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In June 1879, the Ford County Globe reported, "The boys and girls across the deadline had a high old time last Friday. They sang and danced, and fought and bit, and cut and had a good time generally, making music for the entire settlement. Our reporter summed up five knockdowns, three broken heads, two cuts and several incidental bruises. Unfortunately none of the injuries will prove fatal.”
Wyatt Earp
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image available for photographic prints
HERE!
In September 1879,
Virgil Earp sent word to Wyatt of the boom in
Tombstone and Wyatt headed West with Doc Holliday following shortly thereafter. By January 1880, Bat Masterson also left Dodge City for the West.
In 1880, the Santa Fe Railroad reached
Santa Fe, marking the death of the Santa Fe Trail and the many travelers passing through Dodge City. With the Indians effectively "lodged” on reservations, there was no longer a need for a military presence and Fort Dodge
was closed in 1882. By 1886, the cattle drives had stopped.
An illustrious period of history was over but the legend lives on in Dodge City's historic preservation of its romantic and internationally famous Old West frontier history. Today, 100,000 tourists relive the legend each year by visiting the
Boot Hill Museum and historic Front Street reconstruction.
Today, Dodge City
is called home to about 30,000 people. It is located 150 miles west of Wichita
in Southwest Kansas.
©
Kathy Weiser/Legends
of America, updated June, 2011.
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