Park County

History

Named because of the proximity to Yellowstone, America’s first national park, Park County was created Feb. 15, 1909, and organized in 1911. Water development projects were instrumental in the county’s early history. William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody headed an irrigation company that founded the town of Cody. Later, the U. S. Bureau of Reclamation completed construction of what is now Buffalo Bill Dam, bringing water to much of the northern part of the county, including the Powell Valley. Dude ranching and hunting resorts were among the earliest industries. During World War II, Japanese Americans were held at Heart Mountain Relocation Center between Cody and Powell.

"Buffalo Bill" Cody

Park County could have easily been named Cody County, and probably would have been if the Town of Cody hadn't already been named "Cody," for Colonel William F. "Buffalo Bill" Cody. It would have been fitting, too, for no other Wyoming County's creation and development was influenced by a single individual anywhere near as much as was Park County by Colonel Cody. That influence still exists today. Eighty years after Park County was created by the Tenth State Legislature, tourism and agriculture in the county flourish, to a considerable extent, because of Buffalo Bill.

While on hunting excursions in the early 1890s, Bill Cody fell in love with the region that would become Park County. At that time, the area was a part of Fremont County and later would be included in Big Horn County. At Cody's instigation, his good friend George T. Beck platted out a town in 1895, on the south bank of the Stinking Water River, and named it Cody. The name Stinking Water was changed to Shoshone in 1901 by the state legislature, because the Cody town fathers thought the name "Stinking Water" created a bad image for their town. Almost immediately the town of Cody began to grow, and Buffalo Bill, one of the world's great promoters, promoted it incessantly. When Big Horn County was organized in 1897, Cody was a candidate for the county seat of Big Horn County, but lost out to Basin.

Carey Act

Beyond simply promoting Cody and encouraging settlement in the area, Colonel Cody took steps in 1895, which would have enduring effect on the development of the town and the surrounding countryside. That year, under the provisions of the Carey Act of 1894, he and George Beck incorporated the Shoshone Land and Irrigation Company, and applied to the Wyoming State Engineer for water rights. The plan, as approved by State Engineer Elwood Mead, called for the diversion of water from the South Fork of the Shoshone River to irrigate thousands of acres north of the river. The land as to be segregated under the provisions of the Carey Act and then sold to settlers, after Cody and Beck had delivered the water to the land.

With the needed approval, Cody set out to raise the funds needed for the project. Initially, he had some success, and construction was begun in 1897. But even Buffalo Bill Cody couldn't promote the huge amount of money needed to complete a reclamation/irrigation project of the size planned, and in 1899, construction was halted because of the lack of funds. Salvation was near at hand, however.

Westerners were recognizing by 1899 that reclamation projects could not be built through private funding, as required by the Carey Act. The costs were too great, and returns on investment were too long delayed and too small to encourage investors. Consequently, Westerners, including Colonel Cody, launched a lobbying effort to convince Congress of the necessity of having the federal government pay for reclamation and irrigation projects in the arid west. The result was the passage in 1902 of the Newlands Act, or the Reclamation Act, which authorized the federal government to undertake the construction of reclamation projects, eventually to be paid for by the sale of public land and irrigation water to settlers, and the sale of electric power.

Shoshone Project

Along with other influential Wyomingites, Buffalo Bill began lobbying the new U.S. Reclamation Service, and in 1904, the Service announced plans to construct the Shoshone Project in Northern Wyoming, the first in the state and the second in the nation. The project was Bill Cody's old dream, bringing water to the fertile soil north of the Shoshone River. Cody's water rights to the South Fork were transferred to the U.S. Government by the state, and in 1905 construction commenced. By 1910, when the Shoshone Dam was finished (the dam's name was changed to Buffalo Bill Dam in 1946 to honor the ''old scout''), 10,000 irrigated acres were being cultivated in what was designated the Garland Division of the project.

