Deadwood history and Wild Bill Hickok's life and death

Scott: 00:00:01

Because it had the coffee infused in it.

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So it said it was like sweeter.

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So it already had kind of some, it's already.

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Mixed a little bit.

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Yeah.

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And it wasn't bad.

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I could definitely notice like kind of the, the coffee hint to it.

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Yeah.

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And that little bit of sweetness.

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If I was gonna try to, any, any of those other whiskeys a little

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bit straight, I'd have to be like in the, in the drinking mood.

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I guess this is appropriate if we're doing a podcast about cowboys and

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stuff.

Jenn: 00:00:27

Welcome

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to Talk With History.

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I'm your host Scott, here with my wife and historian Jen.

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Hello.

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On this podcast, we give you insights to our history inspired world travels

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YouTube channel journey and examine history through deeper conversations

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with the curious, the explorers and the history lovers out there.

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Now, before we get into our main topic, as always, we've been getting

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our some more reviews recently.

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So I really do appreciate that if you have 20 seconds to drop us a

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review on Apple podcasts or even drop us a five stars on Spotify.

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We greatly appreciate it because the show We actually had the

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highest month of downloads this last July ever for the podcast.

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So pat on the back for us.

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We almost, we got close to a thousand downloads for the whole month.

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So I'm pretty happy about that.

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So thank you for those who are listening and who are sharing the podcast.

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And Wild Bill Hickok was a legendary figure of the American Wild West,

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renowned for his exceptional shooting skills and reputation as a gunslinger.

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He served as a lawman, marshal, and scout during the Civil War and

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afterward in various frontier towns.

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Despite his law enforcement roles, he did have some bad habits and made some enemies

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that brought him to his now famous demise.

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So Jen, let's talk about this famous figure of the Wild West

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and where we were this summer.

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Yeah.

Jenn: 00:02:03

So we went to Deadwood,

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South Dakota.

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We did.

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It was honestly, it was kind of one of the few places I got.

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A little more excited to, to go see just because of the reputation of Deadwood, the

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show and just the whole Wild West thing.

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Sure.

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And like

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the recreation of the picture of the main street, Deadwood is

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the exact historic main street you walk down in Deadwood today.

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So if you watch the show or anything like that, like you're, you're

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walking through history of what.

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It made this town so quickly and even what it's known for

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today.

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Yeah.

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And even I've noticed in the video, right, it's been out for

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a few days now, I've noticed the watch time is a little bit longer.

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And so YouTube kind of gives us these good kind of feedback metrics

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because, you know, I found some cool music that was actually very.

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Fits very well with the story.

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Yeah, this is kind of dead man walking song But there's lots of pictures of

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Deadwood and you describe it very well Even in the video when we're walking

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down this paved modern day street, you know with some throwback kind of

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touristy stuff But then showing the old pictures of these muddy muddy.

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It's just dirt

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dirty road, and it's not even a road I would just say a

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clearing where they have built up these makeshift wooden Buildings?

Jenn: 00:03:23

I wouldn't even use buildings.

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It's like these lean tos that they have made and called them

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saloons and called them brothels.

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Well, and you can picture it, right?

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Because you talk about in the video why they named it

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Deadwood.

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Yeah, a gulch of dead trees were found there.

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And it is a little valley because it is pretty hilly around there.

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And you're in the Black Hills.

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So, uh, here's a valley area and they found these gulch of dead trees.

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So they called it Deadwood.

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Yeah, and so remind me the era that everything kind of

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started coming together out there.

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So you have to remember, this does not, this is American Indian territory.

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Yeah, that's right.

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It's not a state.

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It is not a state.

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And this is going to become a problem for Hickok's murder.

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But this land belongs to the Lakota.

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and it's belonged to them since the treaty of Fort Laramie of 1868.

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So you can think almost, um, 10 years it's been their land.

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Oh, wow.

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And what happens is George Armstrong Custer comes through there in 1874.

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So about six years, he's out there enforcing these treaties, and this

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is what we get into Bighorn, which we'll talk about on another episode.

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He's enforcing these, uh, treaties where the American Indians have

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adhered to staying on certain areas, hence reservations,

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and he's riding through here.

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When gold is discovered, 1874, 1875, and so it becomes this big boom where

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people want to go make their fortunes.

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Yeah, the word gets out.

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The word gets out.

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And so they can't stop this influx of people, even though they should be.

