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Self Guided HISTORIC Trolley Tour Dodge City Convention & Visitors Bureau Historic Trolley Tour

Photo Rights Reserved by Heritage Center, Museum, and Josh Roesener Photography. Start Audio Well howdy folks, and welcome to Dodge City, Kansas–cowboy capital of the world! During this tour, you’ll learn about the evolution of Dodge from a dusty trail town to a bustling cattle and agricultural capital. You’ll hear about the people and places that helped create and tame what some have called “the wickedest little city in the west.”

However, before there was a town, there was a trail–the . 50 years before Dodge City was founded in 1872, traders and wagons rumbled along where the town is now. Thousands of wagons traveled from to Santa Fe, an outpost in what was then Mexico, where traders exchanged merchandise for silver and gold. Slow to point 1 Fort Dodge was established in 1865 to protect wagon trains on the trail from Wagon train on Santa Fe Trail attacks by Plains Indian tribes and to furnish supplies to the soldiers who were fighting the Indian wars on the plains. The abundance of buffalo here lured the hunters, who swarmed over the area killing buffalo to sell for a reasonable price. A successful day’s hunt might reward the hunter with a $100. That would be over $3,000 by today’s standards.

As the word spread about the excellent hunting and about the railroad that would soon reach Kansas, entrepreneurs everywhere were eager to start a business near the new railroad tracks and Fort Dodge, to supply hunters with necessities for their trade. Dodge City in the beginning George Hoover arrived first and promptly opened a saloon on the west edge of the military reservation. In June of 1872, George served his spirits on a board laid between two stacks of sod supports. Within a few weeks, there were several more saloons, dance halls, a general store, blacksmith shop and other businesses, all located south of the newly laid railroad tracks.

The first train arrived in September of 1872. Already, buffalo hides were stacked high waiting to be shipped back east. Soon after the arrival of the railroad, many 1 businesses moved north of the tracks to Front Street.

We are now at the base of Boot Hill, which stood boldly over the new little town and was convenient spot for burials. George Hoover recalled the first burial on Boot Hill in September of 1872. Buffalo hides stacked by railroad According to Hoover, “He was planted, as they called it.” From 1872 to 1878 Dodge City had no proper cemetery so if you had the money or were considered to be someone of importance, you were buried at Fort Dodge. However, if you were like this poor soul, who Mr. Hoover said got planted, he was probably a cowboy or buffalo hunter who had a bit of money in his pocket and wanted to do some gambling and drinking. He likely got into a fight over a card game or a saloon girl and got shot. The saloon keepers might have thought “we can’t leave him laying here, because it’s no good to have a dead man in your saloon”, so they carried him to the top of the hill and buried him in a shallow grave. I say shallow because cowboys don’t like to dig holes so they didn’t dig very deep. Since he didn’t die in the comfort of his bed of natural causes, but suddenly in the street or saloon with his boots on, he could have been buried with such. It became known as Boot Hill, and it forever after carried that name. During the winter of 1872 and spring of 1873, no less than 15 men were killed in Dodge City and planted, as they called it, on “Boot Hill.”

Only one woman is believed to have been buried there-Alice Chambers, a dance hall girl who died in May of 1878, and was the last person buried on Boot Hill. With the town booming because of the cattle trade, the land covered with these unmarked graves became too valuable as merely a burial ground for this “motley crew of sinners.” Early in 1879, the bodies were removed and reburied in Dodge City’s first official cemetery to make way for a new school building. School House replaced Boot Hill Cemetary Slow to point 2 Some buffalo hunters boasted that the buffalo would not be eliminated from the plains in a hundred years. However, several years of intensive hunting caused a noticeable decline in buffalo hide and meat shipments. As the buffalo hunters’ campfires died away and Indian tribes submitted to confinement on reservations, Texas drovers headed their longhorns up the Chisholm Trails, and later the Western Trail, to Dodge City.

Cattle drives into eastern Kansas Cowtowns ended because of rural settlement and a Kansas quarantine law. Longhorn cattle carried a tick that infected 2 domestic cattle with splenic fever. The Kansas legislature passed a quarantine law barring all longhorns from central and south Texas-where the epidemic was rampant-from entering parts of Kansas settled by local ranchers. This action made Dodge City the principle shipping point for Texas cattlemen, beginning about the mid 1870s.

The drive from Texas to Kansas became known as “going up the trail” because the cattle cut permanent and deep trails across the prairie. One old cowboy who rode up the Western Trail in 1884 described it as a “chocolate brown and brick red ribbon that wound up over the hills and down to the rivers and creek bottoms and was fifty to hundred feet in width, cut into the prairie Cattle drive sod a foot or more in depth by the hooves of the longhorn cattle.”

A Texas trail drive was a serious operation. As many as 3,000 cattle were collected in south Texas and handed over to a trail boss for delivery at the railhead 1,500 miles or more away. 10 to 12 trail hands tended the herd, along with a cook and also a wrangler to care for the remuda – a herd of a 100 or more saddle horses. The cowboys spent 14 to 16 hours a day in the saddle – for 30 dollars a month plus their board. They “punched” the cattle along the trail some 10 to 12 miles a day. Clouds of dust were visible for miles on the Kansas prairie and the sound of the cattle hooves was heard hours before the longhorn appeared.