Since that time to the present, construction and development of the Shoshone Project has continued, with enlargement of the Garland Division, and the completion of the Frannie, Willwood and Heart Mountain Divisions. In 1983, Congress authorized the enlargement of the Buffalo Bill Dam and Reservoir, forty-five percent of the total cost to be paid by Wyoming. The dam is being raised twenty feet, and the additional water storage capacity will allow for increased irrigation and electric power production. The Shoshone Project has been and is unmeasurably contributing to the welfare of Park County. The verdant and fruitful fields of the county are truly a memorial to the vision of Buffalo Bill Cody.

Cody's Road to Yellowstone

Colonel Cody wasn't a one idea man, either. Even before the U.S. Reclamation Service took over his irrigation project, he was making efforts to develop tourism in Cody country. Like everyone else who has visited there, Cody was captivated with Yellowstone National Park, and recognized what a great asset the park was. National interest in Yellowstone was stirring and visitors to the park exceeded 18,000 in 1901. His first efforts were directed toward obtaining convenient transportation for tourists to Cody. Along with others, Buffalo Bill was able to convince officials of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad of the benefits they would receive from building a spur line to Cody, and in 1901, the railroad officers announced the pending construction of the line.

The following year, with rail transportation to Cody ensured, Buffalo Bill took another big step in developing a tourist industry. He built the famous Irma Hotel in Cody, in 1902. Named after a beloved daughter, the still operating hotel was modern, luxurious, and designed to serve as headquarters for visitors to Yellowstone National Park. Tourists would arrive in Cody by train, stay at the Irma, and then take a stage or wagon to the Park, by way of the North - Fork Road. After touring Yellowstone, usually for several days, or a week, the visitors would return to Bill Cody's hotel, linger in town for a day or two, and then depart for home on the train.

Tourism

During the decade that followed the construction of the Irma Hotel, two developments occurred, which invigorated tourism in Cody country. First to come was dude ranching and outfitting for big game hunting. Although Bill Cody was not directly involved in dude ranching, he encouraged it, as it brought more tourists into the county. Buffalo Bill had always been a hunter, and actively promoted big game hunting in the region. As the outfitting and guide business prospered, many hunting parties were headquartered at the Irma. Bill Cody and all other businessmen in town appreciated and profited from the extension of the tourist season which big game hunting brought.

The increasing popularity of the automobile, after 1910, was a second major factor in the growth of tourism in Cody country. Recognizing the importance of good roads and highways to tourism, Cody businessmen, including Bill Cody, formed associations to advocate and lobby for improved roads in their region, and from Cody to Yellowstone Park. They held "Good Road Days," and went into the Shoshone Canyon to rake rocks from the road, drain low spots, and repair washouts. In 1914, a through road was finished that began in Minneapolis, Minnesota, went westward through North and South Dakota, entered northeastern Wyoming near Sundance, continued across the Big Horn Mountains, and went on to Cody and to Yellowstone. The road soon became known as the Buffalo Bill Highway. It was not until 1915, after considerable lobbying and a trip to Washington, D.C., by Colonel Cody that the National Park Service allowed automobile travel in Yellowstone. With easier access and improved roads to the park, tourism in Cody country leaped forward.

However, all of this was after Cody country became Park County. The Shoshone Reclamation Project brought hundreds of workers to the area in 1905, when construction on the project began. Camp Colter, which would become the Town of Powell in 1910, was established twenty-three miles north and east of Cody as headquarters for the project, and rapidly became a growing and active town. By 1909, settlers were taking up homesteads on project acres in the Garland Division, and sentiment was growing among the area's residents and in Cody for separation of the area from Big Horn County into a new county.

County Creation

Consequently, in 1909, a bill was introduced in the general session of the Tenth State Legislature to create Park County from the northwest portion of Big Horn County. There was a lot of opposition to the proposed county from other sections of Big Horn County, and the county's commissioners went on record as being opposed. Nevertheless, on February 15, 1909, after passage by both houses of the legislature, the act was signed into law by Governor Bryant B. Brooks. But the issue was not settled yet. The Big Horn County Commissioners instituted legal action to enjoin the organizing commissioners for Park County, William H. Woods, Adam Hogg, and Sanford A. Watkins, appointed by Governor Brooks, from organizing the new county.

