ON THE ROAD WITH IOWAN’S BOB & SHEILA EVERHART
On the road…..”Well, we’ve had a lot of Iowan’s tell us they are glad the politicians have moved out of the state, and most of their television is now pretty much back to normal.” Bob, Sheila, and Bobbie Lhea Everhart, on the road to a final destination in the Rio Grande Valley, have stopped at a number of interesting tourist attractions along the way, especially for Bobbie Lhea, who is their 15-year old home-schooled daughter.
“I had never heard of Pawnee Bill,” Bobbie said, “until dad stopped at his ranch in Oklahoma. Apparently he was a showman like Buffalo Bill, and even teamed up with Buffalo Bill later on after his own show became just about as famous. His ranch is located in Pawnee, Oklahoma, which is where he took his name from, but it wasn’t him who named himself Pawnee Bill, it was the Pawnee Indians. Bill became a scout (much like Buffalo Bill), learned the Pawnee language, and became their representative in Indian affairs. Watching the success of the Buffalo Bill Show (Buffalo Bill, better known as William F. Cody was born in Iowa don’t you know) Pawnee Bill created his own show. Billed as the “Only Genuine Wild West Show” it featured over 1,000 people and horses as well as every equestrian nation in the world. An immense army of Indians, scouts, cowboys, early pioneers, beautiful daring western girls and Mexican Senoritas, it wasn’t long before Pawnee Bill was outdrawing Buffalo Bill. Pawnee Bill was also the only show with a pure white albino buffalo. Buffalo Bill’s ranch is still thriving near North Platte, Nebraska, but his big draw is Cody, Wyoming, where he built the Erma Hotel in honor of his daughter. Pawnee Bill’s ranch is thriving in Oklahoma, and the folks there still do a Pawnee Bill show every year.”
“Cody was a bit of a drinker,” Sheila added, “as well as a gambler. He lost a lot of money on some of his mis-deeds, and eventually asked Pawnee Bill to join their shows together. This is the one they took to Europe, with Cody getting most of the publicity, but it was without a doubt one of the biggest ‘wild west’ shows ever put on exhibition. Age caught up with both of our heroes, but there’s still plenty of their momentos to see in Oklahoma and Nebraska.”
“Pawnee, Oklahoma, had another neat attraction,” Bob piped up. “This is the hometown of Chester Gould. Who’s Chester Gould you are asking? He was the guy who drew the comic books of Dick Tracy. We stopped at a local restaurant owned by the Pawnee Indians, and were waited on by an exquisitely beautiful Pawnee girl. We managed to make it a budget lunch by her suggestion of just visiting the salad bar, which was quite large, unique, and delicious, so that’s what we did. It wound up being a nice budget lunch, and more than we needed. We even had enough money left over to add home-made cheese cake. Bobbie thought it was great, and it was.