When a longhorn steer established itself as the leader of the herd, drovers often shipped the steer home back for use on later cattle drives. The monument on this site is “El Capitan,” a tribute to those longhorn cattle leaders. Slow to point 3 Each year more and more cattle were driven to Dodge City, earning the title “Queen of the Cowtowns.” Dodge’s cattle era was the longest of any of the Cowtowns.

But the cattle boom abruptly ended in 1885 when the quarantine line moved west of Dodge City, and cattle drives no longer could reach here. Adding to the economic disaster were blizzards the next winter that devastated local herds and left the region’s cattle industry crippled. Not until the 1900s did the cattle trade regain momentum. Moreover, it did not reach Cattle loading on train its former heights until the 1960s.

3 A complete disregard for law and order marked the first few years of Dodge City’s existence. was appointed the first sheriff in Dodge City in 1873 and Larry Deger was appointed the first in December of 1875. After that the town fathers hired skilled lawmen such as and . Other lawmen of note included Mysterious Dave Mather, George Hinkle, Ed Masterson, James Masterson, and Pat Sughrue. The town these early men knew had two Front Dodge City Peace Commission Streets, one on each side of the railroad tracks, on the right of where we are now. The railroad tracks became known as the “deadline,” a boundary between the proper north side and the infamous south side. No firearms, dance halls, or other rowdy establishments were allowed north of the tracks. Unless a complaint was filed lawmen made little effort to enforce ordinances on the Map of Dodge City (1870s) south side of the tracks.

Another person of note who spent time in Dodge City was “Doc” Holliday. Doc came to Dodge City from , Texas in the spring of 1878 after being informed by Wyatt Earp about the opportunities to make money from the cowboys who had gotten paid after the cattle drives. So Doc secured a room at the Dodge House Hotel and practiced dentistry during the day and played cards at night, relieving Dodge House (1878) the cowboys of their hard earned money. Check out the statue of Doc located just west of the Visitor Center. Sit at the table and play a hand of poker with him.

On this site, known as Front Street, was the main business block of the 1870s and 1880s. Several fires in1885 destroyed the wooden false front buildings that housed saloons and trading establishments popular with buffalo hunters Dodge City North Front Street (1875) 4 and cowboys. When the cowboys reached Dodge City, they collected their pay and set out to spend it on liquor, women, card games, clothes, guns, and a bath. By 1877, Dodge City had 1,000 people and 16 saloons. The , once located on this block, was the most popular bar in town. Many saloons offered a piano player at least, but the Long Branch offered a five-piece orchestra.

Dodge City businessmen knew that most Texans shied away from anything that portrayed a Yankee background. To draw the Texas trade, the saloon keepers of Dodge City chose appropriate names for their watering places – The Alamo, the Long Branch and the Lone Star. The local stores made extraordinary efforts to hire employees who could “talk the lingo.” Slow to point 4 Rath & Co., a mercantile business for outfitting buffalo hunters and cattlemen, employed clerks who spoke fluent Spanish, German, Russian and Hebrew. Robert Wright, one of the founders of

Rath & Co. Dodge City and the owner of Rath & Co., could speak most Indian languages.

After 1901, Dodge City entered a new period of growth and prosperity, thanks in part to a boom in agriculture. The agricultural industry established the town as it is today, and many of the buildings remaining in downtown Dodge City were built during this 20th century agriculture boom. Coming up in the next block is the location of the Lora Locke Hotel. Several years ago, the county government needed additional space and renovated this building for office use. Since the building is listed as a National Historic Landmark-the lobby of the government center remains as it was. It is open during regular business hours, so if Lora Locke Hotel (1930s) you get an opportunity, stop by and take a look. Slow to point 5 Once known as the million-dollar block because of the large amount of construction dollars spent here in the 1920s, the structures reflect the wealthy agricultural economic times.

We are now climbing Gospel Hill, the site of several early day churches. Gospel Hill boasted a commanding view of the sinful Front Street straight south from here.

Union Church The greatest obstacle to organizing services in Dodge 5 City was indifference. In 1874, religious people in Dodge City numbered 13 in all, and they organized a non-denominational church-Union Church-and built a small wooden building for the congregation, once located where the Dodge City Police Department now stands. Within a few short years, the Presbyterians, Methodists, Catholics, Episcopalians, and Baptists all organized and built churches on Gospel Hill.

A Dodge City Times article reported, “The wicked city of Dodge City can at last boast of another Christian organization – a Presbyterian church. It was organized last Sunday. We would have mentioned the matter last week, but we thought it best to break the news gently to Presbyterian Church (1880s) the outside w or l d .”

The current Presbyterian Church, Central “Silk Stocking” Avenue looking North constructed in 1924, replaced a small frame Presbyterian Church built in 1880 on this site. The church is located on the street once known as “Silk Stocking Avenue,” so called because the many wealthy early day residents built homes on this avenue.

Sacred Heart Cathedral, constructed in 1915 and listed as a National Historic Landmark, replaced an 1882 Catholic church on this site. The church’s architectural features are reminiscent of a Spanish Mission. The Cathedral is one of many buildings in Dodge City reflecting a strong Spanish influence. Inside the cathedral, (which is open for viewing), is a 26 foot oil-on-canvas mural behind the altar

First Catholic Church (1890s) portraying the crucifixion of Christ. The scene is unique in that a character in the foreground has facial features of an American Indian, the flora is of the prairie and the horse is a Pinto.