Appealed to the Wyoming Supreme Court by Big Horn County, the case challenged the constitutionality of the law creating Park County and the law providing for the organization of new counties in Wyoming. The attorneys for Big Horn County argued that the constitutional provision for the creation and organization of new counties required that an election to approve separation of a new county from an existing one be held prior to the creation and authorization of a new county by the legislature. On February 10, 1910, the Supreme Court rejected the argument, and then a month later, denied Big Horn County's appeal for a rehearing before the court.

County Organization

With the legality of the creation of Park County no longer a question, organizing commissioners Woods, Hogg and Watkins proceeded to organize the county. Meeting on March 26, 1910, the commissioners adopted a resolution declaring a special election to be held on May 4, 1910, to approve the organization of Park County and select a county seat. They also established voting precincts and appointed election judges. The election was held in the county as scheduled, and on May 13, the commissioners met to canvas the vote. The organization of Park County was approved by the electorate by a vote of 1,000 for, and 275 against, and Cody was chosen the county seat, receiving 1,004 votes, with Powell receiving 204 votes, Garland 12 votes, Meeteetse 6 votes, and Penrose, Mud Springs and Fenton each receiving 1 vote.

The Democrats and Republicans nominated full slates of candidates for county offices in the September primary election, and on November 4, 1910, the citizens of Park County elected their first county officers. The officers elected were: W. H. Fouse, Walter C. Kepford and Andrew J. Martin, county commissioners; Henry Dahlen, county sheriff; Fred C. Barnett, county clerk and ex officio clerk of district court; C.C. Holm, county treasurer; Henry Fulkerson, county assessor; W. L. Walls, county attorney; Jessie Hitchcock, county superintendent of schools; Dr. Louis Howe, county coroner; and George Hulbert, county surveyor. Also elected were justices of the peace and constables for each established precinct.

On January 3, 1911, the newly elected county commissioners were sworn into office by the organizing commissioners. The same day, the elected commissioners accepted the oaths and bonds of the other elected Park County officers, and began conducting county business. The organizing commissioners had leased a one-story brick building on Rumsey Avenue to use for county business, and one of the first actions of the elected county commissioners was to renew the lease to January 1, 1913, at a cost of $40.00 monthly. After having used what was called the county building for about two months, the commissioners recognized the need for additional office space, and leased what was known as the Pioneer Building for $32.00 per month, and established the offices of the county sheriff and the county superintendent of schools in the building. The Town of Cody's jail was used to hold county prisoners.

County Courthouse and Jail

Apparently, almost from the time they were elected, the Park County Commissioners had determined to construct a permanent county courthouse and jail as soon as possible. On March 1, 1911, they resolved to hold a bond election for the county's electorate to approve the issuance and sale of $45,000 of county bonds to pay for a permanent county courthouse, jail and sheriff's residence. There was opposition to the proposal and charges that the $45,000 was insufficient to pay the total cost of the courthouse and jail, and the commissioners planned to raise taxes to pay the remaining costs. To counteract the charges, four days before the April 18 election, the commissioners passed another resolution, stating that only the $45,000 would be expended for the courthouse and jail.

The resolution seemed to have put the voters' minds at ease for on April 18. They approved the issuing of bonds for the courthouse and jail. On June 6, 1911, the county commissioners employed the Billings, Montana architectural firm, Link and Haire, and accepted the west half of Block No. 55 in Cody, donated by the Lincoln Land Company, a subsidiary of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, as the site for the new courthouse. A month later, July 5, the commissioners approved the architects' plans for the courthouse and jail annex, and advertised for construction bids. On August 29, the sealed bids were opened and the low bid of $37,900 by Gagnon and Company of Billings, was accepted by the county commissioners.

