Texas's oldest continuously operating tavern can be found in Austin. August Scholz opened his establishment after the Civil War, in 1866, and it...
Suds for Crab Cowboys
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frontier fare
Red Hot for the Crowd
In 1879, when the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe chugged into Las Vegas, New Mexico Territory, the railroad brought in a wide variety of food that...
Mark Twain’s Vittles and Viands
Once Missouri-born Samuel Clemens headed west in July 1861, he began his lifelong career of penning frontier life accounts that were both serious...
Dinner in Deadwood with Calamity Jane
In the fall of 1875, a makeshift tent town popped up, beginning a stampede to Deadwood Gulch. By the winter of 1876, the population of this Dakota...
Gourmet Glitz at Gateway to the West
When high society ladies threw a party in the West, they spared no expense. Women living in rural areas had their challenges, but the wealthy ladies...
The Picnic Disease
As towns across the frontier West heated up during the spring and summer months, sweltering pioneers found ways to beat the heat at picnics. They...
Denver’s Unsinkable Hostess
Before she became famous as the “Unsinkable Molly Brown,” after surviving the 1912 sinking of Titanic, Margaret Tobin-Brown arrived in Denver,...
Hand Over the Ice Cream
In 1850, a new ice cream saloon in San Francisco, California, greeted patrons with the aromas of vanilla and lemon. The Alta California described...
Klondike Dining with the Earps
The Klondike and Yukon Rivers, bordering Alaska and Canada, were the final frontier for 19th-century miners out West. In the late 1890s, thousands...
Eating Out
A basic necessity in frontier camps, restaurants often started out in tents. An evolution took place as wagons rolled west and pioneers arrived to...
The Myth of Whiskey
Not all American West pioneers walked up to bars, like Hollywood Westerns often portray, and ordered shots of whiskey. In fact, most would have...
Buffalo Soldier Grub
Buffalo soldiers, officially organized in 1866, were an important part of settling the West. They served in various all-black regiments. Benjamin...