Buffalo Bill Historical Park

Buffalo Bill Historical Park stands in North Platte as a symbol of the Old West. Buffalo Bill Cody's famous shows toured all over America and Europe for about thirty years: from 1883 to the early 1910s. The show was something between a modern rodeo and a traveling circus. He had trickshooters and sharpshooters, and real bison. He also employed real Native Americans to reenact famous battles between Native Americans and the U.S. Government for the entertainment of his audiences. Buffalo Bill Cody was a massive celebrity who really lived in the West. He worked as a Pony Express rider, scouted for the U.S. army during the Indian Wars, and hunted bison for the Kansas Pacific Railroad. The version of the West he performed for his audiences was rooted in true experiences, but stylized. It helped spread the image of the American West as a romanticized land of adventure, where white cowboys thrived in a wild wilderness full of exotic bison and charicatured Indians. His legacy is a complicated one. However, no one can deny the influence of Buffalo Bill on American culture and the mythology of the Western Frontier.