The Home of Stone is one of the oldest homes in Dodge City. The first owner, John Mueller, a boot maker and rancher, hired a German stonemason to build the house in 1881. Constructed of native limestone, cut and quarried 12 miles north of Dodge City, the stones are two feet thick and set Mueller’s House (1881) 6 with limestone mortar.

Each time Mueller shipped cattle east by railroad, the rail cars returned with Victorian furniture for his house. However, Mueller’s residence in Dodge was short-lived. In 1885, fire on Front Street destroyed his boot shop and the following winter’s blizzard devastated Mueller’s Muellers Boot Shop livestock herd, so he sold out and moved to St. Louis in 1886. Only two families ever lived in the house, the Mueller’s and the Schmidt’s. The Schmidt’s bought the house in 1890 for $5,000. By today’s standards that would be around $400,000. Two of the Schmidt children, Elma and Heinrich, never married. The lived in the house until 1960 at which time they sold the house and its furniture to Ford County to be used as a museum. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Sites, and free guided tours are given daily in June, July and up until mid-August. Slow to point 6 Dodge City has approximately 14 miles of brick streets constructed between 1912 and 1925. To build a brick street, a six inch concrete base is poured and covered by a one-inch sand cushion. The bricks are laid out on the sand and sealed with hot tar. Many of these streets were built using horse power and manual labor. Note the cross-diagonal pattern at intersections, used to prevent heavy vehicles from tearing up the roadway when making turns. These brick streets have outlived many asphalt and concrete streets.

The Hinkle House, built by George Hinkle in 1880, is located on the northwest corner of this intersection. Mr. Hinkle was elected Sheriff of Ford County in 1879, defeating the incumbent, Bat Masterson. This historic site and storyboard are on the Historic Dodge City Walking Tour.

St. Cornelius Episcopal Church was built in 1898 with donated labor and stone from a saloon owner’s demolished ice house. The architectural design is Norm Gothic, and the church still retains the original stained glass windows. It is the oldest church building in use in the city. St. Cornelius Episcopal Church (1900s) As the spring cattle trade began in 1882, Dodge City showed signs of civilization. The Santa Fe Railroad discussed plans for a new depot, residents wanted graded roads Dodge City’s First Depot (old train car) and new homes were built to accommodate residents. Also, much to the horror of gamblers, saloonkeepers, and former buffalo hunters, a temperance society was organized in the Union Church on Gospel Hill. 7 Intoxicating liquor, the cause of most gunfire in Dodge City since its founding in 1872, was banned in Kansas in 1880. The only exceptions being for “medicinal, scientific, and mechanical purposes.” Dodge City saloons ignored the ban until the fall of 1885 when the Attorney General visited to initiate lawsuits against the open saloons.

Most saloons made magical transformations into drug stores, where one could purchase liquor for medicinal purposes. Some business owners just painted over the sign and changed “saloon” to “restaurant.” As the Dodge City Globe observed, “From the number of saloons that are being turned into restaurants, it would appear like the eating business was pretty good in this city.” From all appearances, Front Street businesses now specialized in “Methodist cocktails and Baptist lemonades.” However, for over 20 years, more liquor and beer were served in private clubs and basements under Front Street.

Next on our tour is the Santa Fe Depot and Depot Theater (Company). We also want to draw your attention to the Wyatt Earp statue across the street. There is also a story board describing the 100th Meridian. We will pass the actual Meridian area and commemorative marker a bit later in the tour. Santa Fe Depot and Harvey House (1900s)

The railroad business boomed immediately after the tracks reached Dodge City in September 1872. The Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Passenger Depot, built in 1897, was once considered to be one of the finest depots on the line. In addition to Santa Fe Railway division offices, it housed an upscale Harvey House restaurant and hotel. The Harvey House chain of restaurants served meals on china and required gentlemen customers to wear coats. Harvey Houses dotted the rail sides at 125 mile intervals along the Santa Fe Railroad, from Kansas to California, because at each interval steam engines were serviced. The restaurants eventually closed with the advent of railroad dining cars.

The building to the east of the Depot is the former Harvey Girls’ dormitory. The Harvey Girls were no saloon girls. They were Dodge City Harvey Girls respectable women hired as waitresses for the Harvey House restaurant. They followed a strict rule regarding work habits and personal lives. The criteria to be a Harvey Girl read like this; they had to be single between the ages of 18 to 30, of good character, attractive and intelligent. They 8 had to sign a one year contract and live in the dormitory under a strict curfew. They worked 12 to 14 hours a day for the total sum of $17.50 a month. Believe it or not, thousands of women came west to get those jobs.

If you look to your right you can see two huge sundials. The one on the right is for Mountain Time Zone; the one on the left is for Central Time Zone. In 1897, the time of their construction, the line separating the two time zones ran between the sundials. Since then, the Mountain Time zone line has moved some hundred miles to the west. The problem we have with these today is we don’t Sundials early 1900’s know how to reset them for daylight savings time! Slow to point 7 From the beginning of the 20th century until 1955, a small ethnic community grew on the eastern outskirts of Dodge City. Immigrants from Mexico came seeking a better life; most found employment with the railroad. The tiny city within a city was called the “Mexican Village.” Located just south of the tracks and east of this location. It was just a Mexican Village homes little, tiny city. Mexican Village had a dance hall, pool hall, a grocery store, a church, and a school. Inside the Amtrak portion of the depot are a number of story panels with stories and pictures depicting the Mexican Village.

