Buffalo Bill: the American West incarnate. (USA Yesterday).

HIS NAME was William Frederick Cody, but he also was known as the Honorable W.F. Cody, as well as Col. William Cody. Yet, the world knew him best simply as Buffalo Bill.

For Americans and Europeans, he was the icon of the frontier American West, embodying all the realism, romanticism, and mythology that went with it. He brought the West's savagery to civilization and civilization to savagery. Cody was familiar with the elite of the western military, such as Generals Philip Sheridan, George Armstrong Custer, Nelson A. Miles, George Forsyth, and Eugene Carr, serving as Chief of Scouts for the latter. All paid him homage as a tracker, scout, hunter, fighter, dispatch rider, raconteur, bon vivant, and gentleman. His bravery won for him the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Cody fought and killed Indians (Tall Bull and Yellow Hair) and befriended others, including Sitting Bull, Spotted Tail, Iron Tail, Lone Wolf, Black Elk, and Short Bull. In the political arena, he knew Pres. Teddy Roosevelt, himself a rancher in the North Dakota Badlands near Medora. As a man, Cody emulated Roosevelt's ideals of the sporting and strenuous life. Buffalo Bill played command performances before kings and queens of Europe, as well as gathering his troupe for an appearance before Pope Leo XIII in the Vatican's Saint Peter's Square.

Lionized in hundreds of dime novels and later in movies by actors such as Joel McCrea and Charlton Heston, Cody's international popularity spanned decades. The city that leads into the East Entrance to Yellowstone National Park was founded by him and bears his name--Cody, Wyo. It is both a tourist town and a center for scholars with its Buffalo Bill Historical Center.

A showman, but not always a successful business entrepreneur, Cody was a drinker of repute and sometime womanizer. A soft touch for helping others, he wound up his life deep in debt and died in 1917. His burial at Lookout Mountain, Colo., just west of Denver, was attended by about 25,000 mourners.

Yet, despite such information and accolades, we are uncertain about many things in the life of Buffalo Bill. In fact, he had his debunkers, and a number of today's historical revisionists regard him as a liar, fraud, and cheat. Nonetheless, they admit that, in his time, he was the doyen of the western world. The life of this hero and showman embodies the desire for history to become myth and myth to become history.

There can be no question that Buffalo Bill was a legendary character in the dictionary definition of that term--i.e., "a romanticized and popularized myth of modern times." The name Cody is still a popular one for boys today. He spanned the age of the 19th-century Indian Wars to that of 20th-century movies and automobiles. Cody was active in both epochs.

Cody was born in LeClair, Iowa (near Davenport), in 1846, and the family moved near Ft. Leavenworth in Kansas, a staging point for the nation in its westward movement. Horses, mules, and oxen were gathered there by the thousands awaiting assignment. For the ambitious, work always was available, and the death of Cody's father in 1857 made it imperative that his son bring home money. Cody was employed variously as an ox team driver for 50 cents a day and served as a messenger for the firm Russell, Majors, and Wadell, which later founded the famous Pony Express. However, theirs was an ill-fated venture that lost $100,000 and became defunct within 18 months. Its demise came as a result of the new telegraph service across the West that was connected coast-to coast on Oct. 24, 1861.

Whether Cody worked for the Pony Express is a controversial point, but the probability is that he was one of its riders. Legend has it that he once covered 300 miles in a little over 21 hours, using 20 horses. He was an expert horseman and rode ramrod straight in the saddle, always in firm control of his mount.

While he was still a youngster, Cody gained experience as an assistant wagon master on a trip to Ft. Laramie, Wyo., an important outpost on the Oregon Trail, as well as Ft. Bridger, another such station in southwest Wyoming. Cody was an experienced stagecoach driver and covered the route from Lexington to Ft. Kearny in Nebraska. He prospected for gold in the Pike's Peak rash and traveled the far reaches of the Plains. Like many of the old-time mountain men, he had an almost photographic memory for topography.

In 1864, Cody enlisted in the Seventh Kansas Volunteer Cavalry. (Critics claim he was drunk when he signed the enlistment papers, and he later admitted to hoisting a few the night before.) He also did some horse thievery and fought against the South during the Civil War. In St. Louis, he met Louisa Frederici and married her in 1866. He was 20 at the time and she was three years his senior. Biographers claim he was a reluctant bridegroom, though. For a while, the couple ran a Kansas hotel business named the Golden Rule House. During their uneven marriage, Louisa bore him three girls, Orra, Arta, and Irma. A son, whom Cody named Kit Carson after the famous scout, succumbed to scarlet fever at about seven years old. Cody loved children and was heartbroken at this sad event.

