History can sometimes seem a mishmash of facts, folklore and half-forgotten fables, held together by little more than spit and baling wire. Take...
Cowboy Capital of the World
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John Stanley
City of Destiny
By the time the Pilgrims got around to settling Plymouth in 1620, Santa Fe had been a bustling community for more than a decade. For over four...
Wickenburg’s Western Ways
Tradition is more than just a buzzword out Wickenburg way. Although it’s only an hour away from the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the historic...
No Hangin’ Tree ’round These Parts
Most Old West towns grew up helter-skelter around mines or along cattle trails. But Great Falls, named for a spectacular series of waterfalls...
A Mining Bonanza and Bust
Back in the 1980s, LIFE magazine quoted an American Automobile Association...
Rodeo Capital of the World
Buffalo Bill is commonly considered the founding father of Cody, Wyoming. And while that’s a perfectly reasonable assumption, credit really should...
There’s Gold in Them Thar Hills
Grass Valley was once the golden heart of one of the most dramatic eras of the Old West—the California Gold Rush. The little town, tucked up in the...
Hell Paso
Everyone knew that John Wesley Hardin was one of the deadliest gunfighters in all the West. Which is why, late in the evening of August 19, 1895,...
Gateway to the Cascades
Faith. Hope. Charity. Over time, the original names of the three prominent mountains near the charming community of Sisters, Oregon, have faded. But...
Ragtown to Riches
In the morning of Sept. 28, 1874, Colonel Ranald Mackenzie and his Fourth Cavalry swept into Palo Duro Canyon. The soldiers burned Indian camps,...
Billy the Kid’s Legendary La Placita
By most accounts, the death of 24-year-old John Tunstall was little more than a cold-blooded assassination. His murder was the spark that ignited...
Rowdy River Town
There were rules in Victor Trevitt’s saloon—no gambling, for one thing. No fighting, or even any rough talk. Drinking was allowed, of course, but...