The Santa Fe Railway Company threatened to discontinue Dodge City as a divisional terminus and as a cattle shipping point unless the town leaders maintained law and order. It was not unusual for cowboys to shoot out locomotive headlights and fire at train crews. The Railway Company never did shift its operation from Dodge City because the town produced considerable revenue for the railroad business. However, they influenced the change in Dodge City from an unruly town to a civilized city. Dodge’s wild reputation was well known among the old railroaders.

As one story goes: A grizzled old prospector boarded a train somewhere west of Dodge. The train conductor asked where the older timer was going. He answered, “Hell.” “Then that will be 65 cents and get off in Dodge,” said the conductor.

Law enforcement began in earnest, when Dodge City appointed its first marshal, after incorporation in November 1875. Not taken seriously, quite a few of the 9 earlier ordinances, and most of the fines were not meant to eliminate gambling, prostitution, or firearm possession, but to help pay the salaries of law enforcement agents. As we travel along Wyatt Earp Boulevard, we would like to point out the 100th Meridian marker stone post. The 100th Meridian was a dividing line for the United States 100th Meridian Line Louisiana Purchase. Dodge City was the first town located west of this line. The 100th Meridian also was considered a climate change line. Where east of the line was more humid and west of the line was thought to be arid.

“The toughest town on the map” needed more men to help keep the peace, and to prevent vigilante killings seen during the buffalo hunting days. One of the most famous was Wyatt Earp. After arriving from Wichita, Kansas, Wyatt first served as Deputy Marshal, under Marshal Larry Deger. Wyatt Earp According to the Dodge City Times in 1877, Wyatt Earp “had a quiet way of taking the most desperate characters into custody, which invariably gave one the impression that the city was able to enforce her mandates and preserve her dignity. It wasn’t considered policy to draw a gun on Wyatt, unless you got the drop, and meant to burn powder, without any preliminary talk.”

Earp was a seasonal lawman, and for three years, he came and went from Dodge City. In 1879, he left for . By 1880, most accounts record Earp in Tombstone, Arizona. After Wyatt left Tombstone, he traveled from boom town to boom town on the frontier working as a gambler, a prospector, a Wells Fargo investigator, and occasionally a promoter of horse races. He died in California on January 13, 1929, at the age of 81.

Bat Masterson’s life story, also embodied all the colorful tales of the Old West. He boasted careers, as a buffalo hunter, scout for the army, professional gambler, frontier peace officer, sportsman, and promoter.

Masterson was one of Dodge City’s first citizens. Bat, his Bat Masterson brother Ed, and a friend, Henry Raymond, hunted buffalo south of the early Dodge City settlement. The Masterson brothers initially arrived in the area in 1872 as subcontractors, to build part of the right-of-way, for the Santa Fe Railroad between Fort Dodge, and present-day Dodge City.

10 Bat Masterson was appointed undersheriff of Ford County in 1877, and then served briefly as a special policeman on the Dodge City police force. Later that year, he won the office of Ford County Sheriff.

Meanwhile, Bat’s brother, Ed, was appointed city marshal. His tenure would be short. While trying to stop a fight between two drunken cowboys, Marshal Masterson was killed in 1878 at a saloon south of the railroad tracks and was buried at Fort Dodge.

Ed Masterson A bullet took Ed from office, politics swept Bat Masterson out. In early 1880 Bat was defeated by George Hinkle, a bartender, saloonkeeper, property owner, and a conservative member of the “anti-gang” group. Hinkle and his group opposed open gambling and prostitution, Bat did not.

After Bat’s defeat, he headed for the gold fields of Colorado, but moved in and out of Dodge City for several years. True to his jack-of-all-trades image, he later moved to and became a sportswriter with the New York Morning Telegraph. Bat Masterson died at his desk on October 25, 1921.

Notice the street sign to the road that we are turning on. At one time the road had only a hand-painted sign. It was the road farmers used to bring their butter & eggs to town. The county was upgrading their 911 system, and renamed the county road. They renamed this road Lariat. The locals became so upset about the change that eventually the county relented and installed a proper street sign with the name “Butter & Egg Road.” Farther down this road, a road sign actually reads “ L a r i a t ”. Pause audio / move to point 8, restart audio slow to point 9 Owned by three companies, and covering an area of approximately 200 acres, this feedlot area can hold up to 45,000 head of cattle. There are 70 large feedlots within 100 miles of Dodge City, often feeding as many as 1.3 million cattle. Approximately 4 million head of cattle a year spend time in our region’s feedlots. The cattle arrive here from all over the United States, , and Mexico.

The cattle enter the feedlots, at between 600 to 700 pounds. They are fed from between 100 to 150 days, until they reach a market weight of about 1,000 to 1,200 pounds before being processed. Many ranchers no longer brand their cattle because the hides are very valuable. Instead, ear tags identify the cattle’s owner. Some tags contain electronic information regarding each animal, ensuring that they are fed the right nutrients to produce the type of meat and taste most demanded by Cattle in feedlot pens consumers. 11 Cattle drink nearly eight gallons of water a day, and are most often fed a mixture of corn, chopped alfalfa, hay, molasses, protein pellets with added minerals and vitamins, and by-products like cottonseed and wheat meal.

