Wyoming History - Virginia Cole Trenholm

Virginia Cole Trenholm is no longer a household name in Wyoming, too bad, she should be. Trenholm was raised and educated in Missouri and moved to Wyoming when she married in 1932. Her husband Robert was a rancher south of Glendo, and the two spent their married life on that Platte County Ranch.  But it was not as a ranch wife that Virginia Cole Trenholm is best known, it is as a historian and writer.

In the mountains west of Glendo, Platte County Wyoming

She was long recognized as the greatest living authority on the two tribes of the Wind River Reservation, the Northern Arapaho, and the Eastern Shoshoni. Her two books on the subject, Shoshonis: Sentinels of the Rockies, which she wrote with assistance from Cheyenne Teacher Maurine Carley, and The Arapahoes, Our People, are acclaimed works considered, must-reads, for scholars with an interest in the two tribes.

James Michener

Trenholme’s knowledge of the two tribes was so well recognized that when the acclaimed author, James Michener, wrote his famous work of the American West, Centennial, he spent several months spending time with, and corresponding with her about the history, activities, and culture of the two Wyoming tribes.

I often use her book, Wyoming Pageant, also written with Maurine Carley, as my first look resource when I am searching something in Wyoming History. She wrote several other books dealing with Wyoming history and published one fiction title, Omen of the Hawks.

West and South of Glendo Wyoming

Although her books seem to be lost in time, they are as relevant today as they were when she first published them. In, The Arapahoes, Our People, she writes in the preface – I have sought to tell the story of Our People by relating them and their way of life to the world about them. Their single path following the buffalo has branched into many roads leading in many directions; the Bison Path People of yesterday have become, Our People of today. Throughout, they have miraculously retained their identity.

I keep the three books I have mentioned, in the post, on the top shelf of my writing desk, easy to find and always gives me something to write about. 

Many Pronghorn around Glendo

Tim McCoy

Tim McCoy’s, 1938 version of a Wild West show didn’t last long, bankrupt in less than a month. McCoy’s version was more of an anthropological look at the way the west once was, instead of a Wild West thrill show. With Buffalo Bill, whose show went bankrupt in 1913 after a 25 year run, and others long gone, McCoy had hoped to get Americans and then Europeans interested in the old west once again. But moving pictures and by 1938, talking ones, were enough to satisfy people’s old west cravings. McCoy seemed to be the old, too little, too late.

McCoy grew up in the east but moved to Wyoming and became a cowboy as a young man. He joined the Army during WW1 and again in WW2. He rose to the rank of Colonel in the Army Air Corps and Army Air Force. He was the Adjutant General for the state of Wyoming between the wars and given the brevet rank of Brigadier General at age 28. At the time he was the youngest Brigadier General in the history of the U.S. Army.

In 1942, McCoy ran for the Republican nomination for the open US Senate Seat from Wyoming. He lost in the primary and immediately entered the army again.

McCoy became an honorary member of the Arapaho tribe and was given the name of, High Eagle, by the tribe on the Wind River Reservation.

Tim McCoy continued making movies and touring with other wild west shows after the war ended but never had either the money or the inclination to try his own Wild West show again.

 

The Treaty of Fort Laramie

The famous Great Council of 1851 (Treaty of Fort Laramie) is well recorded in History books, especially Wyoming History. But by 1890 when Wyoming became a state the famous treaty location was actually in Nebraska. Fort Laramie (Wyoming) itself only covers a few acres and at the time of the Great Council camps of both whites and Indians were spread out for miles. Grass was eaten down to nothing pushing all involved farther and farther from the actual fort as the government waited on gifts from the east to arrive.

This treaty was supposed to solve the problem of Indian wars against the white men on the plains but many historians point to this as the beginning of the Plains Indians wars of the west. The council that tried to keep Indians away from the trails by giving payments to the tribes for the game they lost after being relocated away from the North Platte River. Although all tribes were invited it was the Sioux, Arapaho and Cheyenne that were closest to the trails and most dangerous to travelers, these tribes were among the first and longest lasting of the Plains Indians trying to stop expansion into their territory.

The United States government made only one payment thus breaking the treaty that they had pushed so hard for. The treaty would be redone in 1868, but it to would also fail and wars on the plains would continue until 1890 and Wounded Knee.