Story great life

During our trip out West, we spent several days in Cody, including one at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West. Lots of Buffalo Bill stuff there, and in case you didn’t know, the town of Cody is named after him: William F. Cody was Buffalo Bill’s name.

I thought I’d enjoy learning more about this larger-than-life character, so I read his autobiography, “Buffalo Bill’s Life Story,” which he wrote in , when he was

Bill Cody was born in , which I noted with interest was the same year King Ludwig II was, over in Bavaria. But the two lived very different lives.

He was the very image of what you think of when you think of the “wild west.” I kept thinking of tall tales when I read the book.

Buffalo bills life story an autobiography frank Stirring campfire tales of the Old West animate these memoirs of Colonel William F. Cody, better known as Buffalo Bill. In a personal narrative as thrilling and satisfying as the most colorful fiction, Cody takes readers on back trails through the frontier he knew and loved, a world that changed almost beyond recognition during his own lifetime.

Either he was extremely impressive (riding a galloping horse while standing, jumping on and off galloping horses, killing dozens of buffalo at a pop, killing various Indians, etc) or he exaggerated. Either way, it was fascinating to look back at a place and time so different from our own.

Some interesting bits:

* What we now call the Great Plains were known at that time as the “American Desert.”
* As a child, Bill saw a military dress parade.

This was the first time he’d seen soldiers, and the horseback maneuvers and precision made a deep impression on him (these would be seen again in the Wild West show he created).
* There was SO MUCH about Indians in this book. Bill spent a lot of time with Indian boys as a child, and from them he learned to be an expert shot with a bow and arrow.

He learned some of their Kickapoo language as well. I was reminded of Ma in the Little House books with her opinion of Indians, when Bill wrote of showing someone “five ‘good’ Indians, that is dead ones.” Lots of animosity in those days between Indians and “the white man.”
* I felt for Bill’s mom and later his wife. He undoubtedly had the “restless spirit” that Pa Ingalls and others had.

At 10, he left home to herd cattle.

Life story magazine ashley tisdale Buffalo Bill lives deep in American legend. A Kansas-bred farm boy, he went on to become a renowned trapper and hunter, army scout, Indian fighter, and finally a world showman and celebrity. As a man of the Wild West, he became known as a larger-than-life buffalo hunter. As an army scout, he earned the Medal of Honor for gallantry in action.

As an adult, he often left his wife and children for months on end, off fighting Indians, performing in shows, or doing other bits of derring-do. At age 13, at his mom’s urging, he attended school for months (“the longest period of schooling that I ever received at any one time in my life”). He soon became restless, though, and “longed for the free and open life of the plains.”
* Around age 20, he met Louisa Frederici, who he married about a year later.

“From that time to this I have always thought that I made a most fortunate choice for a life partner.” I was anxious to learn more about Louisa, but she is barely mentioned again. Once, his young son is very sick, so Bill hurries home from New York where he is performing in a show. Soon after, though, the boy dies.

I’m still curious about Louisa.
* Bill got his famous nickname due to what a great shot he was at killing buffalo.

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Story great life

In one month period, in fact, he personally killed of them. This made me sad; he frequently went out with others on buffalo killing sprees. They always mentioned eating well, and sometimes saving the heads to mount as trophies, but the number killed seemed way out of proportion to what they could have eaten. And today I think buffalo have become almost extinct due to all the killing of them that happened at this time.
* Bill served in the military for a bit during the Civil War, as an employee on the pony express, as a cattle catcher, and he led expeditions all over the west.

Life story game Buffalo Bill's life story: an autobiography by Buffalo Bill, Publication date Topics Buffalo Bill, , Pioneers -- West (U.S.) -- Biography.

As the book wraps up, he was only in his early thirties, and was in shows on the East coast, playing himself. The book didn’t even get to his “Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show” that he was so famous for.
* It was interesting how many times Bill would meet different people he knew previously, even though all these people seemed to travel over the huge western expanse of the US.

This isn’t the first book where I’ve noticed that. Just seems strange and unlikely, since in my own city there are various people I haven’t seen in decades.

I found this book really interesting. I would also enjoy reading a book about Buffalo Bill from an outside perspective, to see if the narrative is pretty much the same.