they were the reckless, tough young women, and then that the older women, owl though they had all the skills, only rode out in emergencies and seems the archaeological evidence that we do have seems to support that. the russian archaeologists and ukrainian archaeologists mention they feel that they have evidence that young girls were sort of the active duty soldiers, going out with boys or with other girls. they had that choice. and the ancient greeks say they either went out by. thes or grouped grouped of yound women, and the older women only fought if they chose to or if there was an emergency. the other interesting thing about archaeology, we find many of the warrior women, at least some of them, certain proportion of them, are buried with young children.

so these were mothers who actually had been fighting. >> thank you. >> a couple of questions dealing with patriarchy. one, in such a uare culture of greek, what was the samson doll, and your photographs seemed to indicate that some amazon traditions survived, and i was wondering to what degree they did and how much they were overwhelmed by invading patriarchy. >> the first question about the amazon dolls, it is a very disct contradicts what maybe scholars have said about amazon, that amazons were invented by the greeks in order to be killed and that they were examples, negative examples, for greek girls and women, that you should

not be like an amazon. look what will happen and yet, now we have evidence that young girls played with amazon dolls, and the other interesting thing that i didn't have time to mention, is that amazon images appear not just on pieces of pottery that were used we men but they -- used by men but appear with great regularity on women's perfume jars 0, on women's jewelry books, on things owned by women in ancient greece. it tells something about the private life of the greeks we don't really know. maybe a lot of ambivalence and fantasy going on. i don't know. but your second question about the survival of other traditions about warrior women in nongreek areas. i was very surprised at how much i was able to find. some stories come from the

caucus or central asia and are oral extra tradition only written down or translated within the last hundred or 200 years. linguists say the languages and traditions were conservative because people are so isolated. so they give us a pretty good idea of the kind of stories that cithians told themselves. i hope that answers your question. thank you. applause. >> that was book tvs coverage of

the science pavilion at the book festival. for nor information, visit us online at booktv.org. >> what the hitching post was the center overrack different for not only cheyenne, woman, but for the rest of the state of wyoming. i was a central part in politics, frontier days and people's everyday lives. our rotary meetings, kiwanis meetings, wedding receptions, parties, anything that big that was happening was happening at the hitching post inn. it started with the lincoln

court when pete something i decided after he and his brother hat tried homesteading and growing potatoes, there's not a lot of potato growing in this part of wyoming 0, once the homestead deal was over, he decided this lincoln highway, there was a lot of people at that point finally starting to travel, and he wanted to start a hotel or a camground basically right here on this very hoped to be busy road. and he start with 25 rooms where people could just -- they had showers showers and such, and then just kept expanding, and his son, came over from russia with his mother, about nine years after this was started, and then a year later, she died. and hard -- harry, the son, grew up and went throw university of wyoming and became an engineer and work for blm. then his father decides. so harry has to decide if he is going to take the hotel or

become anening near. so besided to go back into the family business. harry gets married and brings his wildfire back here, and she becomes -- harry was the businessman his wifes was the person at the front desk. the politics started staying here at the hitching post and make it their central home in the late 1960s when harry decided that he wanted them to stay here versus staying in town at the plains hotel. so he got adele's hair riz son went to legislators and say we want you to stay in our hotel when you come to cheyenne, and offered them at that time a very tiny rate of $5 a night. they couldn't turn i down. so hari knew when the legislators were staying here, the lobbyists would follow, and so that's what started it. and people who might be -- have some contention over a bill at

the legislature itself, it was hard to stay mad at someone when you saw them in your hotel hallway walking through in their pajamas or you're down in the bar and having a drink with them. so many, many laws are actually probably decided right here at the hitching post. >> one year, governor ed hersher in who came to the hitching post every afternoon at 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon with his buddies, at lunch time we held a table that was called the governor's table and we didn't seat it because sometimes the governor showed up and we always had his table for him. at 12:30, if he had not shown, we would release that. but he would come every afternoon, and with a couple of his buddies and they would meet in the corner of the bar and talk about the problems of wyoming and solve the problems there. sew about go know him. then one year the legislature ended at the end of -- around the first of march and there were still some issues that needed to be covered. so the debate started that --

the governors started talking about in the newspaper that the governor was going to call a special session. and i got a call the next afternoon from the paper -- the newspaper in lander, wyoming, the center of the state. they said we understand a special session is coming on mayta 24th. said they can't come on the 24th. we have a convention and we're completely filled. they can't come then. they kind of banter -- asked me a few other questions. the next day i got a call from the governor, the governor's secretary, said, del, the governor would like to speak to you. sew the governor says, del, do you mind if i run the state government and decide when we're going have a special session of the legislature? then he laughed and laughed and said, tell me when we can come and then there was a cartoon about it in the lander paper the next day of the stage coach parked in front of the hitching post and the caption runs who is running the state, anyway, the governor or the hitching post? >> nationally, a lot of people came here, not only because of

the smiths but also because of at the time there was the man who was the publisher of the newspaper who was instrumental in democratic politics, he was the one during the -- he gave the final vote that put john f. kennedy over the edge to be the democratic candidate for president, and so a lot of politicians came here. so -- not just democrats but dwight eisenhower was here, ronald reagan, george burns, gracie allen. tons of people. this 'twas a central place to be. >> the kennedys spent the night. they name on a train, spent the night, did a fundraising party in the coachroom and left the next morning after a political speech on the back of the train. four days before spiro agnew was supposed to arrive, security name and swept through everything, take downing light fixtures and air conditioning and marking everything, and

