WyoHistory.org

The Online Encyclopedia of Wyoming History

A Project of the Wyoming Historical Society

Encyclopedia | Agnes Wright Spring believed women’s stories were “filled with romance and color;” the story of her life is no different. Undaunted by sexist barriers, Spring served as Wyoming state librarian, director of Wyoming’s Federal Writers’ Project and Colorado state historian. Read more about her dedicated and deliberate life. Read More

Law, Order and Prohibition

Encyclopedia | “WOMAN MAYOR IS JAILED, CHARGED WITH BEATING MAN,” read the headline following 1922’s Fourth of July in tiny Cokeville, Wyo. How had the town’s new mayor, elected just a month earlier on a Prohibition and law-enforcement ticket, found herself in the middle of a street brawl? Read More

Yellowstone Microbe

Encyclopedia | A Nobel Prize, big business and scientific breakthroughs including Covid-19 tests and vaccines were decades in the future when microbiologist Thomas D. Brock began taking samples from Yellowstone Park’s hot springs in the summer of 1964. Read More

A Frontier Census

Encyclopedia | U.S. Census taker James Clopper counted 366 people with military connections at Fort Laramie in 1860, and another 300 civilians outside fort boundaries. It weas a diverse group: Soldiers, Indians, traders and freighters lived there; stagecoaches carrying people and mail, westbound young families and a few handcart-pulling Mormons were all passing through. Read More

Tri-Territory Site

Encyclopedia | On a remote sagebrush flat in the Red Desert in northern Sweetwater County, Wyo., four flagpoles and a stone monument mark the intersection of what once were the Louisiana Purchase, the Oregon Country and Mexico. Nothing much ever happened there—but the site remains a linchpin of the American West. Read More

A Century on the Slopes

Encyclopedia | Skiing for fun began on Casper Mountain in the 1920s. People cut a few scattered slopes, added rope tows, started a ski patrol and held races. Hogadon Basin Ski Area was founded in the late 1950s. Today, Hogadon, 26 miles of Nordic trails and a world-class biathlon course lure skiers from everywhere. Read More

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John Hunton and his Diaries of the Wyoming Frontier

Encyclopedia | John Hunton, initially a sutler’s clerk at Fort Laramie, later a government hay and freight contractor, cattle rancher and land commissioner kept daily diaries of his life from the mid-1870s to 1888—leaving a valid and vivid portrait of that time.

'Mrs. Barriers' and the Crusade to Make Wyoming Buildings Accessible

Encyclopedia | The Americans with Disabilities Act was far in the future when a group of Lusk, Wyo. residents first met to propose statewide legislation to make buildings, sidewalks and other public areas accessible for disabled people.

Wyoming's First Woman Mayor

Encyclopedia | Susan Wissler, elected mayor of Dayton, Wyo., in 1912, was Wyoming’s first woman mayor and possibly the second in the nation. Promising to act “without fear or favor,” she served three terms, with some success cleaning up local saloon and gambling elements, all while running her own millinery and dry-goods business.

The Tribes Sell Off More Land: The 1905 Agreement

Encyclopedia | In 1905, Congress ratified an agreement with the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho by which the tribes ceded 1.5 million acres of reservation land north of the Big Wind River. Tribal leaders questioned the final terms, however, and payments were slow in coming and fell far short of promised levels.

When the Tribes Sold the Hot Springs

Encyclopedia | With the buffalo gone and poverty, hunger and disease increasing, the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribes came under intense pressure in the 1890s to sell their land. In 1896, they sold the U.S. government a piece of their reservation ten miles square—including the splendid hot springs at present Thermopolis, Wyo.

Fragmenting Tribal Lands: The Dawes Act of 1887

Encyclopedia | Congress in 1887 passed the Dawes Act, setting up a framework for dividing up tribal lands on reservations into plots to be held by individual Indian owners, after which they could be leased or sold to anyone. Critics saw it as a method clearly intended to transfer lands out of Indian hands.

The Grave of Alfred Corum, Forty-niner

Encyclopedia | Alfred Corum, bound for California in 1849 with two dozen other Missouri men, died on July 4 on the Sublette Cutoff in present western Wyoming. His brother and five other men stayed behind to bury him, deeply saddened on what otherwise would have been a day of celebration.

The Grave of Nancy Hill

Encyclopedia | On the Oregon-California Trail in western Wyoming lies the grave of 20-year-old Nancy Hill, who died of cholera while bound for California in 1852. The gravestone, though old, is not original and part of the inscription—“Killed by Indians—” for many years misled locals about the cause of her death.

Emigrant Spring on the Slate Creek Cutoff

Encyclopedia | Emigrant Spring, west of the Green River on the Slate Creek Cutoff of the Oregon Trail, offered pioneer travelers cold, clear water, plentiful grass for their livestock and plenty of sagebrush for their cooking fires. And the sandstone bluffs above the spring made a natural bulletin board where thousands carved their names.

Church Butte

Encyclopedia | In 1843, Oregon Trail diarist John Boardman was probably the first to make reference Church Butte near present Granger, Wyo., calling it “Solomon’s Temple.” In the 1850s, most emigrants referred to the landmark as Church Butte, because of its shape and perhaps because Mormon companies held religious services there on their way to the Salt Lake Valley.

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WyoHistory.org

The Online Encyclopedia of Wyoming History

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John Hunton and his Diaries of the Wyoming Frontier

'Mrs. Barriers' and the Crusade to Make Wyoming Buildings Accessible

Wyoming's First Woman Mayor

The Tribes Sell Off More Land: The 1905 Agreement

When the Tribes Sold the Hot Springs

Fragmenting Tribal Lands: The Dawes Act of 1887

The Grave of Alfred Corum, Forty-niner

The Grave of Nancy Hill

Emigrant Spring on the Slate Creek Cutoff

Church Butte

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Visit Our Education Section

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Contributors

Subscribe to the WyoHistory.org newsletter

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Monthly Newsletters