TIME IMMEMORIAL – Cowboys Get Cold
The State of Wyoming got its name from “homesteaders remorse,” which manifested itself every winter when people would say, “Why, oh, why, did I move here?!? It's too dad-burned cold in the wintertime...which lasts most of the year!”
This was such a common expression that people started calling the practice of complaining in that particular way “Why-Oh-Whying.” That soon led to the place itself being called Whyowhying. Some boosters considered this a disincentive for more people to move there, so they changed the name from Whyowhying to Whyoming (hoping that appending the “ming” to the name of their State would eventually help in making the State as popular as the Ming dynasty’s nifty vases were).
Practical cowboys have since removed the silent “h” from the name, noting sagely that silent letters are of no value whatsoever. Without the useless “h,” the State's spelling became “Wyoming” and has been ever since.
1806 – John Colter “Discovers” Yellowstone
In eighteen aught six, John Colter “discovered” Yellowstone. This John Colter may have even been the first Euro-American in Wyoming. He told his son-in-law Waylon Jennings back in Texas about the geysers in Yellowstone.
People who hadn’t seen the geysers didn’t believe Colter’s story, considering it to be just “tall tales” and frontiersman’s bravado, or at best “poetic license.”
Some even misunderstood the account and thought that Colter was saying Yellowstone was full of “geezers,” which they couldn’t quite give credence to, as they figured it to be a country best fitted for young whippersnappers, not old geezers.
This is one of the oddities that Colter saw:
This geyser wasn’t geysering when the photographer snapped the picture. Poor reflexes! Must have been an old geezer.
1862 — Homestead Act
The Homestead Act of 1862 greatly affected Wyoming. Homesteaders, ranchers, merchants, and outlaws arrived en masse. Not “for mass,” because very few of them were Catholics, but en masse (in great big bunches).
As an example, Robert Leroy Parker (“Butch Cassidy”) and Henry Longabaugh (“The Sundance Kid”) began their “career” in Wyoming. In fact, this pair robbed a train which became the episode that the first full-length narrative motion picture, The Great Train Robbery, was based on. It is unknown whether Newman and Redford Parker and Longabauch ever saw that film, though -- although they were still alive in 1903 when it came out.
1866 – Fetterman Massacre
What has been called both “The Fetterman Fight” and “The Fetterman Massacre” took place outside Fort Phil Kearny in northern Wyoming near the Bozeman Trail.
Part of what was called Red Cloud’s War, this military engagement was indeed a “wipeout.” The Indians lured the military men out of their fort, where they ambushed them. None of Fetterman’s 81 men survived.
Kim Douglas Wiggins’ stylized painting of the event is shown below:
“I’d rather be fishing. In fact, I’d rather be doing just about anything else, even peeling potatoes, just now.”
1869 — Suffrage for Women
Wyoming became the first State (upon Statehood in 1890) to give women the vote. But it had first extended this “privilege” to the fairer sex in 1869, when Wyoming was still a Territory.
The reason the cowboys and ranchers of Wyoming did this was because they didn’t think it was fair that they, the men, had to be the only ones to suffer through the boredom of listening to campaign speeches, and the frustration of seeing all the political wrangling and machinations ultimately fail anyway. They felt if they had to suffer this way, the women should have to suffer along with them.
So, they called this burden of taking part in the political process and voting “suffrage” - because those taking part had to “suffer” for what seemed like an “age.” Cowboys back in them days couldn’t spell so good. As Scipio says in The Virginian: A Horseman of the Plains (a novel set in Wyoming), “I can cipher some, but I expect I've got my own notions about spelling.”
Some of the women fell for the suffrage subterfuge, and have been fellow sufferers with the men ever since.
“Sufferin’ succotash! The womenfolk fell for this propaganda!”
1879 – First Dude Ranch
The first Dude Ranch in Wyoming, and probably the universe, was the Eatin’ Ranch, near Wolf. The managers of this ranch were also the ones that came up with the term “dude” for a “dandy” or a “city slicker.”
Without the Eatin’ Ranch and their neologism, there would be no movie named “Dude, Where’s My Car?” nor the Beatles song “Hey, Dude.” In other words, Ewe-Knighted States culture would be vapid, vain, and superficial without the contributions of the Eatin’ Ranch.
1880s and 1890s — Hole-in-the-Wall Gang
For a score, during the 1880s and 1890s, the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang – which included Butch Cassidy’s Wild Bunch as a subset for a time – operated out of the Hole-in-the-Wall in northern Wyoming.
For his part, Butch Cassidy (grandfather of David) made every effort to keep from committing homicide, and boasted that he had never killed a single soul in his entire career as an outlaw.
