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Published: March 27th 2012
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Wild Bill Hickok
Gravesite of Deadwood's most infamous visitor. The headstone was originally wood. Adams Museum
Today was a day for contrasts; different traditions of the American west.
I spent the early part in the Wild West, Deadwood.
The
Adams Museum tells the story of the town.
It’s named for a mining executive who founded the museum in the 1930s, W.E. Adams.
The museum is filled with items of all sorts, ranging from the deeply profound to the inane.
All of it is packed closely together.
Fans of western lore could get lost in here.
The first part talks about Deadwood as myth and
reality.
The town was founded in 1875 and quickly rose to prominence.
During this time, the rest of the country was feeling nostalgia for a vanishing frontier.
Deadwood fit perfectly into this nostalgia, and stories about the town grew larger than life.
This is the reason Deadwood in particular symbolizes the mythic west for so many people.
It helps that many of the people who lived here really were larger than life.
The museum talks about many of them.
The most famous is probably
Wild Bill Hickok, who ironically spent
The road to Mount Moriah
When driving to the cemetery, buildings along the road look like this. Remember to pull over before shooting a picture! very little time here.
A gunfighter and part time lawman, he gained a reputation for fighting and fast living in Kansas.
For about three months, he appeared in
Buffalo Bill Cody’s Western Show as a sharpshooter.
Nobody knows exactly what drew him to Deadwood, but the usual explanation is that he expected to make some fast cash gambling.
He was playing poker at Saloon Number 10 on August 1
st, 1876 when a local, Jack McCall, could not pay his tab.
Wild Bill paid it and told the man to stay away from the bar.
The next day Wild Bill was playing poker in the same bar when McCall shot him from behind and killed him.
He was holding a pair of black aces and a pair of black eights, now known as the “
Deadman’s Hand” (and featured on signs and T-shirts all over town).
Calamity Jane is the next most famous Deadwood resident, having also arrived in 1876.
She was a gun fighter and merchant who would also turn to prostitution when funds were low.
She was known for having her picture taken in men’s clothing.
She died of alcohol poisoning.
Her
Calamity Jane
Grave of Calamity Jane, next to Wild Bill as she requested. last wish, oddly enough, was to be buried next to Wild Bill Hickok even though they barely knew each other.
The final character worth noting is
Potato Creek Johnny, whose career encapsulates Deadwood in a nutshell.
He arrived in Deadwood near the end of the mining days.
He still managed to find some gold, becoming famous for a six ounce nugget he unearthed.
He then parlayed that fame into a second career as a tourist attraction.
He spent decades wearing old mining clothes and talking about the mining days of Deadwood.
He later became a fixture in parades and reenactments.
From there, the museum displays daily life in Deadwood.
One irony is that the town now looks nothing like it did in the gold mining days.
Back then it was made of wood.
It burned down several times.
After the last big fire in 1894, town government required all new buildings to be made of bricks.
The Victorian brick look that so many people identify with the mining era was built after it was over!
The Adams
Deadwood Chinese
One of three remaining graves in the Chinese section of Mount Moriah museum, like the Journey Museum (see
Tourists in a Sacred Land), mentions the ethnic groups that moved to Deadwood to seek their fortunes.
People really did come from all over.
The least known were the
Chinese.
The museum has artifacts from Chinese celebrations in the early 1900s.
The Chinese also imported one of the Black Hills bigger vices, opium.
The museum has a section on gambling.
People gambled all over town, but it was concentrated in an area called the “badlands”.
Think of it as the gold rush equivalent of a red light district.
The most popular game was a French import called “
Faro”.
It was
easy to learn and fast to play.
It also had odds that favored the house by over 50%!,(MISSING) so it was banned nationwide by the early 1900s.
Prostitution flourished along with the gambling halls.
Touchingly, the museum has an original matchbook and the auction notice from one of the brothels shut down in the 1980 FBI raid.
The next part of the museum talks about Deadwood after the end of most of the mines.
Town government clearly wanted the
Mount Moriah Flag
The American Flag files around the clock at Mount Moriah, thanks to an act of Congress place to be more respectable.
The museum has a copy of the entire town laws from 1890.
Among other things, keeping “an unruly house or place for public fornication” was cause for a jail sentence.
Things were clearly quieting down as the
organization of merchants replaced the fast lives of gold prospectors.
The last part of the museum is a “collection of curiosities”.
Victorian gentlemen wanted to show the world they were sophisticated, and they did so by
collecting things of all sorts.
The mining executives and merchants of Deadwood clearly joined in that trend.
Many of them ultimately donated their collections to the museum.
The display tries to interpret it as a window on another age rather than just a collection of old stuff.
The artifacts range from a taxidermied golden eagle to a saber from medieval France to dinosaur bones to old shotguns.
Some of it weirded me out.
Mount Moriah
After the museum, I went to
Mount Moriah, the Deadwood city cemetery.
It’s located on a hill high above town, and getting there requires driving one of the steepest roads in existence.
Deadwood view from Mount Moriah
The view of Deadwood from Mount Moriah, which covers all of downtown Houses along the road look visibly tilted.
It says something about Deadwood that cemetery visitors need to pay admission.
The most famous graves, Wild Bill Hickok, Calamity Jane, and Potato Harry, are all located next to each other.
At the far end of the cemetery a sign marks the Chinese section.
Chinese custom in the late 1800s stated that the dead needed to be returned to China, so most bodies were moved after a few years.
Only two known graves still exist.
The final notable item is the flagpole.
It sits on a cliff with a commanding view of all of Deadwood, and even part of Lead in the distance.
