Buffalo Bill sounds better than Bison Bill, I suppose. Buffalo Bill Cody is honored in his namesake town of Cody, Wyoming. There are five museums at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Cody. Here are some aspects of the firearms and art museums:
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- There were many interesting guns here, but I was fascinated by this one: Known in contemporary (ca. 1865) advertising as the “Watermelon Patch Gun,” this trap gun was designed to protect melons. Stretching cords in four directions from the upright lugs on the base armed the trap. Touching any one of these cords caused the barrel to pivot and fire in that direction.
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- Teddy Rosevelt in bronze.
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- Actually in bronze over plaster.
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- There were many interesting firearms, but I was more interested in the machinery used to manufacture them back in the day.
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- A line shaft drove all the machines via canvas belts.
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- Buffalo Bill is actually buried in Colorado. We were there last year. The locals encased his casket in cement so the folks from Cody, WY wouldn’t steal his body for reburial there.
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- The Museum of Flight & Aerial Firefighting was tucked in behind a rest area between Cody and Devils Tower.
In the Zane Grey biography I bought had hid replica cabin, the author compares Buffalo Bill with the lesser-known Buffalo Jones. Buffalo Bill killed buffalo for the railroad while Buffalo Jones preserved them by starting a buffalo herd near the Grand Canyon.