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N0KFQ > TODAY 09.05.17 13:02l 78 Lines 3644 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 31882_N0KFQ
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Subj: Today in History - May 9
Path: IW8PGT<IR2UBX<IZ3LSV<IK6ZDE<VE2PKT<N0KFQ
Sent: 170509/1157Z 31882@N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA BPQ6.0.13
1887
Buffalo Bill's Wild West show opens
Buffalo Bill's Wild West show opens in London, giving Queen
Victoria and her subjects their first look at real cowboys and
Indians.
A well-known scout for the army and a buffalo hunter for the
railroads (which earned him his nickname), Cody had gained
national prominence 15 years earlier thanks to a fanciful novel
written by Edward Zane Carroll Judson. Writing under the pen name
Ned Buntline, Judson made Cody the hero of his highly
sensationalized dime novel The Scouts of the Plains; or, Red
Deviltry As It Is." In 1872, Judson also convinced Cody to travel
to Chicago to star in a stage version of the book. Cody broke
with Judson after a year, but he enjoyed the life of a performer
and stayed on the stage for 11 seasons.
In 1883, Cody staged an outdoor extravaganza called the "Wild
West, Rocky Mountain, and Prairie Exhibition" for a Fourth of
July celebration in North Platte, Nebraska. When the show was a
success, Cody realized he could evoke the mythic West more
effectively if he abandoned cramped theater stages for large
outdoor exhibitions. The result was "Buffalo Bill's Wild West," a
circus-like pageant celebrating life in the West. During the next
four years, Cody performed his show all around the nation to
appreciative crowds often numbering 20,000 people.
Audiences loved Cody's reenactments of frontier events: an attack
on a Deadwood stage, a Pony Express relay race, and most exciting
of all, the spectacle of Custer's Last Stand at the Little Big
Horn. Even more popular were the displays of western outdoor
skills like rope tricks, bulldogging, and amazing feats of
marksmanship. Cody made a star of Annie Oakley, an attractive
young Ohio woman who earned her nickname "Little Sure Shot" by
shooting a cigar out of an assistant's mouth.
Many American's were convinced that Cody's spectacle was an
authentic depiction of the Wild West. Cody encouraged the
impression by bringing audiences "genuine characters" - real Native
American performers Cody had recruited from several tribes. Even
the famous Sitting Bull toured with the show for one season.
Enthralled by the site of "genuine" Indians, few audience members
questioned whether these men wearing immense feathered
headdresses and riding artfully painted horses accurately
represented tribal life on the Great Plains.
Having effectively defined the popular image of the West for many
Americans, Cody took his show across the Atlantic to show
Europeans. He staged his first international performance at the
Earls Court show ground in London on this day in 1887 to a wildly
appreciative audience. Queen Victoria herself attended two
command showings. After London, Cody and his performers amazed
audiences throughout Europe and then became a truly international
success. One bronco rider, who stayed with the show until 1907,
traveled around the world more than three times and recalled
giving a performance in Outer Mongolia.
Though his Wild West show waned in popularity in the 20th
century - in part because of competition from thousands of local
rodeos that borrowed his idea - Cody remained on the road with the
show for 30 years. When the show finally collapsed from financial
pressures in 1913, Cody continued to perform in other similar
shows until two months before his death in 1917. More than 18,000
attended the great showman's funeral, and the romantic power of
his vision still draws thousands of visitors a year to his
gravesite on Lookout Mountain above Denver.
73, K.O. n0kfq
N0KFQ @ N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA
E-mail: kohiggs@gmail.com
Winlink: n0kfq@winlink.org
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