Construction of the Park County Courthouse and Jail was begun shortly after the awarding of the contract, and in February 1912, architects Link and Haire were reporting that the building was nearly one-third completed. Work proceeded on schedule, and early in December, the new courthouse jail annex and sheriff's residence were occupied by the county's officers. The three-story, tanned colored brick building, topped by a tower, in which a large bell and the town's clock were mounted, until the clock fell through the roof into the district courtroom in the 1920s, was an impressive structure. Seventy-seven years later, the Park County Courthouse still stands and houses some county offices, though most of the activities of county government are centered in a new courthouse, occupied in 1985. The new courthouse adjoins the old one, and together they are an attractive and functional facility, blending the first years of Park County with the present era.

Prohibition

Perhaps, because of the early development of farming and tourism, and because it was organized as the era was ending, Park County escaped most of the lawlessness which occurred in Wyoming during the years of the open range and range wars. The county, however, did not escape the violence and lawlessness of the prohibition era. In June 1923, two unarmed bootleggers were shot down as they approached their moonshine whiskey cache, four miles north of Cody, by the county sheriff's deputies. One bootlegger was killed and the other severely wounded. No charges were filed against the deputies, one whom was reported to be the courthouse janitor, as well as a deputy.

Publisher and editor of the Cody Enterprise, Caroline Lockhart, was outraged by the incident. One of the county's most colorful and outspoken residents, Miss Lockhart wrote: "It looks to the people of this locality as if human life was getting pretty cheap when any person with a nickel star pinned on him, can go out and shoot and kill in the name of law and order without a warrant, for an offense, which, at most, is only a misdemeanor." For her comments, Miss Lockhart was sued for libel by Park County Attorney Ernest J. Goppert, but the case was dismissed.

Also during prohibition, Park County was one of two counties in the state -- the other was neighboring Hot Springs -- whose elected county sheriff was legally removed from office by the county's district court. In 1915, the state legislature enacted a law authorizing the governor, through his attorney general, to investigate and prosecute in the district court charges of malfeasance and/or misconduct in office of county officers reported to the governor by citizens of the county. In 1923, at the urging of Governor William B. Ross, because of widespread rumors of collusion and bribery of county sheriffs and attorneys by moonshiners and bootleggers, the legislature extended the law with the adoption of Chapter 53, Session Laws of Wyoming, 1923, Entitled, "Malfeasance in Office by Sheriffs and Attorneys," the Act stated: "Every Sheriff and County and Prosecuting Attorney shall prima facie be deemed guilty of malfeasance and subject to removal where open and continuous violations of any law of the State of Wyoming occur in the county by which said officers are employed."

Obviously, the intent of the law was to force county sheriffs and attorneys to enforce and prosecute offenders of prohibition, and if they didn't, make it easy to remove them from office. In Park County, by 1925, illegal booze was being openly sold and moonshiners and bootleggers conducted their business with impunity. Soon complaints concerning the situation were landing on the desk of Governor Nellie Tayloe Ross, who had succeeded her husband after his death. Early in 1925, Mrs. Ross directed Attorney General David J. Howell to investigate the complaints coming from Park County. The result was the filing of malfeasance charges against Sheriff W. H. Loomis in the county's district court, and his eventual removal from office later in the year.

Tarzan of the Tetons

In March 1939, Park County was the scene of Wyoming's most publicized reign of terror during the twentieth century. Earl Durand, who became known as "Tarzan of the Tetons," even though he was nowhere near the Tetons, grew up on his family's ranch, fifteen miles northwest of Powell. Durand was a loner, who roamed the rugged hills around the ranch and ventured westward into the Clarks Fork Canyon and the Bear Tooth Mountains hunting wild game. During his teens he began living in the mountains, building crude shelters and learning survival techniques for all seasons, and spending as much time in the wilderness as he did on the ranch. When he was twenty, Durand hiked the Continental Divide from Montana to New Mexico, and back, living off the land.

