Nada Chance

Nada Chance, SASS 29547

One of the unique aspects of SASS^® approved Cowboy Action Shooting^TM is the requirement placed on costuming. Each participant is required to adopt a shooting alias appropriate to a character or profession of the late 19th century, a Hollywood western star, or an appropriate character from fiction. Mine is a blend of fact and fiction.

My alias is Nada Chance. Nada was born in Stone County, Arkansas, in 1852. My daddy was a poor but semi-honest circuit preacher who spent more time with the ladies than the gospel. On a Saturday afternoon in October of 1864, I was in my first gunfight. A man named Mike Long and his two sons rode into Mountain View, Arkansas and confronted my uncle - Slim Chance - with being way too friendly with his wife. This resulted in a gun battle in which Vernon Chance, Mike Long, and one of his sons were killed. The other son went to Batesville to get help from the law. My participation in the gunfight was minor in that I hid behind a tree. The next day, my uncle and I headed for Texas to visit his brother-in-law, Rex Hardin.

My uncle married a mean widow woman with money and a hardware store in Round Rock, Texas. I went to work in the store and attended school to learn the three Rs. I was working in the store the day Sam Bass and his gang were taken by the Texas Rangers. I was so impressed with the Rangers I joined them in 1879 and was assigned to the headquarters of the Frontier Battalion where I worked as a clerk. I did not see any real action until I was assigned to Company D under Lt. L. P. Sieker in March of 1882. We spent most of our time stopping fence cutting and trying to protect people and property as Texas grew. I got out of the Rangers in 1887 and returned to Round Rock to run my uncle's hardware store after his wife died.

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