Cody was not a sedentary man and took on different assignments to help raise money. This was a necessity as the hotel revenues produced only subsistence living. Besides, the details of business never were his forte. Essentially, he was a man of action and was happy to quit the hotel business when a branch of the Union Pacific Railroad gave him a job at the then-handsome salary of $500 a month procuring meat for its construction workers. It was in this capacity that he earned his sobriquet of "Buffalo Bill." Twelve bison a day supplied those needs, and Cody delivered the goods. Estimates are that he killed more than 4,000 in one eight-month period. Contemporary environmentalists are aghast at such a slaughter, but food was required for the men. Besides, that was then, and this is now!

His favorite weapon was a .50-70 caliber rifle which he nicknamed Lucretia Borgia after the Italian noblewoman, the daughter of Pope Alexander VI, who was rumored to have assisted in various poison plots conducted by her family. The job lasted for a year and a half, during which time his prowess as a hunter became well-known.

Men who knew the West and were good guides and horsemen were relatively few and far between. When he heard about Cody's ability, Lt. Gen. Philip Sheridan lost no time in hiring Buffalo Bill as Chief of Scouts for Gen. Eugene Carr's U.S. Fifth Cavalry. Cody served as a dispatch rider as well, once averaging 116 miles a day, in the saddle for 58 hours. He held his Army position for four years and, despite his youth--age 23 at the time--those who used his services claim he was the best. In fact, he won nothing but high praise from all the generals he served, including the ever-controversial George Armstrong Custer. Cody was a favorite of Army brass and remained so all of his life.

During his days as a dispatch rider, he had over a dozen encounters with hostile Indians, a well-known one being the Battle of Summit Springs in the Colorado Territory, July 11, 1869. Like so many of Buffalo Bill's exploits, this one is chock-full of controversy. The standard version is that Buffalo Bill spotted a fine horse that an Indian sub-chief named Tall Bull was riding, and supposedly killed the Indian from ambush and took his mount. Cody named the steed Tall Bull and ran it in a number of private races, winning a considerable amount of prize money.

Cody's meteoric rise to public popularity began around 1869 as he became the hero of a fictional work titled Buffalo Bill: King of the Border Men, serialized in The New York Weekly, which had an extensive readership. Edward Judson (using the pen name Ned Buntline) was the author, and later the story was made into a stage production in which Buffalo Bill played himself. Buntline was a rascal and scoundrel, an organizer of riots who served jail time, but he could write up a storm when it came to western adventures and that is just what the public wanted. Another pulp writer, Col. Prentice Ingraham, staged a highly successful play about Buffalo Bill, called Knight of the Plains.

Cody's fame now was on a roll, as the rough-and-tumble West always was fascinating for the more-sedate and sophisticated East. Its denizens enjoyed the West vicariously and lapped up this lurid fiction. Dime novels of western hunters, gunfighters, mountain men, and others were churned out by the thousands, 500 of them with Buffalo Bill as the central character. In the interest of sales, many were falsely attributed to the hero himself as author.

Acting appealed to Cody, and he appeared in various roles, though, in fact, always played himself. He did this for more than 10 years. He also got his friends into the act, quite literally, including Wild Bill Hickok, his longtime acquaintance and senior by 10 years. Buffalo Bill's "acting" may be a generous description, for a good deal of whatever dialogue was written was largely forgotten or ignored, with ad libs taking over. The audience loved it nonetheless, as they at least had authenticity in the actor-star.

Ambiguity marks the various incidents in Buffalo Bill's life. Between theater seasons apparently, he was elected to the Nebraska State Legislature, but preferred the stage and declined to serve. He did hold the post of Justice of the Peace in Cottonwood Springs, Neb., though. Later, he was appointed an aide to the governor and granted a colonelcy in the Nebraska National Guard. Hence, he really was a colonel and not just a "Kentucky colonel."

During the theater's off-season, Cody guided hunting parties, one of the more-famous ones involving a member of the Russian royal family. The Grand Duke Alexis wanted to hunt in the West and brought with him champagne, beds, servants, and anything else grand dukes needed or wanted. In the interest of public relations, Sheridan invited Custer along, and faked Indian attacks were made on the camp and buffalo were downed, to the delight of the Duke. He thanked Cody profusely and gifts tendered to Buffalo Bill on that occasion are on display in the museum at Cody, Wyo.

In 1872, Cody was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his outstanding services to the U.S. Army. Scouting out of Ft. McPherson, he and a small detachment of soldiers were set upon by Indians seeking to revenge the death of one of their tribe in a previous skirmish. Cody and the troopers held them off until Army reinforcements arrived. Cody then chased the Indians, but succeeded only in capturing some stolen horses.