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George Armstrong Custer should be stopping these people because it's not.

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Uh, their land.

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And they shouldn't be settling it.

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It belongs to the Lakota.

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But he doesn't because he's part of it.

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He also wants the gold and of course, uh, and so he allows these people to

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come in and he, the military kind of like turns a blind eye to it and they start

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to have these little makeshift buildings that pop up to service all the Fortune

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hunters, miners, they come into the area.

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So this is about 1876, 5, 000 people, 1877, 12, 000

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people, 1878, 25, 000 people.

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That

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kind of surprised me, even when I went back and I was making the video, like

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that is, especially back then, that is a

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drastic, drastic.

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Right.

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And so it's incomprehensible how they could even govern it to begin with.

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So it becomes a very lawless area, as you can imagine, because you get all these

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men coming in to make their fortune.

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And so you get a lot of gambling, you get a lot of alcoholism.

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You get Hickok who's called here you get the brothels I know of course you

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get the brothels pop up and we'll talk a little bit about one of the most famous

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madams Who's very close to Hickok?

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from the most Profitable brothel there in Deadwood.

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But yeah, so these are things that gonna pop up for all these men you're gonna get

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You know, restaurants, saloons, pop up liveries, so liveries where you put your

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horse, butcher shops, uh, and makeshift tents and things like that, and brothels.

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So what happens is you get wagon trains who, it's their business

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to, you know, bring people, lead people from one area to another.

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They navigate you through, right?

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And if you watched 1883, this is a business of the time.

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Usually you're paid.

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before to take people through and you, you will help with supplies, you know

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the area, you, you're, you do the safety, and then you're paid once you get there.

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And that's basically your pay.

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So Hickok takes a wagon train from Fort Laramie, which is so interesting.

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That's the treaty of Fort Laramie that is adhering to these Indian lands.

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So, this is the big fort of Wyoming, and this is still Wyoming territory,

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and this is Dakota territory.

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So, they're not even states, which again, they're not governed in that way.

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So, he, uh, Hickok takes a wagon train from Fort Laramie to, uh, Wyoming.

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Dead word.

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Now at this point in his life and career, he'd already

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been, he already has a reputation.

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If I remember correctly, he's been a marshal for a little while.

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So he already kind of has all this kind of notoriety.

Jenn: 00:08:01

So yes, James Butler Hickok, he's born May 27th, 1837.

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Um, he's a folk hero of the old west, but mostly because he comes

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up beside Buffalo Bill Cody.

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So he comes up beside him.

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So his stories are told with him.

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Now, Cody can capitalize on those a little better than Hickok, but it doesn't

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mean Hickok stories don't get told.

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So yes.

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uh, Hickok is, uh, he leaves his home at 18 years old, Illinois.

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He, uh, becomes a lawman in Kansas, Abilene, Kansas.

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That'll be important later.

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In Nebraska, he becomes a scout for the Union Army, just like Buffalo Cody.

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And he, um, and he meets like these kind of people who do

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shows and stuff like that.

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So he has met a woman who's part of the circus and he marries her in

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Cheyenne and they're married in March.

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Her name is Agnes Thatcher Lake and you show a picture of her in the video and

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she's a 50 year old widow of the circus.

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So they're running in the same kind of circle.

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And she was actually like a very famous, very well traveled,

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very In that in the circus kind of, you know, world, she was like, I

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was reading about her a little bit.

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She's actually very well known.

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She's very well known.

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And so she stays in Cheyenne.

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So you can imagine they're getting married March of 1876.

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He's going to Fort Laramie.

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So Fort Laramie is right outside of Cheyenne.

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And he's getting there by June.

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And then by he takes the wagon train from Uh, June to July to Deadwood.

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And so she, she stays behind and he wants to make his fortune because

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he's heard about all this gold.

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Of course.

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And so he's like, I'm going to make it rich quickly.

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And he's a gambler.

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And he's a gambler.

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So he joins Charlie Utter's wagon train.

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And Charlie Utter, if you.

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Know anything about Wild Boat Hickok?

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It's the name on the tombstone.

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And we'll talk more about that because Charlie, Charlie Utter is a fan of Hickok.

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It's his wagon train and they all meet up in Fort Laramie and another person joins

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the wagon train then to Calamity Jane.

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So they take the train, the wagon train together.

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So Calamity Jane didn't know Hickok.

