HOME IS WHERE THE TRUCK IS: August 2023

Part Three: Days 6-8

Day 9

6.29.23 Hey y'all. Woke up this morning with no real plan other than to head west. I was slowly making my way to my reason for being out there, but still had a day before I would get there. After consulting the atlas, and essentially flipping a coin, I headed due west-ish toward Dodge City. I had no idea what I was going to do once I got there but I was a solo traveler now! I throw caution to the wind! I laugh in the face of danger! Ahahahahaha. Ahem, anyway. I was a quick hour away and once I got there, I went directly to the visitors center to ask the professional guest directors what they suggested for someone who just has a few hours in town. She suggested the Boot Hill Museum which was just across the parking area.

I went over and checked out the old timey locomotive before heading into the museum. I tell you, the $18 it cost me was so worth every penny. The museum was big and includes more than 60,000 artifacts from the 1870's through the 1920's. Many of them belonged to the original residents of Dodge City. The museum was incredibly educational, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Once you leave the museum you go out to the historic Front Street which is lined with businesses. It was so cute! In the 1970's a school room from 1915 was added to the location, as well as the train depot (which I somehow totally overlooked), an 1880 carriage house/blacksmith shop and an 1879 cattleman's home.

I skipped over the Front Street buildings for now and headed up the hill to check out the jail, Boot Hill cemetery and the Mexican village exhibit.

The jail was so tiny! It was moved to this location from Fort Dodge in the 1950's but it was originally constructed in 1865. I was stood inside the cell for a few minutes and wondered what kind of joker found themselves in there a gazillion years ago. I did a little research and found that it was mostly used for mostly alcohol related offenses since no alcohol was allowed in the fort. Soldiers were often kept there for weeks at a time with no heat or cooling. I guess that would have been pretty miserable. If it gets below 70° I am on the hunt for a hoodie.

The Boot Hill Cemetery is not actually a cemetery any longer as no one is actually interred there any longer. It was in use from 1872-1872. There are tombstones in the graveyard that mark folks that were supposedly buried there and were either moved a long time ago or dug up by animals.

I wandered through the buildings on Front Street looking at more museum items. I stopped in the saloon for a bit and considered trying a Sarsaparilla, but in the end kept moving. They had an ice cream shop that had ice cream flavors named after the Gunsmoke TV characters. I also opted out of the ice cream. I needed to get through the rest of the exhibits because there was a gunfight scheduled for high noon and I was not about to miss that! The gunfight was a lot of fun but when they started firing off those pistols I jumped out of my seat!