The Adjutant General, reviewing the grounds for the award, decided that Cody's heroics "were above and beyond the call of duty." In those days, the medal's requirements were less stringent than today, and the award became mired in controversy. As a civilian scout, Cody didn't meet the changed standards imposed later--i.e., restricting it to those who were formally members of the armed forces. Nonetheless, in 1989, through the efforts of Wyoming's two senators, Cody's right to the medal was officially restored. The bronze star-shaped award is on display in Cody. The inscription reads: "The Congress to William F. Cody, guide, for gallantry at Platte River, Neb., April, 1872."

In 1876, shortly after Custer was killed at Little Big Horn, Cody was with Gen. Wesley Merritt's Fifth Cavalry when the outfit encountered Indians near Hat Creek in northwest Nebraska, a short distance from War Bonnet Creek, which usually, but erroneously, is designated the site of the fight. A minor Cheyenne chief, Yellow Hair (not Yellow Hand), so named for his scalping a blond-haired woman, was slain there by Cody, who first shot him in the leg, which also killed his horse, and then gave the coup de grace. Supposedly, he took the Cheyenne's scalp, held it up, and declared, "The first scalp for Custer." Perhaps the latter simply was apocryphal melodrama, but Buffalo Bill did kill the Indian. Later, Yellow Hair's scalp became advertising display materials for Cody's Wild West Show. However, he withdrew the gruesome publicity souvenir as it proved to be a bit much for the queasy public--especially the refined East. Shortly after the Yellow Hair affair, Cody quit his scouting job as he felt he now was wasting his time.

In 1877, he and his friend, ex-Major Frank North, put some money into buying ranch land in Nebraska. Cody eventually established residence there near North Platte and named it Scouts Rest Home. Cody never aspired to be a cowboy, but took pleasure in watching those who worked the ranch and admired the skills of this tough western breed of men.

Buffalo Bill lived there on and off for 35 years, and it was there that he first envisioned his lifetime career--to portray graphically what the Wild West looked like to the rest of the country and to Europe. The real Wild West's heyday was virtually at an end, and, in 1891, Congress even declared officially the closing of the frontier.

In 1882, to celebrate the Fourth of July, Cody put on a big shindig at his North Platte ranch that proved to be the birth of his Wild West Show. He took on a partner and ran a show lasting about an hour and a half, which went on tour in 1883. Over the years, the enterprise merged with other shows or had various partners.

In 1883, Cody took the show on tour and, blessed with good publicity, won over the competition of rodeos, shooting matches, and circuses. As Buffalo Bill, he was an integral part of the action and made a grand entrance astride his white charger with flowing hair, sporting a full mustache and goatee. He worn black thigh-high boots, beaded gloves, a fringed jacket, and an oversized Stetson hat. Waving it as he made a sweeping bow to the crowd, he always brought the house to its feet, in anticipation of what was to come. Cody was every ounce the showman, driving a stage at breakneck speed and, with a shotgun, blasting glass balls thrown in the air while riding full gallop on his horse.

The Wild West Show gained fame almost immediately. It played Staten Island, N.Y., and Madison Square Garden. In 1885, it drew nearly 1,000,000 fans, and net profits reached $100,000. That was the year Sitting Bull, the Hunkpapa medicine man, was with the show. However, in some years the enterprise lost money. Accidents, rained-out performances, and illness were the major masons.

In 1887, Cody heard Europe's siren call. The entourage there included "eight cowboys, 97 Indians, 180 horses, ten buffalo, ten elk, 5 wild Texas steers, four donkeys and 2 deer." It even had its own cowboy band. (Later, more than 50 railroad cars were needed to transport the troupe.) That year was Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee. She had almost become a recluse with the death of her husband Albert, but she was talked into attending the Wild West Show. After all, there was only one Wild West--the American one--and the show rightly claimed authenticity. In short, cowboys were cowboys; Indians were Indians; and the horses were wild. It presented "history, drama, and nostalgia." What more could one ask for?

Victoria's attendance helped the show's fame spread. Other royalty even took part in the show, as Buffalo Bill drove the kings of Belgium, Denmark, Greece, and Saxony, as well as the Prince of Wales, in a hair-raising ride on the Deadwood Stage. Impressive, too, were a couple of women sharpshooters, one of whom was Phoebe Moses, better known as Annie Oakley. Sitting Bull, who met her on the 1885 American and Canadian tour, had taken a liking to her and affectionately called her "Little Sure Shot." Cody called her "Missie." She toured 17 years with the show.

The newspapers largely gave bouquets of praise to the performances, and the British marveled at the smooth logistical operation and learned mom-efficient procedures in staging their own events. Attendance ranged from 20,000 to 40,000 per day.