finished just the day before spiro agnew was to arrive. late that evening senator simpson arrived at the hitching post and check in, went to his room, and i got a call about 2:00 a.m. from chief of security for spiro agnew saying, we have had a breach and you need to come right out. so i threw on my clothes and ran and went with the master key and the security and went to the front door of the room and knocked on the door, and at 2:00 a.m., senator simpson came all sleepy and said, del, what do you want? i said, you -- you're in the wrong room. i have to move you. the said, no, it's 2 in the morning,s removal. i said no, i'm sorry, you're moving, so we moved him into a room. and through the year is went to washington, dc many times to visit senator simpson to lobby, and every time i saw him he started remember that asshole

spiro agnew made me move. any phone rang at 7:00 a.m. from a friend of mine that owns the business down the street and the called to say, del, the highwaying post is on fire and it's bad. >> the fire was huge. took over the lobby, the restaurant, the kitchen, and some of the hotel rooms itself themselves. the fire started at 7:00 in the morning and was not put owl fully until 7:00 the next morning. and they used four and a half million gallons of water to put it out. but fortunately no fire meb were hurt no firemen lost their lives but it was a huge fire here. >> well, they tore dune the -- they demolished what was left of it. tore it down. and there's bailed right behind me here that they're not in any room -- nobody stays there, but the current owners, i'm told who they are, they have the back two areas of rooms that they're actually renting out to people. they're certainly not a restaurant. certainly not a pretty place to be at nights, but it's still

part of -- part of it is still up and going. the importance of telling the hitching post history is part of our history in cheyenne, our shared history, because the hotel and the smith family played such a huge part in our history, and i think memoirs and people stories matter so much. it's one thing to tell the story of a building -- and it was a building -- but because of the smith family it was bigger than just a building. the night that we had the book signing for the book, it was so great. 300 people were there. and i think for especially former employees and people who really had work here and played ha huge part in their lives, to have something to hold in their hands, that's all there is right now of he hitching post we all knee, this book. i'm very proud to have happened to create that. >> while visiting cheyenne, wyoming, with the help of our local cable partner we toured

various sites in old cheyenne withlori van pelt, author of capital characters of old cheyenne. >> 1860s, into the early 1900s. and i want to show a cross-section of the interesting people who were here and what they did. many misconceptions of wyoming's history and that makes it fun. they don't realize how significant wyoming is in the nation's history, and they don't realize that women had the right to vote here in territorial days, and that was quite controversial, and they don't realize how influential wyoming can be, and people from wyoming aren't just old west type people, you meet some of them to

people, which is fine and they're intelligent and smart, but there were also some political influences that wyoming made, and wyoming people made, and are still making. we're stand until front of the wyoming state capitol, which is an important building in the state's history, of course. also, it has the significance because estell rio was the first woman elected to a state office in the nation. she became wyoming's superintendent of public instruction. this occurred in 1894. and even though it was only about four years after wyoming -- the equality state, became a state, she felt that women should not hold the governorship, that women should be happy with the right to vote, and equal pay. she was a proponent of that. but she also had another significance. in 1898, president william mckinley appointed her as the first female superintendent of indian schools and that was a very important position in that

era. she wrote a textbook, a course of study for indian schools, and traveled 65,000 miles during her first three years in office, and she traveled by buck board, on horseback, not like the travel we consider today. so, she was an amazing person that way. also, she was kind of quirky and loved to dress up. so, when she attended president mckin lee's inaugural she wore a 1,000 decide gown and a $50 halt. she loved fancy hats. and to contrast, a man of many -- that cost, her salary as wyoming's superintendent of public instruction was $2,000. we're standing in front of the wyoming supreme court building. it used to be the state library building. it no longer is. it's significant in wyoming's history, of course, and has an interesting person involved with it. his name was william -- a

powerful attorney in wyoming, in the 1884-1897 era. hing significant in the to state's history because he was also the person -- one of the people who defended the cattlemen in the johnson county war incident of 1892, and he was the supreme court justice for wyoming, and later in 1910, he was appointed to the united states supreme court, and he was a justice there, he served from 1910 to 1932. and he was the first -- and i think the only -- supreme court justice from the state of wyoming. nate robinson was a carriage maker and originally came from aberdeen, scotland, and was one of the finest -- billed himself as one of the finest carriage and buggymakers and wagon makers in the area, and in 1882 he

partnered with george kaufman and they expanded into farm equipment also. one of the carriages that robertson built was for alexander swan of the swan land and cattle company, and that was a large ranching concern here in this area, and he built a trap and also built -- it speaks to the elegance of the era. this was the way that people traveled more and they had buggies and carriages and they had to make sure that their wheels were properly attached, and it's just -- was an elegant form of travel. >> the first book i wrote, dreamers and schemers, i was new to the county and wanted to learn more about that county's history so i followed that same pattern. i wanted to learn more about cheyenne and the people here. i grew up in western nebraska, a stone's throw from the wyoming border here, and i have always been fascinated with cheyenne and the west and probably that old cowgirl misconce