Legends of the Old West - BUFFALO BILL Ep. 4 | “The Wild West”

Episode Date: January 3, 2024

Buffalo Bill loses his best friend, Texas Jack, but he discovers a path toward resurgence in the entertainment business. A Fourth of July party evolves into the life-changing production that will be called Buffalo Bill’s Wild West. The spectacle’s initial success prompts Bill to hire Annie Oakley and Sitting Bull, and Bill embarks on a 20-year career as the most famous showman in the world. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join Apple users join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes, bingeable seasons and bonus episodes. Click the Black Barrel+ banner on Apple to get started with a 3-day free trial. For more details, visit our website www.blackbarrelmedia.com and check out our social media pages. We’re @OldWestPodcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. On YouTube, subscribe to LEGENDS+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: hit “Join” on the Legends YouTube homepage. To purchase an ad on this show please reach out: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In September of 1878, Buffalo Bill Cody was gearing up for his biggest show to date. He had recently been allowed to employ Native Americans as actors for the first time, 1978, Buffalo Bill Cody was gearing up for his biggest show to date. He had recently been allowed to employ Native Americans as actors for the first time, and now he was doing it again. This time, he hired Pawnee men rather than the Sioux performers he had employed on the last tour, and the show nearly fell apart twice. A year earlier, a new Secretary of the Interior had changed the rules regarding the use of Native American actors on stage. Previously, the practice had been banned.

So, theater companies had to use white men who were dressed as Native Americans. But then the new secretary changed the rules, and audiences had loved seeing real Sioux warriors on stage. Now, when Bill used Pawnee actors, the Secretary of the Interior balked. He told Bill that the Pawnee were off the reservation without permission and demanded they return immediately. Bill argued that the loss of the Pawnee would cripple the production. He had already advertised their participation, and it was clear that audiences wanted to see real Native American performers rather than white men dressed in bad costumes. Eventually, Cody convinced the government that he would lose money without the Pawnee. And, in light of Bill's long and valuable service as an Army scout,

the government allowed the Pawnee to stay with the show. Crisis No. one was avoided. Crisis number two was more serious. The show was touring through the southern part of the United States, but the theaters were nearly empty. An epidemic of yellow fever was sweeping through the region, and the actors refused to continue the tour until Bill agreed to skip the southern cities and head north to Delaware. Bill readily agreed to the demand, and they finished the tour despite the extreme change in schedule. When the tour ended in August of 1879, Bill only paused a month before setting off on his next tour. This tour would last from September of 1879 until May of 1880.

Bill was averaging about eight months per tour, an exhaustive pace for anyone past or present. And while touring, he managed to write his autobiography, The Life of Honorable William F. Cody, known as Buffalo Bill. Then, a little more than a month after the tour ended, Bill received word that his old friend and first theatrical partner, Texas Jack Omohundro, had died in Leadville, Colorado after a bout of pneumonia. In a life that had seen more than its fair share of loss, this one hit Buffalo Bill particularly hard. Bill, the scout, and Jack,

the cowboy, had been best friends from nearly the moment they met in 1869. They had ridden the plains together, hunted together, celebrated the birth of Bill's son and daughter together, mourned the loss of Bill's son together, and celebrated Jack's wedding together. mourned the loss of Bill's son together, and celebrated Jack's wedding together. Texas Jack had saved Buffalo Bill's life, both in reality and on the stage. They had created their public personas together, and for each man, the other proved to be the truest and closest friend he would ever have. Buffalo Bill wasn't done acting, but he could feel that something had to change.

And while it might have been easy to think that the change would have a negative quality to it, the opposite happened. Bill had a new idea, one that would make him the most famous man on Earth. From Black Barrel Media, this is Legends of the Old West. I'm your host, Chris Wimmer, and this season we're telling the story of William F. Cody, known as Buffalo Bill, the man who turned the American frontier into the Wild West. This is Episode 4, The Wild West. Texas Jack passed away at the end of June, 1880. By that time, Buffalo Bill had been a successful actor for eight years,

four with Texas Jack and four with his own combination. But other than Jack, none of Bill's partnerships lasted very long. Bill and Jack had toured with Ned Buntline, but only for one season. They toured with Wild Bill Hickok, but only for seven months. Then Bill had performed with Captain Jack Crawford for a single tour before animosity and injury permanently soured their friendship. After that experience, Bill played it safe. He hired professional actors, not fellow scouts, as his co-stars. But after two more years of touring with just another variation of the same type of show, Bill was starting to see the writing on the wall. Audiences still bought tickets,

Bill was starting to see the writing on the wall. Audiences still bought tickets, but the shows were no longer sold out. Buffalo Bill's tour in 1882 took him to some of the same cities twice in nine months. Critics, like one in Steubenville, Ohio, said, There is such a thing as too much blood and thunder. As that tour finished, an interest in the tired concept of the heroic scout of the plains triumphing over savage Native Americans and evil outlaws started to fade, Bill started to focus on a new idea. It seemed to have its origins in conversations with a fellow showman in January of 1882. Buffalo Bill met with a veteran performer, manager, and playwright named Nate Salisbury.