Jenn: 00:10:08

Well, they met this one time.

Jenn: 00:10:10

They, they

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must have, I, I, the more I thought about it, like, and, and we talk about it

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later in the video, like her dying wish.

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Mm-hmm.

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was to be buried next by, next to Wild Bill.

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Mm-hmm.

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. And they, it must have been one of those things, and maybe this is just

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kind of the romantic side of, you know, Outlook that I have on, on stories

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like this sometimes, but they must have just kind of like connected, right?

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Just like birds of a feather, same, same spirit.

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They hit it off, you know, because for some reason throughout history, those

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two names have always gone together.

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And, and to your point, historically, they didn't spend a ton of time together.

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They didn't,

Jenn: 00:10:47

but You can imagine there probably are not a lot of women acting

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like Calamity Jane at this time.

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She's very much adhering to men gender norms.

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She's wearing men clothing and she's succumbed to alcoholism.

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So she's drinking every day, which Hickok is also an alcoholic.

Jenn: 00:11:04

So he's drinking every day.

Jenn: 00:11:05

So there's some shared hardship.

Jenn: 00:11:07

Sure.

Jenn: 00:11:07

That they have together on this wagon train.

Jenn: 00:11:09

Drinking buddy.

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drinking buddy.

Jenn: 00:11:11

She's a good shot.

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He's a good shot.

Jenn: 00:11:13

They can tell stories together.

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They can laugh together.

Jenn: 00:11:16

So they probably connected.

Scott: 00:11:22

Well, and even like the more that I learned about them and you

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again, you mentioned it in the video, uh, and, and I'll link the video

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in the show notes for this podcast.

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But you talk about her, she's got kind of a big heart, right?

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When she, when she isn't drinking and when she is sober enough to,

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to do things, she is out there.

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They're helping.

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Yeah.

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And he kind of does the same thing, right?

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He's a lawman.

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He's a marshal.

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He's out there trying to enforce the law.

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So they both have that spirit about them.

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Yeah.

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Charity heart.

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They have that charity heart.

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Now I did read for him, his kind of habit, especially as

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a lawman was incredibly rough.

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He kind of sought out.

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The trouble, you know, and would go, you know, from zero

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to fighting very, very quickly.

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And that's just kind of how he did his business.

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And even when I was looking up, there's been various movies made about Wild

Scott: 00:12:08

Bill Hickok and Deadwood and different versions that there's a TV show.

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Sure.

Scott: 00:12:12

The, the couple versions that I saw, I think it was, is a relatively

Scott: 00:12:16

well known actor that did one of the movies or something like that.

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But he just, he, like somebody, somebody says something to him like off one time

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or he's in Deadwood or he's in some town and someone's not supposed to have

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guns and he finds out he has a gun.

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He doesn't even like talk to the guy.

Scott: 00:12:29

He just goes up and punches him in the face and drags him away.

Scott: 00:12:32

Right.

Scott: 00:12:32

So that was kind of his

Jenn: 00:12:33

reputation.

Jenn: 00:12:34

Yeah.

Jenn: 00:12:34

It's very lawless.

Jenn: 00:12:35

Yes.

Jenn: 00:12:36

And so it is very much this, uh, violent, physical.

Jenn: 00:12:41

Time and you get all these men in Deadwood and it becomes like

Jenn: 00:12:46

you're governed by yourself, right?

Jenn: 00:12:48

Right,

Scott: 00:12:49

and and that's kind of why I think that's kind of why he had this mystique

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about him because he was a lawman He had that reputation and actually again when

Scott: 00:12:59

I was making the video I read that he had earned this reputation early as a marshal

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because he was I guess supposedly One of the first ones to kind of have this

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quick, quick draw shootout, you know, like standing in the middle of the street,

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just like get it done, like a quick draw.

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Like he was one of the first supposedly, um, to, to do

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that and to kind of have that.

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You know, established a, you know, sure.

Scott: 00:13:24

Around, around him and his, his reputation.

Jenn: 00:13:29

One more.

Jenn: 00:13:30

I gotta look pretty when I'm down.

Jenn: 00:13:34

I'm a dead, I'm a dead, I'm a dead man.

Jenn: 00:13:42

So he's in Deadwood.

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We've established, he gets married in March of 1876, and Cheyenne

Jenn: 00:13:48

makes it to Laramie about June.

Jenn: 00:13:51

It takes the wagon train up to Deadward from Laramie, Wyoming

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to Deadward, South Dakota.