Early in March 1939, near the family ranch, Durand was arrested for poaching elk. Twenty-six-years-old at the time, he was tried in justice of peace court, found guilty, and sentenced to six months in the county jail in Cody. On March 17, Durand struck Undersheriff Noah Riley over the head with a milk bottle. Dazed, Riley was forced to take his patrol car and drive Durand to the family ranch, but not before Durand helped himself to a rifle and ammunition from the sheriff's office. In Powell, Deputy Sheriff D. M. Baker received word of the escape, and accompanied by Deputy Town Marshall Charley Lewis, drove to the Durand ranch. A gun battle took place at the ranch, and both Baker and Lewis were killed by Durand.

Following the battle, Durand gathered his wilderness gear and headed for the mountains. It wasn't until five days later that he was seen again, despite the efforts of law enforcement officers from the region and scores of volunteers scouring the mountains for him. The evening of Tuesday, March 21, Durand appeared at the farm of Herf Graham. There he stole a rifle and left a letter for Park County Sheriff Frank Blackburn. The letter expressed Durand's bitterness toward Blackburn and his intent to kill the sheriff, if possible. In the last paragraph, Durand admitted that he would be killed, saying: "Of course I know that I'm done for, and when you kill me I suggest you have my head mounted and hang it up in the courthouse for the sake of law and order." Durand." The letter was signed, "Your beloved enemy, Earl”

Leaving the Graham place, Durand went to the Harley Jones' farm. He demanded ammunition from the Jones boys, the only family members at home, and after getti.ng it, disappeared into the night. The next morning at daylight, Durand kidnapped Mr. and Mrs. Art Thompson and forced them to drive him into the mountains, near Clarks Fork Canyon. By afternoon, the manhunt was on, and Durand was forced to make a stand on a high, rocky c1tadel. His rifle fire kept the posse, now numbering more than one hundred men, planed below him, and the snow was so deep that the officers couldn't get above him. Though the sheriff issued orders not to attempt to rush Durand, as darkness fell, two brave, but foolhardy, men tried. They were Arthur Argento and Orville Linabary, and Durand killed them both.

During the night, as the posse withdrew to their base camp, Durand followed them down the mountain. He made his own camp 1n a clump of trees, a few hundred feet from the sheriff's camp and the road. Throughout that night, the following day, and the next night, Durand lay in hiding, watching the camp and the road, hoping to commandeer a vehicle and escape. Finally, at about nine o'clock on Friday morning, March 24, his chance came. Posing as a posseman, with a deputy sheriff badge pinned to his shirt, he stopped a car driven by Harry Moore of Cody, which was carrying two passengers, John and Peter Simpson. Durand revealed his identity, and directed Moore to turn around and drive toward Powell.

At 1:30 p.m., after forcing Moore and the Petersons from the car at an abandoned coal mine, Durand entered the First National Bank of Powell, with rifle in hand, and shouted, "It's a holdup, and up with your hands!" He then began shooting the windows out of the bank, apparently to terrify the people in the bank. After getting $2,000 in cash, Durand tied three bank employees together and marched them to the open front door. The shooting in the bank had aroused the town, and the bank was surrounded by armed men. When Durand shoved his hostages out the door, someone in the crowd fired, striking and killing twenty-year­ old bank employee, Johnnie Gawthrop. When Gawthrop fell, Durand was exposed and immediately hit by a bullet fired from across the street by high school student, Tipton Cox. Durand crawled back into the bank lobby, managed to pull his pistol from its holster and fire a shot into his head. So ended the saga of Earl Durand, "Tarzan of the Tetons."

Buffalo Bill's Death and Burial

Today in Park County, Earl Durand's week of terror is nearly forgotten, but the memory of Buffalo Bill is strong and active, and contributes to the well-being of the county. Colonel Cody died at the home of his sister, Mae Decker, in Denver, on January 10, 1917, with his family at his bedside. Memorial services were held in the Colorado State Capitol on January 14, and in Cody on the same day. Interment was not until June 3, on the top of Lookout Mountain, west of Denver, and therein lies a controversy which has not totally subsided in more than seventy years.

