♪ >> we have the mon consider of the daddy of them all because it really was the first big odeo of them anywhere. shyian started in 1897 as a means to bring some economic vitality into an otherwise depressed economy. and this was certainly not what was expected to happen but it soon became one of the premier rodeo events easily became known as the world championship rodeo, the place to go for any cowboy or for anybody who

wanted to experience western life as it was experienced by the cowboy's themselves they would be able to come here. the days has all of the traditional rodeo sports that you would come to expect including wild horse racing, steer roping, steer wrestling, calf roping, and then of course saddle bronching, bareback, bull riding, and so many other things. shyian frontier days started in 1897 so we are in our 118 year of the event and it got started as an effort to try and bring people up from denver, colorado. there was a gentleman by the name of frederick who was a railroad agent and he was trying to find excursions to try to get people to ride passenger trains from denver to the outlying communities so the union pacific would make money. he went to several communities and asked them what kind of thing they would be able to

have a fair for and they had a fair for corn. they had corn day. they went to greeley and they asked something. and they said potato day. and then they came here and asked what we grew up here. unfortunately, not much. we used to have the largest cattle portion of the cattle industry in the world. certainly incredibly influential in the 1870s and 1880s. basically called the shots on how the cattle industry is run through a good portion of the united states. unfortunately, thanks to bad weather the industry got wiped out in the 1880s and the state was trying to find a way to recover so we didn't have anything that we thought somebody could have a fair for. well, after several days of discussions, the railroad agent went back to catch a passenger train to go back to denver. and as he was doing so he noticed some cowboys wrestling a very uncooperative horse into a box car and it took them 20

or 30 minutes just to get this one animal inside this carriage. he was so thrilled by the experience and thought it was so fun and colorful that he canceled his trip, reorganized another meeting with the city fathers and said what about what i just saw with these cowboys trying to wrestling a horse on to a railroad car? they decided they would celebrate the frontier and have a one-day celebration in september to go ahead and see what they would be able to do. now, the pictures that we have here are an arrangement from the first day until about 19 41. this is a souvenir ribbon in this frame from the very first frontier day in 1897, one of the few surviving remnants from that event. that was actually presented to us by a friend of the museum who is an avid collector of old west and cowboy lore. we know that he found this in a friend's house in wyoming and he made an offer to buy it for

the museum and they agreed. we do know that it has been around the country from one owner to the next for the last several decades. the furtherest back we were able to trace it is back to san diego in 1993 and we have no idea where it was before that. but now it has returned back here and we are continuously trying to collect items just like this to expand the heritage of collection that we have here. one of the most wonderful pieces that we most recently located here inside our own archives is this original letter from the wyoming fronty day committee dated september 1897. it has the sigs of the very first chair when printed on was r head by the editor on the committee. this is a beautiful letter explains exactly what they're going to be doing for the first frontier day here. but then they're asking the

city for $250 to help the event. unfortunately, what makes this particularly fun all the way back then is that we have the clerks' signatures on the back that basically outlines the request and it was rejected a couple of times by the city before finally ten days before frontier day got started they finally said ok. so this is a wonderful piece. it was a close call. it was first submitted to the city on september 7 and they didn't get approval for another 13 days as the clock was ticking down. what we have here this very early newspaper in 1926 is a discussion of what was happening here in 50 years ago. and we have by this time an event that's gone from one day to five. and it's run by the chamber of commerce as an institution to try and generate income for the city. these post cards are kind of fun.

