Kansas, Dodge City - Thursday, October 2, 2014 - Boot Hill Museum

On Tuesday I picked up the grandkids after school.  We went to Lemon Park and the basketball courts.  They had a football game they wanted to play at Lemon Park, unfortunately it involved quite a bit of running and tagging and grandma didn’t last too long at that one.  I did a little better at the basketball court, but Wyatt was really better on his own.

 

Cheyanne and I watched an ant colony building something along the edge of the court while Wyatt practiced shooting hoops.

On Wednesday we headed west about 70 miles to Dodge City.  About halfway there we stopped at Greensburg which was 95% destroyed by an EF5 tornado on May 4, 2007.  David took daughter Desira, grandson Tyler and I through there about 2 weeks after the tornado struck.  The devastation was just mind boggling.  I think 10 people were killed, but seeing the total destruction of the town you wondered how anyone survived.  The town has been rebuilt and although it is missing much of its history, it is still a nice town.

We stopped at the visitor’s center which is also a museum housing the world’s largest hand-dug well.  The digging for the well began in the 1887 when both the Santa Fe and Rock Island Railroads were laying tracks across the plains of Kansas and needed a reliable source of water.  When the well was completed in 1888 it was 109 feet deep and 32 feet in diameter.  It served as a source of water for the city until 1932.  The well was covered and opened as a historic attraction in 1937.

 

 

The construction of the well was an engineering masterpiece completed by teams of farmers, cowboys and transients using shovels, picks, half barrels, pulleys and ropes.  When I first heard about “the world’s largest hand-dug well”, I thought that was probably one of the least interesting things I had ever heard of, but the more I read about it the more amazed I am that they were able to accomplish this.  You can descend into the well on a series of newly built steps.  We chose to pass on that because then you had to come back up.

After we parked in Dodge City looking for the visitor’s center we came upon “El Capitan”.  This statue commemorates the Texas longhorns that gave Dodge City its place in history as “queen of the cowtowns”.  The longhorns are descendants of Spanish cattle brought to Mexico in the 16^th century.  Between 1875 and 1886 over 4 million head were driven up the trail to the Santa Fe railhead in Dodge City.

 

 

 

Our main focus for the day was Boot Hill Museum, admission $10 per person.  Shown here are the replicated store fronts depicting what Dodge City looked like in the 1880’s.  This was recreated from photographs.

 

 

 

 

This jail was originally at Fort Dodge which is about 5 miles out of Dodge City.  It was constructed about 1865 without many amenities.

 

 

 

The “People of the Plains” exhibit displays the various roles of the people who made Dodge City, Native Americans, soldiers, buffalo hunters plus many others.

 

 

I’m always amazed at the intricate beadwork.

 

When you stand outside this buffalo display there is audio of a buffalo stampede and the floor shakes while a recreation of a buffalo hunt is shown on overhead video screens.

The Museum covers part of the Boot Hill Cemetery.  This was never an official burial ground, but was used primarily for the bodies of buffalo hunters, drifters and others who had no family in the area.  Many were buried with their boots on, hence the name. No one famous was ever buried here.  The marker says “Dead Eye”.  The sign explains that “Dead Eye Steve O’Hara was killed, red eye ruined his dead eye and he was killed in a fair fight”.

The General Store has some interesting items.  This bronze cash register wasn’t for sale.

These canes made from buffalo reproductive organs according to the clerk could be had for $125.  Greg said they were very heavy – I wasn’t touching them.

We went into the Longhorn saloon for a sarsaparilla (that isn’t spelled like I think it should be).  It tasted like root beer to us.  The bartender said it was an original recipe made in Kansas.  Since we didn’t know what sarsaparilla was supposed to taste like we had to assume it tasted like it was supposed to – really sweet.

I think they said this bar came from the “Gunsmoke” television show.

As we were walking around through other “stores” finishing our really sweet drink we came across this dress form.  Would you look at the waist on that thing!!  Ladies from that time obviously didn’t drink a lot of sarsaparilla (or anything else for that matter).

This horn chair dates back to the late 1880’s.  It was made in San Antonio and the catalog depicted it as a “extra large easy chair No. 9 composed of 22 horns, horn veneer frames….in jaguar skins, price $85.00”.

We walked back to the truck and saw several stones on the “Dodge City Trail of Fame”.  This one is of Milburn Stone who played “Doc” Adams on Gunsmoke.  He was the only Kansas native that played in that series.