Immediately following Bill Cody's death, the State of Colorado and the City of Denver concocted a grandiose scheme to memorialize Cody, ignoring the fact that although he had been a frequent visitor to Denver over the years, he had never been a resident of Colorado. Contrarily, he had resided in both Nebraska, owning a ranch at North Platte, and in Wyoming, where he was a legal resident at the time of his death, for many years. Nevertheless, Colorado and Denver officials were able to convince the Cody family that the old scout could be better memorialized for eternity on Lookout Mountain, with national pilgrimages to his final resting place than any other location.

Of course Nebraska and Wyoming were to be included in the Colorado/Denver scheme to the tune of $25,000, donated by each state to the memorial. Shortly after Cody's death, a bill was introduced in the Colorado Senate to construct a $100,000 monument or mausoleum on Lookout Mountain, with the three states and the City of Denver each appropriating $25,000 to the memorial fund. The fund was to be controlled and decisions made by a commission, composed of one commissioner each from the three states and one from Denver.

Nebraska responded in January to the proposal with the introduction of a bill in its unicameral legislature to appropriate the $25,000. In Wyoming, the response was a polite no thank you, but underneath the politeness was a feeling of outrage and anger that Bill Cody wasn't to be buried in the beloved town he had founded. With Wyoming's refusal to participate in the three-state memorial, the proposal was dead, for the act approved by the Colorado Legislature stipulated the participation of Wyoming and Nebraska before the Colorado funds could be expended. Despite the collapse of the three state memorial, Colonel Cody was buried on Lookout Mountain, and eventually a memorial was built on the mountain. The memorial and grave site never became the national tourist attraction its promoters envisioned, and today, Lookout Mountain mainly attracts lovers and drug dealers seeking isolation.

Buffalo Bill Museum

In Wyoming and Park County, however, things were stirring. At the close of the memorial services for Colonel Cody, held in Cody on January 14, the Buffalo Bill Memorial Society, encompassing every organization in the county, was organized. The immediate purpose of the society was to erect an equestrian statute in Cody that could easily be seen by travelers on their way to Yellowstone National Park. A fund drive was organized to raise $25,000 for the statute, and the state legislature helped appreciably toward meeting the goal by appropriating $5,000. Funding for the statute was not needed, as sculptress Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney chose to donate the statute and the land on which it was to be erected.

Mrs. Whitney's statute of Buffalo Bill, mounted on a horse, rifle raised above his head, took seven years to complete. During those years, using the funds originally subscribed for the statute, the Buffalo Bill Memorial Society (the name was changed to "Association" in 1922), built and established the Buffalo Bill Museum, near the site for the statute. The museum's first curator was Mary Jester Allen, Bill Cody's niece, and she worked with Mrs. Whitney on the statute and tenaciously in developing the museum. In a few years, she was able to assemble a remarkable collection of memorabilia and artifacts of Buffalo Bill, his Wild West Show, and the frontier west in general.

In 1958, the Buffalo Bill Memorial Association was given a huge boost in its efforts to have the museum become a major cultural and tourist attraction. The Whitney family announced the establishment and construction of the Whitney Gallery of Western Art to honor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. Built as an addition to the museum, the gift included a collection of Western Americana art, featuring the works of Frederick Remington, Charles M. Russell, William Henry Jackson, Alfred Bierstadt, Alfred Jacob Miller, and George Catlin. Since then, sculpture and paintings of other artists have been added to the permanent collection, making the Whitney Gallery the single best, and largest collection of western art in the world.

Now known as the Buffalo Bill Center of the West, the museum and art gallery is much more than merely a collection of Buffalo Bill memorabilia and western art, having received major collections of Plains Indians artifacts and relics, with cultural and cycloramic interpretations, and the historic gun collection donated by the Winchester Arms Corporation, "the Gun that won the West." Also, to enhance the Center, the Association acquired Buffalo Bill's boyhood home and moved it from Iowa to Cody. Truly an historic, cultural and research center of the frontier west, the Buffalo Bill Center of the West is Bill Cody's lasting legacy to Park County. Annually, thousands of visitors come to the Center, Cody, and Park County, and Park County government effectively provides governmental services for visitors and residents alike.