they show some early events, wonderful pictures showing our first grounds. the wild horse race, an event which still happens and some of the favorites for everyone. everybody still likes watching that. here we have a post card on a horse called whirlwind. this wonderful picture is goldie st. clair who is a champion bronching rider of the world at this time who is here riding in front of a crowd. of course we have cowboys, cowgirls, but probably one of our famous animals is ole steam boat this wonderful horse in this picture that you see here. he had a broken nose as a colt so every time he started charging around he would huff and puff like a steam boat so he got his name that way but he was considered to be unrideable. and anybody who did ride him there was controversy that something wasn't going the horse's way. he was extremely tough, extremely famous. a lot of people believe that he is the horse on our license

plate. it may not be true but people believe it so it's an important thing that here we have an animal that's so legendary that he is now part of wyoming lore. and this also is a magnificent piece. i love this because this is one of the rarest items in our history. decided to have royalty for frontier days. we have a miss frontier and lady in waiting that have been with us for the last several decades. but this item here is unique because it is the only black outfit, black leather outfit that we have ever have used. done in 1939. when she was miss frontier she decided to try to do something new. she decided she wanted to wear black. that was the last full week in july so it was probably the warmest that we've ever had. but her family has been kind enough to give us this outfit

last year that they were keeping for themselves and we have of course her original satin shirt, the vest that has her badge and also the deputy terive's badge that every miss frontier has had. her boots, her split leather skirt, her hat, even her purse. for frontier days it seems like it was born under a rising star and that first year was so successful it brought 4,000 people up. but it was also so successful that a gentleman by the name of buffalo bill cody heard about its success and was determined to actually have his show come to here in correspondance with the rodeo. the very next year in 1898 he came and i would say that was our tipping point because it brought even more people in. we went from 4,000 to an estimated 20,000 people in one year thanks to the fact that he came. and when he brought in, he

established parades for us, he was also the inspiration to bring indians here for the first time. it was a marvelous affair with more celebrities than we could possibly imagine starting to arrive frome our senator from wyoming to governors from surrounding states, and even ot to the point that by 1903 president teddy roosevelt came which just sealed the deal. from that point on we've had people at the forefront of western culture, politics, theater, who would want to come ut to be a part of this event. >> where we are right now is in the main rotunda of the frontier days old west museum. the museum was created in 1978 by a group of women responsible for putting on the parade known as the wheel. they had been looking for some

place to display and take care of the old antique carriages that we have in the frontier days collection. and this museum finally was established in 1978 when they closed the old dance hall palion. they agreed to let the museum be established to talk about the old west, western art, and of course the carriages that we have in our collection today. we have the trophy saddle for the frontier days all around champion. this is his saddle. going to be awarded this frontier days in 2014. this one that we have here is an example of the saddle as it was in 2012. but we have examples of saddles like this one sitting over behind me was the one that hanks won here in 1907. so it's 107 years old. and this is the continuity that we like toe show people is that the trophies that are awarded then are still important and still part of our lore today. so we collect not only

memorabilia but we also have other pillars of our collection that we like to maintain. we have the largest working carriage collection in the world one of the three large egs in the united states. the largest one west of the mississippi river. and we use most of our vehicles. there's 168 vehicles in the collection and about 140 of those roll every year in every parade four times a year. >> all right. we are just getting around to the other side. >> as a matter of fact, we are exactly three days out from launch. the city, the volunteers are businessly painting, freshning things up, cleaning things. we also had a huge effort by volunteers to get the parade vehicles in order. you can imagine to have 140 carriages rolling, it's a real spectacular affair to get everything from the military to the floats to marching bands and these carriages to start rolling in our parade. and so we had many, many volunteers who are in the

process of trying to get that done. we got the cattle drive, they actually brought the livestock bstock in. they drove it in yesterday morning sunday. those animals are now ready to compete over at the frontier days. so they're being cared for. with the large number of visitors that come every year, the event continues to have the original purpose of trying to bring economic vitality to the city and even to the entire region both here in wyoming and colorado. and i would say with easily a quarter million visitors every year that come to see our event for the ten days that it's running, the contribution to the city, the county, and to the state is astronomcal. i don't think we would be the same without our frontier days. this community owe as great deal of gratitude to the people who continue to volunteer to make this event happen.

the city has benefited tremendously and has grown because of the influence of front tier days. but i think in so many ways the history >> throughout the weekend, american history tv is featuring cheyenne, wyoming. team recently went there. of learn more about cheyenne c-span.org.s at you're watching american history tv. u