Predictably, both would later claim to have had the initial idea that developed from their meeting. Salisbury claimed that Bill was, quote, at the end of his profit string on the theatrical stage, and that Bill would be the perfect star of a new outdoor extravaganza that Salisbury had dreamed up. Bill, of course, claimed that he was already envisioning an arena show that would free him from the limitations he felt in his stage performance. With a bigger venue, Bill could add more performers and authentic displays of frontier life. Buffalo Bill and Nate Salisbury couldn't reach an agreement in January of 1882, and Bill finished his latest tour that spring. And in July, the town managers of North Platte asked Bill to plan the festivities for the

big Independence Day celebration, which was the perfect trial run for the kind of show Buffalo Bill was envisioning. Bill had learned that the only activities the town had scheduled for the holiday were a couple horse races. He protested, insisting a bigger celebration was in order. Town leaders agreed and nominated Bill as chairman of the event. After 10 years as a stage actor, one thing Buffalo Bill had learned was how to publicize a show. Flyers, posters, and newspaper advertisements were printed. Men, women, and children of all ages were invited to attend what Buffalo Bill called the Old Glory Blowout. A parade was organized, much like the ones that Bill and Texas Jack had done in cities when their dramatic tours arrived. But this one would be much larger, with a full band, a contingent of military veterans, children from North Platte, and a long line of carriages.

Anyone who was interested was invited to compete in races, both on horseback and on foot. to compete in races, both on horseback and on foot. Bill invited cowboys to put on an exhibition of chasing, lassoing, and riding buffalo and longhorn steers from Texas. It was the first occurrence of two American traditions. It was the first rodeo as a major public event in American history, the first time cowboys competed with each other while entertaining audiences by roping and riding. And the Old Glory blowout was the first of what would come to be called Wild West shows. It was an enormous success, and from that moment on, Bill Cody never looked back. He had been a successful scout and a successful actor, but at the helm of Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West, he was a bona fide showman. Or as he told one reporter,

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The success of the Old Glory blowout convinced Cody that the idea of a Western outdoor spectacle was a good one. It also convinced him that the level of capital required to make a tour of the outdoor show successful would require both an outside financial partner and significantly more money in his own coffers than he currently had. Buffalo Bill had often talked about leaving the stage behind forever, Buffalo Bill had often talked about leaving the stage behind forever, either to return to his old job as a scout or to try his hand at raising cattle on his ranch on the Dismal River. But with the recent success of the Old Glory blowout and visions of an outdoor spectacle in his head,

Bill stopped hedging his bets. He sold the ranch to a friend and prepared to use the cash for his new venture. To raise more money, he tried another theatrical tour. But Western-themed stage shows were no longer the novelty they once were. Other Western shows, inspired by the success of Buffalo Bill and Texas Jack, had sprung up from the very beginning. Now, ten years later, those shows were well-established. They competed with Buffalo Bill's show for theater space, ticket sales, and revenue. It was harder

and harder to fill seats. And some critics thought that everything that could be said about the frontier had already been said on stage or in the pages of dime novels. or in the pages of dime novels. It had been a year since Bill had talked to Nate Salisbury about partnering on a tour of outdoor shows. Nate wanted to wait until he could plan and execute a trip to Europe before committing to the venture. But Bill was impatient. He turned to another North Platte friend for help.

Dr. William Carver was a dentist when he first met Buffalo Bill and Texas Jack back in 1872 when they were working as scouts out of Fort McPherson. Witnessing their transformation to superstardom, Carver likewise reinvented himself as a world-class rifle shot, winning tournaments and a name for himself in California. He had teamed up with Texas Jack in 1878 for a series of shooting exhibitions, demonstrating his prowess with his rifle while Jack talked to the crowd, did a lasso act, and shot coins out of the air with his revolver.

When Bill told Doc about his plans for an outdoor show combining sharpshooting exhibitions, elements of his stage show, and demonstrations of cowboy life, Carver agreed almost immediately. Then Cody went back to Nate Salisbury, and he was shocked when Nate turned down his offer of partnership. Salisbury told Bill that he could not abide Doc Carver, and wouldn't join Bill as long as Carver was involved. He considered the man a fraud.

