Sitting Bull was killed 135 years ago today, on December 15, 1890. Buffalo Bill’s Wild West presented itself, in both Europe and America, as an authentic historical exhibition—what its programs called the “Drama of Civilization” as it unfolded in the frontier West. Central to that story, and to the Wild West itself, were the show’s Lakota performers. This was Bill Cody’s show, and he was its star, but the Indians were its most essential element. Audiences watched the Lakota e

On October 30, 1912, the Jacksonville Journal ran a small human-interest piece tied to a large piece of news: Buffalo Bill’s Wild West had broken up for the season. As it often did, the great traveling show was dispersing for the winter, its performers and employees scattering across the country by rail and steamship. For Frank M. Ironmonger, Florida passenger agent for the Clyde Line, the news stirred memories that reached back nearly half a century—past the Wild West, past

In 1879, the simmering tensions between the Ute people and the U.S. government finally boiled over in northwestern Colorado. At the center of the conflict was Nathan Meeker, an idealistic Indian Agent who believed he could force the Utes to abandon their nomadic culture for farming and fences. When Meeker’s rigid demands met Ute resistance, the situation escalated into a crisis that drew Major Thomas Thornburgh and a column of 200 soldiers into the territory. But instead of q

Episode 2 of the Buffalo Soldiers series which I wrote for Legends of the Old West follows the 9th Cavalry into the unforgiving terrain of southern New Mexico, where small patrols of Black troopers were tasked with tracking fast-moving Apache bands through canyons, arroyos, and the jagged Florida Mountains. The episode sets the stage by showing how these soldiers operated in hostile country—often outnumbered, always overworked, and constantly navigating landscapes where the e

The newest Legends of the Old West series has launched, and it begins with a powerful opener written by podcast host Chris Wimmer . Episode 1, “Battle of Fort Lancaster,” sets the stage for a six-part exploration of the Buffalo Soldiers and the pivotal moments that shaped their history on the American frontier. I wrote episodes 2-5 of this series. The Buffalo Soldiers’ story begins in fire and chaos at a lonely outpost on the Texas frontier. In Episode 1: “Battle of Fort L

One of the most interesting things about working with history is how much of it we’ll never actually see. We have studio portraits of Texas Jack and Buffalo Bill, a handful of stage shots with Morlacchi, and the occasional lucky outdoor photograph. But the larger world they moved through—their rides, their performances, their campfire hours—lives mostly in written accounts. That’s where the new Nano Banana Pro, running through Google’s Gemini, turns into a surprisingly helpf

A Newly Discovered Photograph of Texas Jack Junior and the Mexican Joe Show Company Every so often, I open my email and find that history surprises me with something truly remarkable. Last week, I got an email from Don Arth, who shared this image with me and graciously allowed me to share it with you. This newly uncovered photograph, shared here publicly for the first time, captures Texas Jack Junior and fellow performers from the Mexican Joe Show Company, taken around 1886,

Back in August of 2017, I made the trip to Cody, Wyoming, for the Buffalo Bill Centennial Symposium at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West. I had just finished the first draft of my book on Texas Jack Omohundro and was trying to find a publisher. That evening’s keynote speaker was historian and author Paul Andrew Hutton , whose book The Apache Wars I had brought with me, hoping to have him sign it. After his talk, I had the chance to meet him and tell him about the project I

Before Texas Jack was a cowboy legend, he was John Baker Omohundro. And before he was synonymous with the Lone Star State, he was a boy from Virginia — born July 26, 1846, in Palmyra, 50 miles as the crow flies northwest of Richmond. He earned the name “Texas Jack” years later, after driving longhorn cattle across the plains and scouting alongside Buffalo Bill Cody and Wild Bill Hickok. But no matter how far he roamed, from the open range of Texas to the vast prairies of Neb

Did you know that Hollywood’s greatest leading man, an Academy Award winner and heartthrob of a generation, once served as a pallbearer...

Robert Redford, one of Hollywood’s true icons, has died at 89. For more than half a century he embodied the golden era of American...

Yesterday marked the paperback release of Julia Bricklin’s Red Sapphire: The Woman Who Beat the Blacklist . I read this book when it...

Graham Greene has walked on. The Oneida First Nations actor, who was good in every role he inhabited, died this week at the age of 73....

Azariah Wild. It’s one of the great names of the Wild West. But even most serious students of American history have either never heard of...

This photograph, that I saw for the first time yesterday, is a rare moment in time from my family's history. It was taken around 125...

The other day my dad mentioned a song my grandfather, Lee Jackson Cooper, had written with Dalton Roberts. That sent me digging—and...

I’m working on a couple of podcast episodes about the Buffalo Soldiers, the Black cavalrymen who rode for the U.S. Army after the Civil...

In the decades after Texas Jack Omohundro helped define the image of the cowboy for audiences across America, his namesake and...

If you’re a fan of Wild West history—and especially of the Lincoln County War and the legend of Billy the Kid—do yourself a favor and...

Review: In the Days of Billy the Kid by James B. Mills A deeper, richer American West—told through the lens of Hispano resistance and...