In 1876, Custer’s Seventh Calvary was defeated by the Lakota and Cheyenne tribes at the Little Big Horn; three years later, two British columns were...
Dining on the Iron Horse
Hopeful pioneers boarded trains bound for the frontier, but found little pleasure other than a basic seat. If a passenger lowered a window for some...
Betting the Farm in Arizona Territory
What topic could bring one of every five citizens of Phoenix on a hot August night in 1900 to a meeting in the downtown Dorris Opera House? A guess...
A Fist Full of Double Trouble
"We pack six-shooters and derringers for fear of the knave,” wrote 1860s Nevada miner and hay rancher George A. Whitney when describing life in the...
The True History of Lonesome Dove
Martin Scorsese once said, “More than 90 percent of directing is the right casting.” Lonesome Dove is the greatest Western miniseries—no, to hell...
Taming Ash Fork, Arizona
Recently I came across this article on my hometown situated on the Santa Fe Railroad line Old National Trail and the soon-to-be storied Route 66....
One of the Toughest Lawmen in the West
Mike Meagher was one of the toughest lawmen in the West. At age 28, in 1871, the Irish born Meagher was appointed marshal of cowtown Wichita,...
Nebraska’s Homestead Settlement Trail
Nebraska, known by the slogan, “Where the West Begins,” is an Otoe Indian word meaning flat water, which referred to the Platte River. Even before...
Trail of Horses
When Edward Borein died in 1945, he left on his easel an unfinished oil depicting cattle at a watering hole, with a group of mounted cowboys yet to...
The Night I Discovered Pluto
Just what would one expect Clyde W. Tombaugh to do the night of Feb. 18, 1930 when the 24 year-old amateur astronomer ended decades of speculation...
Aztec’s Astonishing Arches
There are so many extraordinary things about Aztec! We constantly boast about our fabulous events, top-shelf recreation, enviable climate, rich...
Gold on the Klondike
On August 16th, 1896 a prospector named George Carmack, his Tagish Indian wife Kate, her brother Skookum Jim and nephew Tagish Charlie were looking...