Some of the other members of the gang were not as fussy on that point, however. The other members of The Wild Bunch included, at various times, Elzy Lay, Henry Longabaugh (“The Sundance Kid”), Tall Texan, Newsflash Carver, Chameleon “Deaf Charlie” Hanks, Laura Bullion, Flat-Nose Curry, Kid Curry, Red Curry, Thai Curry, Chicken Curry, Stephen Curry, and Bob Meeks.
In fact, sometimes these gangsters simply rode around on a bicycle-not-built-for-two-but-still-with-two-people on-it, and sang Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Kneecaps.
They were the inspiration for the Apple Dumpling Gang, led by the ruthless Don Fife and Barney Knotts.
1885 — Rock Springs Massacre
In the 1880s, anti-Chinese sentiment was strong in the West. In Rock Springs, Chinese miners were paid less than the Euro-American (or basically any non-Chinese) miners.
This mismatch in pay actually ended up making those who earned more money per hour angry with the Chinese, because due to their low wages, the Chinese were the ones getting the jobs. Apparently it didn’t dawn on these miners that the problem might be the employers, who were trying to save every last dime they could.
1882 saw the enactment of the Chinese Exclusion Act, prohibiting further Chinese immigration for ten years. Those already in the country were not asked to leave, though.
The racial and economic tension reached fever pitch in Rock Springs in 1885, and resulted in what is called both the Rock Springs Massacre and the Rock Springs Riot.
As a result of the attack on the Chinese miners, at least 28 of them were killed, with 15 injured, and 78 of their houses burned to the dirtline.
Times sure have changed. Nothing like that would happen these days.
1889 to 1893 — Johnson County War
The 1889-1893 Johnson County War, also known as the War on Powder River and the Wyoming Range War was, in a nutshell, a battle between the rich and the poor, the have-a-lots and the have-littles. The have-a-lots were determined to be the have-a-lot-mores.
The cattle barons hired thugs to come in and terrorize the homesteaders, with whom they did not want to share the land.
Many novels have been written and movies filmed based on this conflict, including The Virginian (covered below), which took the side of the ranchers, and Shane (covered below), which told the story from the homesteaders’ point of view.
In True Grit, the main protagonist, Rooster Crowburn as played by John Wayne, is not only a former confederate of Bloody Bill Anderson, but also a hired gun who had been one of those brought in by the ranchers to drive the homesteading families out.
1902 — “The Virginian” Novel
Teddy Roosevelt’s friend Owen Wister penned “The Virginian: A Horseman of the Plains” in 1902. It is set in Wyoming, and considered to be the first Western novel.
It has been adapted for both the big (movie) and small (television) screen many times over.
1921 and 1922 — Teapot Dome Scandal
The Teapot Dome Scandal unfolded during short and stout Warren G. Harding’s administration – in 1921 and 1922 to be more specific.
It was really a tempest in a teapot, though: Warren had accidentally and absent-mindedly put the “dome” (lid) of a teapot in his pocket while dining at the British embassy in Buford, Wyoming.
Prior to Watergate, this brouhaha was considered to have been the worst political scandal in Ewe-Knighted States history. It goes to show just how much things have deteriorated, I reckon.
1963 -- “Spencer's Mountain”
The movie Spencer's Mountain appeared on the silver screen in 1963. Set in the Grand Tetons of Wyoming, it is actually based on the same writings that spawned The Waltons a little less than a decade later.
Although the star-studded cast included Hairy Submarine, Jane Fonda, and Donald Crunch, the real protagonist was Wyoming’s Grand Tetons, as seen below:
Ansel “Antsy” Adams accidentally fired this shot off when he was trying to take a picture of his navel and lost his grip on the camera’s handlebar
2012 to 2017 -- “Longmire”
From 2012-2017, transplanted New Mexican “Buffalo Will” Durant wrote a bunch of sci-fi comedies about the Wyoming hip-hop scene that were re-imagined and filmed as infomercials for Longmire Beer.
These shows featured the recurring characters Walter Lawnmower and his daughter K.D., Michael Vick, Hank Sitting Bull, Archie Andrews, Jake Knightmare, Tributary, Lucius, and Barleycorn Connolly, Graham Grassy Knoll, Merle Travis, Ruby Tuesday, Barsabbas, Eddie Guinness, Muff Potter, and Mt. Rainier.
. . .
An excerpt of every State’s (satirized) history has been posted here on substack, in alphabetical order (from Alabama to this, the final one, Wyoming).
For “the rest of the story,” the (32-page) complete book “The New All-too-True-Blue History of Wyoming” is available here.
The regions of the U.S. have been combined into volumes, too; Wyoming is included in the volume The New All-too-True-Blue History of the American West
You can listen to this excerpt here.
Blackbird Crow Raven is also the author of the book “the Zany Time Travels of Warble McGorkle”