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And he gets there about July.

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So again, not very long time because August 1st is when all these things

Jenn: 00:14:07

will start to happen for Hickok.

Jenn: 00:14:10

So it's August 1st, 1876, where he's at saloon 10.

Jenn: 00:14:15

Now In the video.

Jenn: 00:14:18

And if you visit Deadwood, this, there's a little discrepancy.

Jenn: 00:14:24

So the location of saloon 10.

Jenn: 00:14:27

is still there, but it's not saloon 10 anymore, but the actual location where

Jenn: 00:14:33

Hickok was playing cards is there.

Jenn: 00:14:35

Now, saloon 10 had burned at one point and the owners had moved the location across

Jenn: 00:14:42

the street and further down, but still kept a lot of the furniture and the chair.

Jenn: 00:14:47

And the the decorum from the decorations and stuff from

Jenn: 00:14:52

what the saloon looked like.

Jenn: 00:14:53

So you can go to the saloon 10, which is not the location and see the chair

Jenn: 00:14:59

where Hickok was murdered and you can see what the what What would it look like?

Jenn: 00:15:05

What the saloon would it look like?

Jenn: 00:15:06

And then you can go further down the street to the actual location.

Scott: 00:15:09

And I think the name of that place was like Wild Bill

Scott: 00:15:11

Bar or something like that.

Jenn: 00:15:12

Yes.

Jenn: 00:15:13

So that's the difference between the two.

Jenn: 00:15:15

But so what's happening is August 1st, he's playing poker in saloon 10.

Jenn: 00:15:20

Poker was his game.

Jenn: 00:15:21

And he's the seat opens up and a Jack McCall sits to play poker with him.

Jenn: 00:15:27

And during the session, McCall loses.

Jenn: 00:15:31

A lot, and Hickok encourages him to quit, quit now, try to go make some

Jenn: 00:15:37

money to pay us what you owe us.

Jenn: 00:15:41

And he gives him money for breakfast the next morning because he's

Jenn: 00:15:44

basically used all his money.

Jenn: 00:15:45

And people claim, or historians claim, that insulted McCall.

Jenn: 00:15:50

Yeah.

Jenn: 00:15:51

So he was insulted by him giving him basically, you know, um, Charity money.

Jenn: 00:15:56

Charity money.

Jenn: 00:15:58

And so the next day.

Jenn: 00:16:00

Same location.

Jenn: 00:16:02

So August 2nd, Hickok walks into the same saloon to play poker and the only

Jenn: 00:16:08

seat open has its back to the door.

Jenn: 00:16:10

And Hickok being, being a lawman doesn't want to sit with his back to

Jenn: 00:16:14

the door, but he wants to play poker.

Jenn: 00:16:15

It's his game.

Jenn: 00:16:17

So he sits there.

Jenn: 00:16:17

He actually asks a couple of guys he's playing poker with if

Jenn: 00:16:20

they would change seats with him.

Jenn: 00:16:21

But if you know anything about poker, it's bad luck to change your seat.

Jenn: 00:16:25

So they refuse.

Jenn: 00:16:26

So he's playing and, um, That's when McCall will walk into the bar and shout

Jenn: 00:16:33

something at him and just shoot him point blank range right against the head.

Jenn: 00:16:37

And he kills him instantly.

Jenn: 00:16:50

And the bullet actually goes through Hickok's head into the

Jenn: 00:16:54

gentleman he's playing poker with.

Jenn: 00:16:55

Yeah, that's right.

Jenn: 00:16:56

Into his arm.

Jenn: 00:16:56

And that gentleman will keep the bullet in his arm for the rest of his life.

Jenn: 00:17:00

Holy cow.

Jenn: 00:17:00

And he's a, um, he's like a captain of a steamboat, of the paddle boats.

Jenn: 00:17:07

And he would walk into bars saying.

Jenn: 00:17:09

Uh, here comes the bullet that killed, uh, Bill Hickok.

Jenn: 00:17:13

Of

Scott: 00:17:13

course, yeah, if you're a ship captain of like a

Scott: 00:17:15

riverboat or something like that.

Scott: 00:17:16

You're like, here's my

Jenn: 00:17:17

story.

Jenn: 00:17:17

Yeah, here comes the bullet.

Jenn: 00:17:19

So, McCall knows, knows he's done something bad, right?

