Editor’s note: Solano Chronicles appears every other Sunday in the print edition of the Vallejo Times-Herald.
Famed frontiersman William Cody was disappointed in 1902 with what he termed his first and last “Buffalo Bill’s Wild West” show to be staged in Vallejo. But he didn’t give up on the town, returning in 1910 and again 1914 to present sensational extravaganzas that attracted thousands.
Cody had already achieved worldwide fame and was the subject of countless dime novels and newspaper puff pieces when he brought his first show to Vallejo. The advance press was upbeat – but turnout was terrible for a matinee, and poor lighting plagued an evening performance.
The show, invented by Cody in 1883, featured a traveling company of cowboys and cowgirls, Indians and ex-soldiers who once were enemies, Mexican vaqueros and others numbering in the hundreds. By 1902 he had performed all over America and Europe and was headed to Europe again for what turned into a three-year tour.
The Wild West show returned to the U.S. in 1907 and Cody continued performing until two months before his death in Denver on Jan. 10, 1917. At one point the world’s highest-paid performer, he lost much of his fortune due to bad investments.
The 1902 event in Vallejo, with a population of only about 12,000, was billed as a big deal – and a good deal as well. Reserved seats were $1, half what people paid for the best seats at packed Madison Square Garden shows in New York. Regular admission here was 50 cents. Tickets for anyone under age nine were a quarter, and children from the Orphans’ Home got in for free.
The “Wild West” show arrived early in the morning on Sept. 5, in 35 rail cars and coaches that ran on the same railroad tracks that exist today. A 10 a.m. “grand street cavalcade” through town followed, featuring parading performers, seven bands and Cody on horseback, as workers rushed to set up a huge tent in a field close to the tracks. The location was at the east end of Carolina Street – now the old McKinley School grounds.
Workers also hooked up a portable power plant and about 80 electric lights. In a front-page story that day, the Vallejo Evening Chronicle said the tent, “the largest affair of the kind ever put up in Vallejo,” would protect people from the sun during the matinee, and the power plant, a technological marvel in its time, would ensure that the evening show was “brilliantly and effectively lighted.”
The Evening Chronicle’s follow-up story the next day, as Cody, all his performers and work crew and 325 horses boarded the train and headed for their next shows in San Francisco and Oakland, led with details of the poor turnout and lighting problems, and a baffled Buffalo Bill’s disappointment.
A reporter said Cody “courteously” agreed to an interview and then stated “he was very much disappointed at the matinee attendance, which was the smallest audience ever present in the history of the Wild West” show.
The Chronicle also said the evening show, unlike the matinee, attracted “a vast crowd of interested spectators.” However, the show was “considerably handicapped by the poorness of the lighting of the big arena, which was due to a disarrangement of the electrical plant.”
The program, the Chronicle continued, “was evidently appreciated by the audience,” especially those “who wanted to see a complete and magnificent reproduction of life on the frontier.” But, the report added, “There were no doubt many who fully expected to see a circus performance, with trapeze artists, clowns, trained horses, fairylike soubrettes flying through hoops, who were disappointed.”
It was a different story on Sept. 30, 1910, when Cody returned to Vallejo and performed for thousands of spectators who, according to the local paper, “unstintedly and enthusiastically cheered and cheered whenever the occasion arose, and that was pretty frequently.”
The news account described a “mammoth programme, which was carried out in its multitudinous details with a precision which was both startling and highly gratifying. There was not a dull moment from the rising of the curtain until the playing of the national anthem.”
“In all, the show was a grand success and it is to be regretted that this will be its last appearance here,” the Vallejo Evening News reported.
But Cody, who routinely used the “last appearance” term to promote increased attendance, appeared again in Vallejo for an April 28, 1914, event even after his original show went bankrupt in 1913. This time he was hired by the Sells Floto Circus, which changed its name to the Sells Floto and Buffalo Bill Circus.
Like the 1910 show, the 1914 circus was a success, with the Times-Herald reporting it was seen by “large and delighted audiences” on hand for a downtown parade and the big event that followed.
“The horses were exceptionally fine appearing, the costumes of the riders were new and clean, and the entire circus equipment was first class,” the newspaper said. “The show was even better than the parade, and three and sometimes five rings were filled with clever performers, ranging from animal trainers to clowns.”
Besides the old Vallejo newspaper accounts of the Wild West Show, details for this column came from University of California, Davis history professor Louis S. Warren’s 2005 book, “Buffalo Bill’s America: William Cody and the Wild West Show.” This is a great read for anyone interested in an extensive account of Cody’s colorful history and role as an American cultural icon.
— Vallejo and other Solano County communities are treasure troves of early-day California history. My “Solano Chronicles” column highlights various aspects of that history. If you have local stories or photos to share, contact me on Facebook. Old film footage of Buffalo Bill and his www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=buffalo+bill%27s+wild+west+show&&mid=AEFCD2A7E55A1C44A402AEFCD2A7E55A1C44A402&FORM=VAMGZC