Because of the unique digestive system of cattle, feeders can use a variety of products to produce beef. Feedlots located near bakeries utilize discarded and old cake mixes. Feed yards near potato chip factories utilize outdated potato chips; paper and all. One of our local elevators makes wallpaper glue out of milo. One of the local feed yards uses this throwaway for a protein supplement. Cattle can, and have often been fed potatoes, beets, crackers, and by-products from the production of alcohol, and even jelly beans. After the animals are shipped out, feedlot owners clean the cattle pens. The manure is repurposed as fertilizer on croplands.

Cattle are completely utilized for our natural resources and man’s use – by providing food and fiber and by-products. Processors leave nothing to waste as all parts of the animal are utilized in some way. For example, hide processing companies buy cattle hides and make them into fine leather. The majority of cattle hides, 85%, end up as either footwear or automobile upholstery. Other products produced include cosmetics, fertilizers, photographic film and pharmaceutical products.

Southwest Kansas is considered a good location for cattle feedlots because of the area’s low rainfall, low humidity, and availability of a large amount of irrigated grain.

The cattle and agriculture industries represent about 60% of Dodge City’s economic base; the remaining 40% is comprised of health care, education, tourism, and manufacturing.

Immigrants from Germany, France, England, and Russia Sorghum also called Milo settled our part of the country, one of the last frontiers in mainland America.

Settlers first successfully planted wheat in the fields surrounding Dodge City. German Mennonites from Russia, brought hard winter wheat, called “Turkey Red,” to America in 1874. Today, in addition to wheat, farmers plant and harvest corn, soybeans, alfalfa, sunflowers, barley, and sorghum, that is fed to cattle. Wheat is the principal crop grown on unirrigated land. Cattle feed yards, and available irrigated land, have led to an increase in corn production.

The area’s agricultural industry began with diversified Turkey Red Wheat farming, using horses and steam power, and has evolved 12 into single or limited crop production. Large-scale irrigation has created the extensive agri-business of today.

Rainfall averages 20 inches a year with an average growing season of 160 to 180 days. Many crops are grown on dry land on a rotation basis, others with an irrigation method called flooding, or by a power-driven sprinkler that moves in a circle. Around Dodge City, 75% of the land is used for cropland, 25% is rangeland.

You’ll notice off in the distance to your left, another addition to the revenue of local landowners. Wind turbine ‘farms’ have been constructed around the area to capture a significant natural resource. With Dodge City being one of the windiest cities in the country it was only natural for their location here. Landowners are compensated for wind turbines on their land.

The land surrounding us is part of a vast portion of North America known as “The .” In the early 1800s, Wind Turbines U.S. Government surveyors referred to the plains as “The Great American Desert,” unfit for cultivation or habitation, because of the scarcity of water, and few trees for building, but history proved them wrong. This area has one of the richest wheat and cattle industries in the world.

Indian nations first claimed the entire plains, roaming to hunt buffalo for their livelihood. Following the European discovery of North America, a succession of European countries; Britain, France, and Spain, claimed this land at one time as they sent explorers throughout the vast frontier.

Francisco Vasquez de Coronado established rights for Spain in 1541, when he traveled through Kansas in his famous quest for the City of Gold. Spain abandoned explorations after an unsuccessful search for the precious metal, but left behind the horse, a legacy that transformed the Plains Indian culture forever. Plains Indians became expert horsemen, successfully adapting the horse to warfare. More than 300 years later, commercial traders and European settlers tried to claim the Great Plains as their own. The Plains Indians used their considerable horsemanship skills, and knowledge of the land, to resist intrusion by outsiders who entered their hunting grounds. The area south of the River, became part of Mexico when it declared its independence from Spain in 1821. Trade with Mexico became possible. That same year, William Becknell and his fellow traders traveled from Franklin, Missouri, through the plains and the Rocky Mountains, eventually arriving in Santa Fe, Francisco de Coronado 13 Mexico. where they made tremendous profit, selling goods.

Back home, Becknell enthusiastically described the tremendous profit he made from his venture. That next year another small caravan of wagons made the trip.

The great Santa Fe Trail was born and became a principle trade route to the southwest, until the introduction of the railroad. The Trail was a great highway that stretched 750 miles–500 miles of which is in Kansas. In the Dodge City area, the main path, called the Cimarron Route, passed through southwest Kansas to Santa Fe, Map of the Santa Fe Trail through Kanas beginning about 15 miles west of the present day Dodge City. Travelers on the Trail used this route until after the Civil War, when the use of the Rocky Mountain Route increased because of improvements to the Raton pass over the Rocky Mountains. This branch followed the Arkansas River into Colorado to Bent’s Fort.

Along the Santa Fe Trail, as elsewhere in the west, the Indians at first were curious rather than hostile. Then, as traffic increased the American Indians began to consider the wagon caravans a threat to their existence. Indian raids increased rapidly, and the travelers along the trail demanded government protection from the attacks.

