylor narrates the opening comments. He gives the date as 1870, the location as Fort Griffin and her nickname as “Mystic Maude” which was the name she was referred to at Fort Concho. Lisa Gaye plays Lottie and John Clarke plays the love interest, a minister by the name of Reverend Peter Green who had apparently courted her when they were younger. The episode can be found online, at this writing.
Lottie is also the subject of nonfiction accounts. J. Marvin Hunter wrote a book, now long out of print, called “Lottie Deno, Her Life and Times.” Carmen Goldthwaite also devotes a chapter to her in her book, “Texas Dames – Sassy and Savvy Women Throughout Lone Star History.”
© 2023, all rights reserved.
Texas History Notebook 