When the Wild West Show went to Germany in 1891, it took on the additional title of the Congress of Rough Riders of the Word. The enterprise included performances by Russian Cossacks, lancers, Spanish and Arab horsemen, and a precision drill team of Zouaves (French infantrymen from Algeria). All were dressed in colorful uniforms and illustrated the importance of keeping what was good of the old, but offering new fare as well. France fell in love with the performances and awarded Cody the coveted Legion of Honor.

Despite taking on different names and mergers, in the public's mind it always was Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. Vignettes of western stories were enacted, such as the holdup of the Deadwood stage, the Pony Express, the Custer battle, and an Indian raid on a lonely prairie homestead. It also featured Indian scalp dances, the hunting of buffalo, bronco busting, steer and buffalo roping and riding, sharpshooting, a race between an Indian and a rider on a horse, and cowgirls doing their riding tricks. In Europe, it featured an eight-hour race between a bicyclist and a Pony Express rider, the latter winning the event. Interestingly, the inclusion of cowboys in Bill's show made them romantic figures ever since. Prior to that, they were near the social bottom rung of workers.

In subsequent years, as new events occurred, such as Teddy Roosevelt's charge up San Juan Hill in 1898 in Cuba and the 1900 Chinese Boxer Rebellion, these, too, were reenacted. Thus, the presentations were continually updated.

When he could, Cody sent money back to Louisa for purchasing additional land. She did, but, unbeknownst to him, placed ownership in her name alone, a sign that things weren't going well in their marriage. On the other hand, she was a better businessperson than he, as the money virtually flew out of his hands since he was generous with freebies and donated to various causes.

Heeding the Army's call

Back home in 1890, Cody got an urgent call from the Army. Indians were being stirred up by the evangelical Ghost Shirt Movement, which promised the return of their good old days. It predicted that, if certain rituals were followed, a flood or dust storm would cover the Earth, destroying white men, but not the Indians. At the appointed time, Indian ancestors would return to the Earth, which would now be the Happy Hunting Ground. The impending event was to take place by the Sioux Pine Ridge Reservation in the South Dakota Badlands near Rapid City.

Cody's friend Sitting Bull heard about it and wanted to go there and find out more. Sitting Bull no longer was as prominent as during the Custer affair some 15 years earlier, but his influence was considerable, and agents feared a mass exodus from the reservation. He was forbidden to leave, but said he would go anyway. Buffalo Bill was asked to come to Ft. Yates and persuade Sitting Bull to stay. Meanwhile, the Indian Agency thought it best to send Indian reservation police to arrest the medicine men, but, in the fracas that followed, killed the 56-year-old Sitting Bull. His body was taken to the reservation headquarters and hurriedly buried in quicklime. In less than two weeks, the massacre at Wounded Knee by Pine Ridge forever silenced Indian belief in the Ghost Shirt religion.

The publicity garnered by this event well served Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. In 1893, playing adjacent to Chicago's Columbian Exposition, his depiction of the Wild West was an incredible success.

In 1902, Buffalo Bill's show was back in England for another command performance. Accompanying him were 19 Indians he had helped release from their imprisonment at Ft. Sheridan, Ill., for participating in the Wounded Knee battle. As a token of affection, Queen Victoria sent a cherrywood bar to Buffalo Bill's Irma Hotel in Cody, where it can be seen today.

As the show continued its tours over nearly three decades, Buffalo Bill was accused of abuse to his animals and of unfair treatment of his performing Indians. The charges never held up, as Indians said Cody was a good employer and Black Elk, a medicine man, said his boss "had a strong heart."

Cody's debts snowballed and simmering marital problems came to the fore. Divorce proceedings took place, but there was an eventual reconciliation. To obtain money to pay his debts, Buffalo Bill gave a number of "farewell" performances, went into the movie business, and took on a new partner. Finally, his enterprise was foreclosed due to debt.

In 1917, he was on his deathbed and said he wished to be buried in Cody, Wyo. However, when he died, his wishes were overridden by Louisa (who supposedly took money from a Colorado newspaper seeking publicity), and his body was entombed on Lookout Mountain near Golden, Colo., just west of Denver. Condolences came from kings, queens, princes, heads of state, and ordinary citizens. The word indeed had lost a loved one.

The change of burial plans upset many Buffalo Bill fans, and threats were made to steal the body and take it to Wyoming. To prevent this, 10 feet of cement was dumped on the casket, so Buffalo Bill's remains are them to this day. A museum stands next to the tomb, and the site is visited by thousands of tourists every year. Cody's wife died in 1921 and, after five feet of the cement covering his casket were excavated, was placed in the same tomb.

Gerald F. Kreyche, American Thought Editor of USA Today, is emeritus professor of philosophy, DePaul University, Chicago, Ill.