To subdue the Indian tribes, and to make way for white trade and settlement, the war on the plains seemed inevitable to American authorities. A series of forts were built. Fort Dodge being one of the forts.

The Plains Indians were skilled warriors, and battles proved ineffective for poorly manned garrisons at the Fort. One of the military’s strategic moves against the American Indian involved the buffalo.

Herd of buffalo At one time, treaties prohibited white hunters from hunting buffalo south of the Arkansas River. Eventually, the military encouraged buffalo hunters to go into that area. They knew that killing off the buffalo would lead to the defeat of the Plains Indians. The buffalo was the mobile Indian tribes’ primary source of food as well as material for their tee-pees, weapons, and clothing.

The plains, at one time, were filled with thousands of buffalo herds. The herds 14 were so vast they stretched for miles in length and width as they moved along the prairie. Three years of intense buffalo hunting nearly eliminated the buffalo in this region by the late 1870s.

Soon we’ll arrive at Fort Dodge, one of the area’s earliest permanent settlements.

Fort Dodge was founded in 1865 by order of General Grenville Dodge. Fort Dodge (1879) Its primary purpose was to protect those traveling on the Santa Fe Trail, from Fort Larned, 60 miles to the northeast, to Fort Lyon, nearly 130 miles west into Colorado. Fort Dodge troops also were charged with the protection of , mail, and later, railroad construction workers.

We are traveling the route of the Fort Hays and Fort Dodge military road. When the Union Pacific Railroad reached Hays, 100 miles to the north. All military freight destined for Santa Fe and beyond was first shipped by rail to Hays, and then hauled by wagon to the Santa Fe Trail near Fort Dodge. This road was little used after the Santa Fe Railroad reached Dodge City. Slow to point 10 Fort Dodge, because of its location in the Supply train headed to Fort Dodge from Fort Hays heart of the American Indian country, served as a distribution point for rations and supplies to the , , , and Tribes. During the Fort’s active military years, it played a vital role during the Plains Indian Wars, as a base of operations for troops under the command of Brevet Major General , General Nelson Miles, General Phillip Sheridan, and other army units.

Fort Dodge is currently a Kansas Soldiers’ Home. Most of the buildings on the grounds were built after 1890, but some of the structures remain from the military years. Because of the scarcity of timber, the military built many prairie forts without a stockade or protective walls. These forts had quarters for officers, barracks for soldiers, stables, storehouses, a hospital, headquarters and a sutler’s store, all grouped around a parade ground.

Originally, troops were housed in tents, shanties made of sod, and Fort Dodge (1867) dugouts on the river bank. Later, 15 permanent buildings were constructed of stone, mined from a quarry, some 12 miles north of the Fort. Civilian employees and army personnel used wagons to haul in the stones, which were generally cut 11 inches in height and two feet thick. Five of the original stone buildings and one of the wooden frame structures remain. To get a better look at the buildings remaining from the military years, we will circle the original Fort Dodge parade ground.

The first building on your right is a duplex built in the 1870s and was an Officer’s Quarters.

The military constructed the Commanding Officer’s quarters in 1868, and it was one of the last stone structures built. This one-and-a-half story building, Quartermasters’ Quarters (1878-1880s) contains a spacious center hall with two large rooms on each side. The attached kitchen forms an “L”. Fireplaces heated the lower level. The upper story has four rooms with windows that some say were intended as gun ports. They can be seen just above the porch line. Slow to point 11 The stone building has been called Custer House for many years. Although General George Armstrong Custer was never actually stationed at Fort Dodge; he did lead the Seventh Cavalry from here to Commanding Officers Quarters (1879) the Battle of the Washita, an Indian battle fought south of the Fort in .

This one-story building, completed in 1868, served as the post hospital. It provided a ward of 12 beds, a dispensary, and other support facilities. Slow to point 12 The health of the soldiers was surprisingly good, in spite of sanitation and personal hygiene problems. However, in 1867, soldiers marching from Missouri to New Mexico brought cholera to Kansas forts. 30 cases occurred at Fort Dodge for 10 days in July of that year. 20 people died, including Mrs. Isadore Douglas, wife of the Commanding First Fort Dodge Hospital Officer of the post, Major Henry 16 Douglas. The Major’s tour as post commander was unusually trying, not only due to his personal tragedy, but also because of his responsibility for building permanent fort quarters and defending the frontier with an inadequate number of troops. He resigned from the military shortly after he finished the assignment at Fort Dodge.

The Fort’s library and museum are located in one of the remaining storehouses. Two of the 130-by-30 foot structures were built in 1866, and along with a bakery, were the first stone buildings to be completed on the fort’s grounds. The north ends of each storehouse, were partitioned to provide offices for post headquarters and the quartermaster. Even though this structure has been covered with stucco, the door and window openings reveal original stone building material. The building across the street from the library to the north was built around 1900 and still serves as the Kansas Soldiers’ Home Chapel.

Work on the company barracks began in 1866 but was halted by a post Quartermaster, serving temporarily as the Fort’s Commander. It was decided a storehouse was of prime importance because exposure to the weather destroyed a majority of the post’s supplies. The troops were then consigned to the dugouts on the river banks for more than18 months.