The flag flies here twenty four hours a day, thanks to a special act of Congress passed to honor World War I veterans.
Black Hills Roundup
My other western tradition tonight was rodeo.
Rodeo
started as a way for working cowboys to show their skills to each other.
Soon enough, people started paying to see the competitions.
People found they could make more money from competitions than working on the range, and rodeo was born.
Black Hills Roundup Opening Ceremony
The Black Hills Roundup Queen presents the flag during the opening ceremonies. I went to the
Black Hills Roundup in Belle Foche.
It
started in 1918 as a way to raise money for World War I soldiers, and has been going ever since.
It is the oldest continuously held rodeo in the country.
It’s also a mid-market rodeo, which means it does not attract the top level competitors.
These competitors are youngsters building their careers and old cowhands still at it.
The rodeo is still fun to watch, and less overwhelming that the truly huge events (think of minor league baseball vs. major league games).
Tickets are easy to get, too.
The event began with a horse riding showcase.
Lots of local groups rode in, including a local high school team and one from the University of South Dakota.
Next was a military tribute.
A local National Guard unit just got back from Afghanistan (and is going back in six months) and they were honored on the area floor.
Everyone stood and applauded.
Finally, they had a charity presentation.
A local working cowboy (not the rodeo kind) was severely injured on the job.
The rodeo
Bronco Buck!
A competitor attempts to stay on his horse during bareback riding. promoters donated to his rehabilitation, and he was wheeled out to the arena to get the check.
The audience applauded for this was well.
After that, the rodeo started.
Traditional rodeo consists of several
events.
They divide into three main groups.
In roughstock, a cowboy rides on a horse or bull, which tries to throw them off.
In roping, cowboys try to catch a calf by various methods.
Finally, there is precision racing, where people race horses through tight courses.
Bronco riding traditionally starts things off.
A cowboy sits bareback on a horse, with one hand on a rope on its waist and the other free.
The horse runs out of a chute and tries to buck the cowboy off.
The cowboy holds on, swinging arms and legs to show his level of control.
Judges score the ride, and highest total wins.
The rides are fast and thrilling.
Half didn’t make it long enough to get a score.
Of the roping events, I liked
Tie Down Roping the best.
For starters, the competitors were overall the most
Go, girl!
A cowgirl executes a tight turn during barrel racing skilled.
A calf runs into the arena.
The competitor chases after it on a horse.
The cowboy has to lasso the calf on the neck, dismount, drop it to the ground, and tie its feet together.
Shortest time wins.
Two of the competitors missed the calf.
A third had it, but then tripped the rope with his spur so the calf got free.
The rest managed to tie the calf in under ten seconds.
Fun to watch.
Women usually compete in only one rodeo event, but it is a thrilling one,
barrel racing.
Empty barrels are set up around the area, and competitors race around them in a cloverleaf pattern.
Good racers turn as close to the barrels as they dare, since it cuts precious seconds off the final time.
Knocking one over means a penalty.
When someone got around the second to last barrel with a time near the lead, the entire arena cheered them on.
Final times can be as close as a hundredth of a second.
The last event in every rodeo competition, and the
Bull 1, Cowboy 0
A cowboy, the blue blur to the right of the bull, comes off during bull riding. Also note the barrel with legs and a cowboy hat to the left, the rodeo clown. one the audience likes the most, is
bull riding.
The event is just like bronco riding, except the horse is replaced by a huge bull.
These animals are mean, they can jump high, and they love to spin.
The announcer made sure to point out that less than 10%!o(MISSING)f all riders have managed to stay on these bulls.
In this case, every single rider came off.
Some stayed on for a few seconds, and one came off as soon as the bull was released.
The event certainly was thrilling, fast and violent.
It should be no surprise that bull riders are the most prestigious of all rodeo competitors.
Two other aspects of the event are worth discussing: rodeo queens and rodeo clowns.
Like beauty queens elsewhere,
rodeo queens are pageant winners whose main job is to promote the events.
Unlike beauty queens elsewhere, they need to be really good horse handlers.
The Roundup Queen rode in with the American flag during the anthem at the start of the event.
Rodeo clowns entertain the audience between competitions.
Ours dressed like a hayseed farmer, and told the sort of
Roundup Fireworks
The midsection of the Black Hills Roundup Fireworks rural bumpkin jokes Larry the Cable Guy made famous.
Many of them made fun of politicians.
Part of the western myth is extreme self reliance, so distrust of the government (any government) runs deep in this audience.
Rodeo clowns also have a far more dangerous job, distracting the bull after a bull rider falls off so the competitor can escape the arena safely.
After the rodeo, the
fireworks started.
Event promoters like to call it the biggest patriotic display in the Black Hills.
I give them lots of credit for enthusiasm.
The show was basically a long string of preprogrammed displays, one after the other.
They would have something like lots of low level jets followed by something like lots of starbursts.
It ended with a huge wall of flashing dots.
All of it was matched to a rock and country soundtrack that I had trouble hearing over the booms.
The final result was roughly on par with the Chicago Navy Pier (see
Chicago Gives me the Blues), with more fireworks but less artistry.
Watch it thanks to the magic of
Roundup Fireworks Finale
The start of the finale of the Black Hills Roundup Fireworks. Youtube.
WARNING: The soundtrack has a few bad words from spectators.
I spent the weekend at a Bed and Breakfast called
Sand Creek.
It is located on a wheat farm in what feels like the middle of nowhere near Spearfish.
I had real trouble finding it, eventually driving the road at 10 MPH looking for mailbox numbers.
I wanted to relax over the holiday weekend, so the place was just what I needed.
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