Big Nose Kate
When good girls go bad
by Charlene Worthy
How did Mary Katherine Hornady, a young Hungarian girl, daughter of
an emperor’s physician, of fine breeding and well-rounded education become
one of the most notorious madam’s of the 1800’s ending up in Tombstone
tossing back shots and raisin’ hell with Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday?
By her own account Big Nose Kate was a rip-roaring, hard-drinking,
gun-slinging bad girl. Her story begins November 5, 1850 in Pest, part of the
Austro-Hungarian Empire. Her early life was one of ease and
privilege. As the daughter of a prominent physician, she was well
educated. Mary Katherine learned English, French and Spanish as well as
her native Hungarian. In 1862, Dr. Hornady accepted the post of personal
physician to Emperor Maximilian, a Hapsburg Archduke. A few years later,
things got dicey. Maximilian’s government fell and the Hornady’s fled to
Davenport, Iowa, a Hungarian enclave. The Emperor was executed. In
March of 1885, Kate’s mother died. Her father followed her to the grave in
May, and Kate, her sister, and three brothers were sent to an orphanage.
Kate resurfaced in the foster home of Otto Smith.
At 17, Kate high tailed it out o