The dugouts flooded when it rained, and rattlesnakes were common throughout the muddy quarters. Finally, three barracks were completed, two built of stone and one of adobe. Each bunk held four soldiers, two up and two down, each sleeping in opposite directions, head to toe. Wells behind the buildings provided drinking water of excellent quality, while water for washing was carried from the Arkansas River located south of the Fort.

Lieutenant George Hesselberger’s name, the post Quartermaster in charge of construction, is engraved on the stone block above the north doorway of the former men’s barracks. Hesselberger was honorably discharged from the Army in 1871. It is believed that Fort Dodge Bunk House he inherited a vast fortune from German relatives and was living in as late as 1906.

In the early 1930s, a Works Progress Administration (or WPA) project removed the adobe barracks and linked the two stone barrack buildings together. Slow to point 13 Both civilians and soldiers were buried at Fort Dodge’s cemetery. Eventually, civilian bodies were moved to Dodge City’s first official cemetery in 1879. The bodies of the military personnel were moved to Fort Leavenworth National 17 Cemetery in 1886. Presently, the cemetery is part of the Kansas Soldiers’ Home Property. Buried here are Veterans of eight wars.

The Fort closed in October of 1882. In 1889, the federal government allowed what remained of the military reservation and buildings to be purchased for $1.25 an acre by the State of Kansas, which used the property as a home for Kansas veterans and their dependents. The citizens of Dodge City Main Entrance State Soliders Home (date unknown) raised the money for the purchase. The Kansas State Soldiers’ Home opened in January 1890 and continues to operate as such.

The building on the hill, is an old military hospital. After the Vietnam War ended, the decision was made that it would be too expensive to make upgrades to meet new government regulations for the disabled. It was closed and they just simply walked away from it. Many have said it is haunted, not just because it was a veteran’s Fort Dodge Hospital on the hill (date unknown) hospital, but also because of the many Indian battles that took place up on the hill.

This building called the “Sutler Store” was a grocery store and formerly housed the post office. It was constructed around 1900 by the Kansas Soldiers’ Home, and it is operated by private contractors just as sutler stores were in the military years. The original Fort Dodge Sutler Store and buildings stood where this structure is now. A civilian who kept the store in connection with the fort was known as a sutler.

The store sold foodstuffs, firearms, ammunition, wagon repairs, and many tools and utensils; to soldiers, civilians, employees, travelers, and Plains Indians who often visited. The Fort’s Commander, along with a board of officers, regulated the prices of goods sold. A popular entertainment center for off-duty soldiers, the Sutler Store sold liquor. Bar hours and the number of drinks sold were strictly regulated by fort authorities. The sale of whiskey was occasionally suspended, but seldom for a very long time. One of the rare closings happened when the entire troop became so intoxicated they could not ride their horses to escort the mail to Fort Supply, and into Indian Territory.

When you leave the old Fort grounds and enter Highway 400, you are traveling on the original path of the Santa Fe Trail. 18 On to point 14 Along this road, you will see some of the businesses that contribute to today’s agricultural industry in Dodge City.

Cargill Corporation is the owner of one of the largest meat processing plants in the nation. It employs about 2,700 people and processes about 6,000 head a day. Cargill purchases about $1 billion a year in livestock. After the company processes the cattle, they vacuum seal beef portions to sell throughout the world. Cargill exports an estimated 15% of it products. They are an industry leader in food safety. Cargill

Water is fundamental to cattle and grain production. The western 1/3 of Kansas is blessed with a good supply of underground water from water-bearing gravel in what geologists call “the Ogallala Aquifer.” The Aquifer lies under the High Plains from Texas to South Dakota, including western Kansas. It’s a vast, finite underground lake covering some 174,000 square miles. It is a principal source of irrigation, municipal, Ogallala Aguifer water supply industrial, and household water in southwest Kansas and portions of seven other states.

The invention of the center pivot irrigation system, a sprinkler system on wheels that pivots around the crops, created an irrigation boom in southwest Kansas. Feed grains grown as a result of irrigation enabled this area to become a leader in operation of feedlots. Because of our feedlots, meat processing companies built four major plants in southwest Kansas. Altogether these plants process an average of 20,000 head of cattle a day.

However, heavy irrigation diminishes the water supply faster than rainfall can replenish the reserve. Irrigation System (Valley) Conservation measures are continually explored. Today, several state agencies are responsible for management of water resources in Kansas.

Another major factor causing livestock industry growth in western Kansas was the growth of reliable truck transportation. It is estimated about 1,500 trucks a day accommodate Dodge City businesses. National Beef employs about 3,000 people and process about 6,000 head a day. The plant was originally opened by Tom Shirley, Art Ebener, and Sam Davis in 1961, under the name Hy-Plains Dressed Beef. Then in 1992, the plant was 19 purchased by National Beef and Farmland Industries. It was the first plant owned by National Beef. 30,000 boxes of beef are sent from the plant each day to 30 different countries as well as the United States.

The mural surrounding the front part of the National Beef building is a chronological history of Dodge City and was National Beef painted by Stan Herd, a local artist who has gained international fame for creating crop art from plowed and planted fields. Stan’s work can be seen in galleries, museums, books, TV commercials and magazine ads. He is also the artist of the mural on the former bank building on Second Avenue in downtown Dodge.