Jenn: 00:17:23

And, uh, and of course, the dead man's hand.

Jenn: 00:17:26

So, Hickok in his hand is holding aces and eights.

Jenn: 00:17:29

Black aces and eights.

Jenn: 00:17:31

And they don't know what the whole card is.

Jenn: 00:17:33

That's what the fifth card is.

Jenn: 00:17:34

And there's speculation.

Jenn: 00:17:35

You'll see some places have the nine of diamonds.

Jenn: 00:17:38

But that's no one really sure what the fifth card is, but that's the hand he has

Jenn: 00:17:42

when he's killed So it's called the dead man's hand and we show it in the video and

Jenn: 00:17:46

sometimes when you go to his grave people have left So McCall runs out of the saloon

Jenn: 00:17:54

and tries to jump on a horse and we talked about this that most horses if you're

Jenn: 00:17:58

Tying up your horse to go in somewhere.

Jenn: 00:18:00

You're gonna loosen the saddle Because you're not going to cinch a saddle

Jenn: 00:18:04

on a horse and for it to rest so when he jumps on the horse saddle It just

Jenn: 00:18:08

falls right off and then he runs down the street to the butcher shop and we

Jenn: 00:18:12

we show that there's a and he Hides in the cooler basically there and they

Jenn: 00:18:16

find him They pull him out of there and they actually do the trial in the

Jenn: 00:18:20

same place where Hickok is Yeah, I

Scott: 00:18:23

was kind of surprised with such a lawless place, you know, I assume there

Scott: 00:18:27

must have been other lawmen, you know, in the, in the city or something like that.

Scott: 00:18:30

He probably wasn't, he probably wasn't the only one.

Scott: 00:18:32

You don't really

Jenn: 00:18:33

know.

Jenn: 00:18:33

Yeah.

Jenn: 00:18:33

Well, they don't really, I mean, it's an informal minors jury.

Jenn: 00:18:37

They get the minors, the guys who are there.

Jenn: 00:18:40

to stand a jury.

Jenn: 00:18:41

So, and it can't really be a trial because it's not really a territory.

Jenn: 00:18:45

Yes, it's lawless.

Jenn: 00:18:46

It's lawless.

Jenn: 00:18:46

It's, it's, um, it's Indian land.

Jenn: 00:18:48

It's a reservation.

Jenn: 00:18:49

It's not, it belongs to the American Indian.

Jenn: 00:18:52

So it's not, it can't be governed basically.

Jenn: 00:18:56

So you can't really hold a trial, but they do.

Jenn: 00:18:59

And McCall claims that When Hickok was a Marshall in Abilene, Kansas Again, I

Jenn: 00:19:08

told you that name would come up that Hickok killed his brother Now there is

Jenn: 00:19:13

a record of a McCall being killed in Abilene, Kansas by a lawman Oh, really?

Jenn: 00:19:18

They don't claim that it's Hickok.

Jenn: 00:19:20

It just says a lawman that the records aren't that clear But there is a McCall

Jenn: 00:19:24

that is killed earlier by a lawman.

Jenn: 00:19:28

And there's not even clear if that's his brother, but the name matches up.

Jenn: 00:19:32

Now, now they, they didn't know this.

Jenn: 00:19:34

The minors hear this story and the minors are very much, again, this

Jenn: 00:19:39

lawlessness of the West where you govern yourself and you're very much

Jenn: 00:19:42

eye for an eye type of mentality.

Jenn: 00:19:46

So they let him off, right?

Jenn: 00:19:48

You think about someone who killed your brother, they deserve to

Jenn: 00:19:52

to whatever they get from you.

Jenn: 00:19:55

And so the miners are like, Oh yeah, you're totally validated and what you did.

Jenn: 00:19:59

You're free to go.

Jenn: 00:20:01

But McCall gets out of town relatively quickly because people

Jenn: 00:20:03

are upset because people like Hickok, including Charlie, Charlie utter.

Jenn: 00:20:07

And Charlie utter is the gentleman who they'll bury Hickok the very next day.

Jenn: 00:20:12

He's not buried at Fort at Mount Moriah cemetery where we visited his grave today.

Jenn: 00:20:18

He's He's buried at a closer cemetery to the location of Main Street, but

Jenn: 00:20:22

as the city grows, they move them.

Jenn: 00:20:25

They move the cemetery about three years later in 1879 and on the day of his death.