And after that rejection, Bill turned to another old friend. John Burke had been Jessapina Morlocki's manager when she joined the Scouts of the Prairie production in December of 1872. When she stuck with the show after Bill and Jack ousted Ned Buntline, Burke stayed too. He was a trained actor, but his relationships with newspaper reporters and theatrical owners all over the country made him a natural promoter. When Buffalo Bill and Texas Jack went their separate ways, Burke went with Jack and Jessupina. Burke acted in Jack's shows, managed Jack's hotel business at the Philadelphia Centennial, and worked as promotions manager for the Texas Jack combination.

Since Jack's death and Jessapina's retirement, John Burke had been acting and managing several traveling shows. But when Buffalo Bill asked him to serve as the business manager for his new venture, Burke immediately agreed. The partnership would last for 35 years. Buffalo Bill and Doc Carver tried to decide on a name for their new entertainment. Carver suggested the Cowboy and Indian combination and the Yellowstone combination, but Bill thought the word combination signified stage shows. Combination was an old term for a traveling theatrical group. So, Bill suggested Cody and Carver's Golden West. The men eventually settled on the much more clunky name of Buffalo Bill and Dr. Carver's Wild West, Rocky Mountain,

and Prairie Exhibition. Since it would require strong lungs to say the full name in one breath, and it would take up way too much space in a newspaper headline, it was no surprise that journalists called it simply The Wild West from the very beginning. The show premiered on May 19, Wild West from the very beginning. The show premiered on May 19, 1883 in Omaha, Nebraska, though Buffalo Bill never referred to his big outdoor exhibitions as shows. The introductions to the spectacle, written by John Burke and printed in show programs, said that the purpose of the event was to illustrate life on the plains by showing Indian encampments, cowboys, vaqueros, buffalo, elk, stagecoach robberies, feats of markmanship, and events that were characteristic of the border. Bill thought that the word show should be reserved for circuses.

His productions were much more than that. than that. Over the course of the summer, as the Wild West toured through the Midwest and the Northeast, several things became apparent to Buffalo Bill. The first was that the big outdoor exhibitions, with their spectacle and scope, were his future as a showman. The second was that if he wanted the Wild West to be successful, he had to reckon with his relationships. The first relationship that fell apart that summer was with Josh Ogden, who had served as the business manager of Bill's stage show for the past nine years. The second relationship to suffer under the weight of the Wild West was Bill's marriage to Louisa. Bill had been on tour with

his stage show in February of 1883 and had missed the birth of his fourth child, a daughter named Irma. His marriage had always been tumultuous, and his nearly constant touring schedule increased the strain on his relationship. He had sold his North Platte ranch to raise money for his new venture and was infuriated when Louisa refused to allow him to mortgage their North Platte home as well. The two began to discuss divorce. The animosity between them was so deep that neither saw any chance of reconciliation. Then, in October of 1883, while Cody and Carver were playing in Chicago, Bill received an unexpected and urgent message from Louisa summoning him home. It must have felt eerily like the message he had received when his son,

Kit Carson Cody, was sick with scarlet fever. His 11-year-old daughter, Ora, was dead. United in their grief for their lost child, daughter Ora, was dead. United in their grief for their lost child, Bill and Louisa consoled each other and forgot all talk of divorce under the weight of their shared heartache. But even in his grief, Bill Cody knew that the show must go on. The Wild West production was the way he provided for his family. He had to steel himself to continue performing as Buffalo Bill to adoring audiences and for the final conflict born of the Wild West. His marriage had survived the strain of his new venture, but his partnership with Doc

Carver would not. Carver had a healthy ego. He billed himself as the champion rifle shot of the world and backed up his claim in demonstration after demonstration of his amazing marksmanship. Later in life, he would expand his claims to include being a better pistol shot than Wild Bill Hickok, a better Indian fighter than Texas Jack, and a better buffalo hunter than Buffalo Bill Cody. If Carver had any humility at all, it seemed to be in the realm of showmanship. He knew Buffalo Bill was the better showman, so when Bill issued a directive in service of the

Wild West, Carver obeyed. But Carver was a dour and serious man with a bad temper. Like other partnerships, the first version of the Wild West would not end well, but its demise would open the door to a much better possibility. The first version of the Wild West was a rocky experience. At one show, after a series of missed targets, Doc Carver slammed the butt of his rifle across his horse's ears and punched an assistant when the guy protested about animal cruelty. Buffalo Bill saw the Wild West as family entertainment, and Carver's outbursts infuriated him.

