By jingo, does everybody in Hannibal, Missouri, think he’s Mark Twain—the driver on the tour bus, the guide at the Mark Twain Cave, even Mark Twain...
(Not Really) Roughing It on the Mark Twain Trail
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Travel & Preservation
John Colter’s Favorite Mistake
Screeching and yelling “like so many devils,” the Blackfeet grabbed at the driftwood raft hovering above the swimming naked man. Although humiliated...
Denton, Texas
Founded in 1857 as a county seat, Denton grew slowly until the railroad reached town in the 1880s. A rail outlet brought a considerable increase in...
Buffalo Bill’s Wild Bunch
With binoculars in hand, Kenny Martin of Wild Mustang Tours and I look across the badlands of McCullough Peaks in search of the “Wild Bunch,” one of...
Be Like Remington
A delirious blood-covered cavalry soldier rises up. Firing his pistol, he makes a mad dash to run through the Lakota warriors. One warrior rushes...
Be Like Remington
A delirious blood-covered cavalry soldier rises up. Firing his pistol, he makes a mad dash to run through the Lakota warriors. One warrior rushes...
Following 19th-Century Ute Trails
Nathan Meeker raised a crop of distrust, anger and resentment among the Utes that led to disaster. In one of his first acts as agent, Meeker...
Wanted: Riders for the Pony
On a hot August day, I borrowed a dark bay quarter horse named Jake to participate in a Pony Express Trail Ride from the ghost town of White Oaks to...
Remembering Mountain Meadows
“It was very famous in its day. The whole United States rang with its horrors.” But by 1872, when the classic Roughing It was first published, Mark...
Winnemucca, Nevada
Trappers and Basque sheepherders arrived in today’s Winnemucca, Nevada, in the 1830s, but a Wild Bunch robbery put it on the Old West map. On...
On Oklahoma’s Centennial Trail
And they said it would never last. But here she is, Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweeping down the plains, hitting the century mark. Oklahoma, a...
On Oklahoma’s Centennial Trail
And they said it would never last. But here she is, Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweeping down the plains, hitting the century mark. Oklahoma, a...