Jenn: 00:20:32

But Charlie utter will cut that original tombstone and it'll say,

Jenn: 00:20:36

it says almost looks like clutter.

Jenn: 00:20:38

CH.

Jenn: 00:20:39

Yeah.

Jenn: 00:20:40

Yeah.

Jenn: 00:20:40

Shutter.

Jenn: 00:20:41

Um, but.

Jenn: 00:20:42

Um, he also invites everyone back to his camp for the funeral.

Jenn: 00:20:47

And it's almost like everybody from the town shows up.

Jenn: 00:20:49

Because again, Wagon Train, he has a camp that he's established.

Jenn: 00:20:52

And so everyone comes there and he considered him a friend.

Jenn: 00:20:56

And so he's the one who will pay for the funeral and then pay for the tombstone.

Jenn: 00:21:00

And McCall gets out of the area where he ends up back around Fort Laramie.

Jenn: 00:21:04

And he's running his mouth that he killed a U.

Jenn: 00:21:07

S.

Jenn: 00:21:08

Marshal.

Jenn: 00:21:08

He killed Bill Hickok and An actual U.

Jenn: 00:21:13

S.

Jenn: 00:21:13

Marshal is listening to him.

Jenn: 00:21:16

And again, you have this loyalty of even with the lawlessness, you have this

Jenn: 00:21:20

loyalty between marshals that we know how difficult this job is for us to do.

Jenn: 00:21:24

And here you are running around that you killed one of the most famous U.

Jenn: 00:21:27

S.

Jenn: 00:21:27

Marshals.

Jenn: 00:21:28

So he takes them to Dakota territory, a place that's actually

Jenn: 00:21:32

run by the federal government.

Jenn: 00:21:33

It's Yankton, Dakota territory, and he puts them on trial.

Jenn: 00:21:38

So it doesn't really.

Jenn: 00:21:39

Hit that double jeopardy since the first trial wasn't an actual trial and

Jenn: 00:21:45

a Hickok's brother comes to town to hear the testimony and he's found guilty

Jenn: 00:21:51

and he's hanged the very next day after he's found guilty on March 1st, 1877.

Scott: 00:21:57

It's so funny to me that, you know, if you.

Scott: 00:21:59

You almost couldn't script a story like this, right?

Scott: 00:22:03

And for us, you know, in the American culture, you know, this, this story is

Scott: 00:22:07

part of kind of that wild west Story that we learned growing up and everything like

Scott: 00:22:11

that and you you almost again You couldn't script a more predictable bad guy, right?

Scott: 00:22:17

someone who just kind of gets away with murder literally and then is

Scott: 00:22:20

off running his mouth like they write that into movies all the time Right.

Scott: 00:22:24

And they do that because people actually do that.

Scott: 00:22:26

And then, you know, this guy wasn't the

Jenn: 00:22:28

most intelligent person.

Jenn: 00:22:29

Obviously, if he would have just kept his mouth shut, he probably could have lived

Jenn: 00:22:32

a very long life and gotten away with it.

Jenn: 00:22:34

But he obviously was not the smart guy, especially to be

Jenn: 00:22:38

losing at poker so, um, so badly.

Jenn: 00:22:45

We visit Hickock's grave.

Jenn: 00:22:47

Right beside him is Calamity Jane.

Jenn: 00:22:48

She'll die in 1903.

Jenn: 00:22:50

Her dying wish is to be buried next to Wild Bill, because I think they had this

Jenn: 00:22:54

close friendship and kinship, and, um, she really thinks fondly of Deadwood.

Jenn: 00:23:00

And then right about two graves over from her is a very famous,

Jenn: 00:23:05

uh, madam named Dora Dufresne.

Jenn: 00:23:08

And Dora Dufresne runs the most profitable brothel in Deadwood.

Scott: 00:23:13

It is, I think I saw, this was one thing that...

Scott: 00:23:16

I didn't notice the first couple times when I was editing the video

Scott: 00:23:19

and then finally I was looking at some of the signs right then and

Scott: 00:23:23

they have in Deadwood on that Main Street where you're kind of walking

Scott: 00:23:25

up and down doing most of the filming.

Scott: 00:23:27

They have signs and basically they're not quite historical markers, but

Scott: 00:23:30

they're like the classic kind of wooden hanging sign hanging from outside.

Scott: 00:23:35

historic locations.

