Although the word “hype” didn’t come into common usage until the Roaring ’20s, William “Buffalo Bill” Cody fully grasped its meaning decades earlier.
Using marketing devices that would make a Madison Avenue executive proud, the former buffalo hunter and Army scout transformed his Wild West show into an international sensation.
“He was really America’s first great celebrity,” said Steve Friesen, director of the Buffalo Bill Museum and Grave in Golden. “He was known throughout the United States. He was known in Europe, and became, within his lifetime, a symbol of the American West.”
About 90 artifacts and other objects surrounding Buffalo Bill and his celebrated Wild West show – part rodeo, part shooting competition, part costumed pageant – are featured in an exhibition running through Jan. 27 at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.
The institution, which occupies the former El Paso County Courthouse, focuses primarily on the history of the Pikes Peak region. Along with permanent exhibits, it offers a new temporary presentation every six to 12 weeks.
Curator Katie Gardner said a Buffalo Bill exhibition seemed appropriate because of the showman’s enduring popularity and his many connections to the state. Cody performed 35 times in Colorado from 1886 through 1916, including 11 visits to the Springs. And he’s buried atop Lookout Mountain.
The Wild West show’s annual tours, which were promoted with maps and route cards, listing dates, cities and even the railroads transporting the troupe, put today’s mega-tours by rock stars such as the Rolling Stones to shame.
During the extravaganza’s 30-
year run from 1883 to 1913, it drew millions of people worldwide. More than 1 million people attended the show in Chicago, when it was presented in conjunction with the World’s Columbian Exhibition of 1893.
“Buffalo Bill left Chicago a millionaire,” Friesen said, “and he wasn’t charging a dollar a head. There are some who would say that it was every bit as popular as the World Columbian Exhibition itself.”
In an era before the rise of modern media, Cody’s shows helped shape – for better or worse – the nation’s perceptions of the American West. In that respect they were as important as Albert Bierstadt’s Rocky Mountain paintings or George Catlin’s Indian portraits, albeit with the calculated mythologizing of Frederic Remington and Charles M. Russell.
To spur attendance, Cody relied on an array of advertising vehicles, including colorful chromolithographic posters, such as one boasting: “Actual Scenes – Genuine Characters in our Grand Open Arena with Covered Grandstand Seating / 20,000 People Twice Daily – 2 & 8 p.m. – Night as Light as Day.”
An 1885 program touts the fact that the show was “witnessed and endorsed by – President Arthur and cabinet,” then rattles off a list of Army generals who have seen it.
“The man was quite visionary,” Friesen said. “He wasn’t always so good with his own finances, but he looked ahead and he realized how something like this would pay off. He thought about ways it could pay off better.”
At the core of this exhibition are 18 original posters drawn from the more than 125 in the collection of the Buffalo Bill Museum. Included are two 9-foot-tall pieces showing Arab and Cossack riders and another in French promoting the show’s visit to the famous Champ de Mars near the Eiffel Tower.
Indeed, the exhibition began as a touring display of the posters alone, but the Pioneers Museum wanted to do something more ambitious. So it enlarged the show, with the Buffalo Bill Museum making the largest loan of objects in its history.
Among the additions are two Wild West tickets and a 10-
cent 1894 souvenir booklet, “Historical Sketches and Programme,” plus such personal artifacts as a pair of Cody’s boots and a commercially distributed wax cylinder with a Thomas Edison recording of his voice.
The museum has bolstered those loans with such selections as four postcards from English presentations of the Wild West show, all from the collection of Scott O’Malley of Colorado Springs, and a beaded Sioux dress thought to have been worn by a performer.
Rounding out the offerings are books and other objects that show Cody’s continuing influence on how the West has been portrayed and promoted in other parts of popular culture.
Buffalo Bill died nearly 90 years ago, but the Wild West legend he shaped is as alive and popular as ever.
Fine arts critic Kyle MacMillan can be reached at 303-954-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com.
“Buffalo Bill and the Invention of the Wild West”
ARTIFACTS EXHIBIT|Exhibition of 90 objects related to Buffalo Bill and his Wild West show, including 18 vintage posters|Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, 215 S. Tejon St.; through Jan. 27|FREE|10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays; 719-385-5631 or cspm.org
More Buffalo Bill
Here are other places in the West to explore Buffalo Bill’s life and his legacy:
Buffalo Bill Museum and Grave
987 1/2 Lookout Mountain Road, Golden. This institution, founded shortly after the death of Cody’s wife, Louisa, in 1921, contains about 5,000 objects, including 1,300 photographs related to Cody’s life. Running through Jan. 28 is “Out of Disaster … Hope: Buffalo Bill in New Orleans,” which examines, among other things, Cody’s influence on Mardi Gras. 303-526-0744 or buffalobill.org
Buffalo Bill Historical Center
720 Sheridan Ave., Cody, Wyo. This major Western study center incorporates five major museums, including the Buffalo Bill Museum, which examines Cody’s personal and public lives and places him in the context of the history and myth of the West. Also on view are the Whitney Gallery of Western Art and Plains Indian Museum, both with important collections in their fields. 307-587-4771 or bbhc.org
Buffalo Bill Ranch State Park
2921 Scouts Rest Ranch Road, North Platte, Neb. Cody built the Scout’s Rest Ranch in 1886 during the heyday of his Wild West tours, and he spent many winter months there, housing the show’s stock in the property’s large barn. Both the ranch house and barn, with a display of wagons and carriages, are open to the public. 308-535-8035
-Kyle MacMillan