Please note on your right the Winter Livestock Auction sign. The auction, one of the largest privately owned livestock auctions in the nation, is held every Wednesday. Visitors are welcome. More than 3,000 head of livestock are bought or sold Stan Herd each sale day by people in Oklahoma, Texas, Colorado, and Kansas.

Grain elevators, large storage units sometimes called “the cathedral of the plains,” were the first agri-businesses established in western Kansas. The forerunners of present- day elevators were storage units owned by railroad companies and later owned by individuals. Today most grain elevators are farmer cooperative owned. They tower over the western

Kansas landscape holding millions of bushels of grain waiting Winter Livestock to be shipped to destinations all over the world or used regionally by feedlots.

Dodge City, in 1885, was on a sure road to prosperity. Then the 1885 quarantine law, the blizzard of 1886, and the disappearance of open range financially ruined local stockmen. The extensive freight business conducted out of Dodge Pride Ag grain elevator City into Indian Territory was lost to the new railroad’s building to the south. Wheat prices dropped to 40 cents a bushel and land was as low as 50 cents an acre. Robert Wright, one of the area’s first settlers, said, “Property values dropped to 5 cents to 10 cents on the dollar, and you can buy land for a song and sing it to yourself.”

It was in one fell swoop in 1886; fire, ice and a lingering depression dissolved Dodge City’s dreams and extravagant plans for growth. Dodge City soon lost its lusty habits and its population of rough frontiersmen, gunmen, gamblers, and 20 western characters. Not until the agricultural boom of the early 1900s did the local economy rebound.

For many years until the end of World War II, some residents of Dodge City were hesitant to talk about its lurid past. Jess C. Denious, a young newspaperman from Wichita, arrived in Dodge City in 1910 and purchased the local paper. Denious discovered a wealth of fascinating history in his old newspaper files. Thinking it would be interesting to republish the paper’s articles about the days of Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson, he started reprinting some of these colorful accounts. Soon after the first article appeared, several local citizens called on Mr. Denious and informed him that this sort thing just wasn’t done in Dodge City. Most wanted to forget about the wild and lawless years. They wanted their town to be known as a “civilized city.”

Today, Dodge City is proud of its western heritage. Our heroes have grown to be larger than life. Their history involved not only the facts, but legends that grew up around them.

As the nineteenth century ended, the tendency of the western pioneers to brag a bit, furnished an abundance of material for dime novels, nickelodeons, Hollywood films, and later, radio and television. The history of the west has been a mother lode of entertainment riches. DODGE CITY is synonymous with the west. Pause audio until point 14, restart audio at 14 and slow to point 15 Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson have evolved into world famous who helped to bring law and order to their western community. Their lives are the basis for the modern-day hero, Marshal Matt Dillon, Gunsmoke’s fictional composite of Dodge City’s real characters.

Indelibly impressed on the history of the frontier spirit, Dodge City is part of a vast folkloric literature of frontier conflict –the simple duel between right and wrong; white hat and black hat. James Arness as Marshal Matt Dillon Be sure to visit Wright Park, established in 1883, on 2nd Avenue by the riverbed. It’s a great place to sit in the shade and eat lunch and relax. While you’re there be sure to check out the Santa Fe Trail marker, at a spot where many travelers camped after crossing the Arkansas River from 1822 to 1872. A decision would have to be made whether to continue west along the river, where there was water, to Bent’s Fort or turn off here to Santa Fe, along a route with no water.

Wright Park You can also check out the Hoover Pavilion 21 built in 1919 and named after George Hoover, the first elected mayor of Dodge City. Just east of the pavilion is Liberty Garden featuring a 1,200 pound piece of steel from the Twin Towers brought down on 9/11, and a fountain with two miniature towers.

Originally an Andrew Carnegie Library, the Carnegie Center’s history will fascinate those who enter the door on the corner. With its round second-story gallery, this Hoover Pavilion and Liberty Garden unique home to the Dodge City Arts Council provides gallery space and a small gift shop for local artisans. Pause audio, on to point 16, restart audio & continue on route. Dr. O.H. Simpson was best known nationally for developing the gold inlay process for filling teeth. However, in western Kansas, he is best Andrew Carnegie Library (1920s) remembered for his creation of the Cowboy Statue of the former cowboy and lawman, Joe Sughrue. This statue, which has stood on the sacred ground of Boot Hill since 1929, is a tribute to the old west and heritage of Dodge City, the Queen of the Cowtowns. The inscription reads, “On the ashes of my campfire, this city is built.”

The Kansas Teachers’ Hall of Fame is the Dr. O.H. Simpson first one of its kind in the United States. It is dedicated to the early and present day teachers who have devoted their lives to this fine profession. Also located here for viewing, is an actual one-room schoolhouse from the Joe Sughrue with cowboy statue area. The school was built in 1887 and used until 1946. It was generously donated to the Hall of Fame. They moved it to town and restored it to make it part of the tour. Also at this location you can visit the ’s Wax Museum-see the life-size wax figures of famous western personalities. Guided tours are given daily during the summer season for $8.00.

We hope you’ve enjoyed your tour and you’ll be back real soon, to Pleasant Hill School House once again walk in the footsteps that wrote the history of the old west.

22 Dodge City Convention & Visitors Bureau 400 W. Wyatt Earp Blvd. 1-800-OLD-WEST www.visitdodgecity.org @visitdodgecity