Scott: 00:23:36

So one, one wooden sign says this is the actual location where Wild Bill Hickok

Scott: 00:23:40

was was killed on August 2nd, 1876.

Scott: 00:23:44

You know, here's the spot where Jack McCall was captured.

Scott: 00:23:47

And then they actually have another sign talking about one of the brothels.

Scott: 00:23:50

Yes.

Scott: 00:23:51

And but it said on there that it wasn't closed by.

Scott: 00:23:54

It wasn't closed until 1980 by the FBI.

Scott: 00:23:59

1980.

Scott: 00:24:01

That just I was so Caught off guard by that, that that

Scott: 00:24:05

was around doing their thing.

Jenn: 00:24:14

Well, I feel like, so again, we talk about all these men coming into town

Jenn: 00:24:18

and these women come to service the men.

Jenn: 00:24:20

And if the men are the ones who are.

Jenn: 00:24:24

the law, but they're also partaking of a brothel, then they're going to turn

Jenn: 00:24:29

a blind eye to it for a very long time.

Jenn: 00:24:32

Yeah.

Jenn: 00:24:32

I,

Scott: 00:24:33

I just, there was just a funny aside that just really surprised me.

Scott: 00:24:37

And I don't think most people would notice it if they're watching the video.

Scott: 00:24:40

But if you look in the video, you can see that it was, it

Scott: 00:24:43

just says, closed 80, right?

Scott: 00:24:46

By the FBI.

Scott: 00:24:48

Um, which was, Just, I

Jenn: 00:24:49

thought it was hilarious.

Jenn: 00:24:50

Well, Dufresne is also credited with the term cat house.

Jenn: 00:24:54

Oh really?

Jenn: 00:24:55

So she had a bunch of cats brought in on a wagon train because the women who

Jenn: 00:25:01

worked in her brothel were getting scared of the rats and they were getting very

Jenn: 00:25:06

upset and so they wouldn't do their job.

Jenn: 00:25:09

And so she brought in cats to get the rats.

Jenn: 00:25:12

And so the men knew the cat house.

Jenn: 00:25:16

They wanted to go visit the cat house that had like 12, 15 cats there who

Jenn: 00:25:20

were taking care of all the rats.

Jenn: 00:25:21

And that's where you get the term cat house.

Jenn: 00:25:23

Yeah,

Scott: 00:25:23

I do.

Scott: 00:25:24

I don't think I knew that.

Scott: 00:25:25

I don't think I had that in the video either.

Scott: 00:25:27

So it's a little podcast special for our listeners.

Scott: 00:25:29

And it makes sense.

Scott: 00:25:30

Yeah.

Jenn: 00:25:45

So

Jenn: 00:25:50

if you're wondering more about Deadwood, in 1877, you know, the U.

Jenn: 00:25:54

S.

Jenn: 00:25:54

government tries to like, uh, what can we do to kind of capitalize on

Jenn: 00:25:59

this gold that's being found here?

Jenn: 00:26:01

And they kind of modify the treaty of Fort Laramie.

Jenn: 00:26:07

And that the Lakotas never adhere to it.

Jenn: 00:26:10

And even today, they brought a trial against the US government in 18, in 1980.

Jenn: 00:26:16

And they cited the original treaty saying that this is our land, and you took it.

Jenn: 00:26:21

And so the US government tried to pay them a billion dollars for it.

Jenn: 00:26:25

And the Lakotas won't take it because they want the land.

Jenn: 00:26:29

That money sits in a savings account today for the Lakota people, which they

Jenn: 00:26:35

refuse to touch it because that land belongs to them and they want the land.

Jenn: 00:26:40

Wow.

Jenn: 00:26:40

And now so many people live there, like we even visited there.

Jenn: 00:26:44

And it is part of, you know, it's adhered to by a

Scott: 00:26:48

state.

Scott: 00:26:48

Well, and if, and if you're listening, right, so the Black Hills area.

Scott: 00:26:53

Right.

Scott: 00:26:53

If you're, if you're not familiar with the South Dakota area, and I wasn't

Scott: 00:26:56

really until we spent some time, we spent a few days there with, you know, for a

Scott: 00:26:59

little, we had a little family reunion, but that's right near Mount Rushmore.

Scott: 00:27:03

That's crazy horse, which we'll talk about in future, in upcoming episodes.

Scott: 00:27:07

So there's a whole lot in that area and it's gorgeous.

