Fish Tales

Buffalo Bill’s inn inspired guests to fish for salmon and trout.

- Sherry Monahan

William F. Cody invested some profits from his Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show in the Sheridan Inn in Sheridan, Wyoming. When the traditional English inn opened in 1893, a newspaper ad boasted of the inn’s 67 guest rooms and “most elegant dining room West of the Missouri River.”

The billiard room and saloon were the first to greet guests, in mid-May, offering patrons drinks and an elegant free lunch. The hotel opened in grand style at the end of the month, revealing a dining hall and modern kitchen that The Sheridan Post reported was “equipped as that of any city west of the Missouri river....”