Both men drank lots of alcohol, as did the rest of the all-male cast of Cowboys and Frontiersmen. A Chicago journalist noted that many of the 5,000 people who turned out to see The Wild West were less than reputable, warning that decent people were likely to avoid the show. Nate Salisbury saw the performance in Chicago and warned Buffalo Bill of imminent failure. He reported, Chicago and warned Buffalo Bill of imminent failure. He reported, Cody came to see me and said that if I did not take hold of the show, he was going to quit the whole thing. He said he was through with Doc Carver and that he would not go through such another summer for $100,000. Luckily for Bill, Nate Salisbury finally agreed to join the production, and it was none too soon. Cody's personal and business relationship with Carver ended with the final show of the first Wild West tour.

And, much like his falling out with Captain Jack Crawford five years earlier, his feud with Doc Carver would continue for as long as both men lived. would continue for as long as both men lived. Carver immediately started his own Western show, plotted a competing tour, and did his best to draw audiences away from Buffalo Bill's shows. In July of 1885, Bill and his new partner Nate Salisbury initiated a lawsuit against Carver's use of the title Wild West, which Cody claimed to have created. The lawsuit dragged through the summer, but ended with Cody in sole possession of the Wild West name. For all intents and purposes, Doc Carver was done. He desperately sent letters

offering to make appearances at any county fair for a paltry fee of $300, while Buffalo Bill launched an empire. With Nate Salisbury by Bill's side as a partner and John Burke in charge of promotions, a new entertainment was born, Buffalo Bill's Wild West. But for all the promise of the general concept, Cody and Salisbury agreed that some changes were in order if the show was going to live up to its potential. Salisbury had spent years in musical theater, and he soon hired a group of musicians who would come to be called Buffalo Bill's Cowboy Band.

The Cowboy Band added music to the show, heightening the dramatic tension of the show's biggest scenes, like the finale called Attack on the dramatic tension of the show's biggest scenes, like the finale called Attack on the Settler's Cabin. While a scared white family sheltered inside a cabin in the middle of the arena and Sioux warriors circled menacingly, the Cowboy Band would signal the appearance of Buffalo Bill, leading a band of cowboys to the rescue. Starting in 1885, the Cow cowboy band began every appearance of the Wild

West with a performance of the Star Spangled Banner and a salute to the American flag. The Star Spangled Banner wouldn't become the national anthem for another 46 years, by which point Buffalo Bill's tradition would be deeply ingrained into American entertainment and maintained today at major sporting events nationwide. Nate also approached Bill with a seemingly wild idea. He wanted to do two things at once. He wanted to replace the sharpshooting exhibitions of the great rifleman Doc Carver, and he wanted to bring some much-needed femininity to the production. and he wanted to bring some much-needed femininity to the production. Nate's idea was embodied in the diminutive Phoebe Ann Moses,

who stood just 4 feet 11 inches tall, and was better known by her stage name, Annie Oakley. Annie Oakley had been a natural with a gun since the first moment she picked one up to put food on the table of her twice-widowed mother. Then she made a name for herself as a crack shot as a young teenager. One of the men who bought meat from her arranged for a contest between her and a traveling trick shot artist named Frank Butler. Frank lost the match and fell in love with 15-year-old Annie at the same time. They married a year later, in 1876, and were inseparable for the rest of their lives. Annie Oakley had already earned a reputation performing in theaters, but was drawn to the Wild West, which billed itself as America's national entertainment.

Bill and his team held up the attractions as both educational and suitable for men, women, children, and families. Buffalo Bill and Nate Salisbury offered Annie a three-day trial run as a performer during an appearance in Nashville, Tennessee. When the three days were up, the two men agreed. Annie was hired on the spot, and they spent $7,000 on posters, billboards, and other art to showcase her as a Wild West star. And after Annie's addition, the show continued to diversify. Oakley was joined by Della and Bessie Farrell, fellow sharpshooter Lillian Frances Smith, and Emma Lake Hickok, the daughter of Agnes Thatcher Lake and stepdaughter to Wild Bill Hickok. The production was becoming more family-friendly, but Bill knew that the key to success was still action, danger, and excitement. The name of the show was The Wild West, after all,

and nothing in the West was wilder in the public's imagination than the Sioux, and no member of the Sioux Nation was more widely known than the man Buffalo Bill hired next, Sitting Bull. After the defeat of Lieutenant Colonel Custer and his troops at the Little Bighorn, Lakota leader Sitting Bull and his people escaped the army by crossing into Canada. Sitting Bull remained exiled near Wood Mountain for four years, refusing an offer of pardon for his, quote, crimes and a chance to return to his home. But buffalo herds were dwindling as fast in Canada as they were in the United States, which meant starvation for his people.