Scott: 00:27:10

It's a beautiful area.

Scott: 00:27:11

It's,

Jenn: 00:27:12

it's absolutely beautiful.

Jenn: 00:27:13

And you can see why they want the land.

Jenn: 00:27:16

And I.

Jenn: 00:27:16

I.

Jenn: 00:27:16

Think there could be some compromise being that the land belongs

Jenn: 00:27:20

because you can still visit.

Jenn: 00:27:21

Bighorn is on a Indian reservation, Badlands is on an Indian reservation

Jenn: 00:27:26

and they still use it, you know, for people to visit and they can still

Jenn: 00:27:30

make a profit off of still keeping this, you know, this land, um,

Jenn: 00:27:34

protected for their use of their tribe.

Jenn: 00:27:37

So I think there could be something you could adhere to, but, um, what happens

Jenn: 00:27:41

in 1879, and this is the big fire in.

Jenn: 00:27:45

Deadwood.

Jenn: 00:27:46

And most people have not made huge fortunes.

Jenn: 00:27:49

They've been there for like four years by then.

Jenn: 00:27:53

And so most people leave.

Jenn: 00:27:54

And the people who stay are people who are established in the town.

Jenn: 00:27:58

And it has, even today, there's a couple thousand people who live there.

Jenn: 00:28:04

And, um, and it's still, I think it's the tourism is really what

Jenn: 00:28:09

drives the town, but it never is going to hit that big heyday.

Jenn: 00:28:14

that it had there in the 1870s.

Jenn: 00:28:17

But it was a very cool place to visit.

Jenn: 00:28:19

And, uh, Hickok is the story there, if you go there.

Jenn: 00:28:23

So you definitely want to go down Main Street.

Jenn: 00:28:25

It's the historic Main Street.

Jenn: 00:28:27

And you definitely want to go to Mount Moriah Cemetery.

Scott: 00:28:29

Yeah, and they have, they have tour buses that'll take you up to the cemetery

Scott: 00:28:33

because it's up a very steep hill.

Scott: 00:28:35

That is not one you're going to walk from Main Street up to the cemetery.

Jenn: 00:28:38

They'll try to tell you you can walk.

Jenn: 00:28:41

Don't

Scott: 00:28:41

do it.

Scott: 00:28:41

Don't do it.

Scott: 00:28:42

I mean, it's steep even sitting in a car.

Scott: 00:28:44

Um, so, but yeah, it was an absolute blast.

Scott: 00:28:47

It's a gorgeous area.

Scott: 00:28:48

It really did get, for me, kind of to that inner child, you know, just kind

Scott: 00:28:53

of little bit of excitement there.

Scott: 00:28:55

And we had our whole family with us.

Scott: 00:28:57

We had our family, they were kind of watching us film because, you

Scott: 00:28:59

know, that was kind of just a topic.

Scott: 00:29:01

So they were enjoying that.

Scott: 00:29:03

And as we look back at, you know, while Bill Hickok's life has been romanticized

Scott: 00:29:07

and immortalized in various books, Movies, legends, and even this podcast,

Scott: 00:29:15

he remains an enduring symbol of the American Wild West and is remembered

Scott: 00:29:19

for his remarkable marksmanship, daring adventures, and a tragic end

Scott: 00:29:23

that befell many legendary figures.

Scott: 00:29:26

of the era.

Scott: 00:29:28

So thank you so much for listening to the Talk With History podcast.

Scott: 00:29:31

Please reach out to us over at talkwithhistory.

Scott: 00:29:33

com.

Scott: 00:29:34

More importantly, if you know someone else that might enjoy

Scott: 00:29:36

this, share this with them.

Scott: 00:29:37

If they're a Wild West fan, if they're, they're a cowboy fan,

Scott: 00:29:40

they're going to love this podcast.

Scott: 00:29:42

We have another podcast similar to this, where we talk about Buffalo Bill Cody.

Scott: 00:29:46

We have more like this coming up.

Scott: 00:29:48

We're going to be talking about Little Bighorn.

Scott: 00:29:49

So if you're listening to this in the future.

Scott: 00:29:52

We'll look those episodes up, because I'm sure you'll enjoy them.

Scott: 00:29:55

We rely on you, our community, to grow, and we appreciate, we

Scott: 00:29:58

appreciate you all every day.

Scott: 00:30:00

We'll talk to you next time.