Big Schmidt

Big Schmidt or Olf Schmidt, as he is known, is the town hooligan in Tinsley, Texas. He is a mountain of a German and his English is very good though his accent thick. Schmidt fancies himself a tough guy and was the foreman at the McDowell Ranch before the McDowell's pulled up stakes and drove their herd north to cash it in and buy into the railroad. Schmidt stayed behind in Tinsley and turned to rot gut whiskey.

Schmidt has a notion that he and Katie Birch, a barmaid at the Elk Horn Saloon in Tinsley, are a couple though she is not as willing. That doesn't stop Schmidt from assuming that she is his property however and usually he treats her as such.