In July of 1881, Sitting Bull returned to the United States, which meant starvation for his people. In July of 1881, Sitting Bull returned to the United States and surrendered at Fort Buford. Two weeks later, he and his band were transferred to the Standing Rock Agency on the modern border between North Dakota and South Dakota. Soon after his arrival, Sitting Bull was arrested as a prisoner of war and taken to Fort Randall, where he was held for two years before being allowed to return to Standing Rock. In 1884, Sitting Bull briefly joined as a promoter for a series of shows in Canada and the northern part of the U.S. And at an appearance in St. Paul, Minnesota, Sitting Bull first met Annie Oakley.

He was so impressed with her ability as a sharpshooter that he paid a photographer $65 out of his own pocket to have his picture made with her. With inflation, that's the modern-day equivalent of more than $2,000. Sitting Bull gave Annie Oakley a Lakota name that translates to Little Sure Shot. When Buffalo Bill asked Sitting Bull to join the Wild West in 1885, he showed the Hunkpapa leader a postcard of Annie Oakley to prove that she was part of the production. According to Nate Salisbury, it was the postcard that made Sitting Bull agree to join Buffalo Bill's Wild West. Sitting Bull's friendship with Annie Oakley dramatically affected the way he was accepted by audiences.

He had been reviled less than a decade earlier as the killer of Custer and the perpetrator of a massacre. a massacre. But now, Sitting Bull was loudly and repeatedly cheered as he rode his horse around the arena during the show's opening and told audiences, through a translator, that he wanted to see his children educated and hoped for reconciliation between the Sioux and white men. Sitting Bull only stayed with the show for four months, but he opened the door for the Wild West's inclusion of Lakota men, women, and children. Annie Oakley, Lillian Smith, Sitting Bull, and the Cowboy Band broadened the appeal of the Wild West, but they weren't the stars of the show. The stars of the Wild West were Buffalo Bill and his Cowboys. Cowboys had long been viewed by the American public as rough men. They flooded into towns like Dodge City, got wildly drunk, started fights, and shot the place up. For most people, there wasn't much difference between a cattle herder and a cattle rustler.

The Wild West drew a line between the two, casting cowboys as, quote, genuine cattle herders of the reputable trade. casting cowboys as, quote, genuine cattle herders of the reputable trade. And the show pitted them against, quote, their greatest foe, the thieving criminal rustler. Show programs included a long piece on the life of the American cowboy that was written by Texas Jack Omohundro. Men like Buck Taylor, who was dubbed the King of the Cowboys in Wild West advertising, rode beside Buffalo Bill in arenas across the country, helping to turn the cowboy from a frontier worker into an American hero. The combination of cowboys, Indians, sharpshooting, and Buffalo Bill himself proved to be powerful. Audiences flocked to arenas wherever the Wild West played, and there was no rest for the weary. Normally, when shows wrapped up in the late summer, all the tents,

property, and gear would be sent to winter storage, but not Buffalo Bill's Wild West. When the spectacle ended its tour in September of 1886, Nate Salisbury and Buffalo Bill decided to send everything to New York City for a new production they called The Drama of Civilization. They prepared new artwork and hired more Native Americans, sharpshooters, and cowboys than ever before. Nate and Bill were about to establish the Old West equivalent of a Las Vegas residency for modern musicians. the Old West equivalent of a Las Vegas residency for modern musicians. Buffalo Bill's Wild West would perform at Madison Square Garden for the whole winter. Next time on Legends of the Old West, Buffalo Bill's Wild West plays its historic run in New York and then heads to Europe to perform for kings and queens.

But back home, all is not well. New tensions rise between Native American nations and the Sioux government, and they explode into violence with the murder of Sitting Bull and the massacre at Wounded Knee. That's next week on Legends of the Old West. Members of our Black Barrel Plus program don't have to wait week to week to receive new episodes. They receive the entire series to binge all at once with no commercials, and they also receive exclusive bonus episodes. Sign up now through the link in the show notes

or on our website, blackbarrelmedia.com. Memberships are just $5 per month. Black Barrel Media.com. Memberships are just $5 per month. This series was researched and written by Matthew Kearns. Original music by Rob Valliere. I'm your host and producer, Chris Wimmer. If you enjoyed the show, please leave us a rating and a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening. Check out our website, BlackBarrelMedia., for more details and join us on social media. We're at Old West Podcast on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. And all of our episodes are available on YouTube. Just search for Legends of the Old West Podcast. Thanks for listening.