Kaycee, Wyoming 1998

In July 1998, on one of those vacations where nothing is planned ahead and sleeping in the van made anything possible, I saw the Kaycee, Wyoming area. I wanted to be there because of all the stories I had read about Butch Cassidy, Old West history, and the Big Horn Mountains.

We drove through Kaycee, got information and drove out to the area where Cassidy had his hideout. Today you could actually walk to where it was, access being arranged through the ranches, but it would have to be from the south not from where we were. At that time, there was no access, but it wasn't really just seeing the hideout itself but the feeling of the area that I wanted.

It was beautiful country with a lot of red rock which I hadn't expected. Later I read that there is a 50 mile ridge of these red rock cliffs. Beneath them are big ranches with water and what looked like good grass-- something you don't see just anywhere in the West. At that time, they appeared to be family operations but that might have changed in the intervening years as some places like those have been bought up by off-site owners or even corporations with ranch managers hired to run the daily operations (nothing new to the West).

The road into our destination, a campground high above the middle fork of the Powder River, was dirt, heavily rutted and full of puddles. We weren't surprised at its condition as we'd been in Buffalo the night before and seen the violent thunderstorm as it passed through.

In fact that brewing thunderstorm had led us to decide to take a motel room instead of camp of which we were glad as we debated the size of the big hail balls and wondered if they'd dent the top of the van sitting in the parking lot. I'd read about pioneers being hit by them as they came west with no real shelter possible. While we get hail in my part of Oregon, it's tiny pellets, which can still hurt but won't knock you out.

On the road up to the campground, we were lucky we had all-wheel drive on the van and that Farm Boss was familiar with driving in such conditions as it was questionable making it up the hill. It looked like not everyone had. This is not the kind of country where you want to get stuck. Those were the days before cell phones which might not work out there even today.

Because of the storms, we decided camping up there wasn't going to be smart. We might have had to spend more than a few days before we could get back out. I did cut some sage from one of the nearby canyons for my smudges, got some photos, but we didn't linger.

Butch Cassidy was thought highly of in this area. He treated the locals well (some made extra money riding with him on a job or acting as a lookout). His word was good. Some say that for all his robberies, he never killed anybody.

Cassidy didn't appear to have been a psychopath like Jesse James likely was but was a wild one who took a path that possibly he couldn't get off. The stories are still told that he wasn't killed in South America, that those who knew him saw him later in Utah and other places, but he had gotten his chance off the outlaw trail and lived his life out as an honest man. I think people would like to believe it-- likely or not.

In Cassidy's case, one little story, that I have heard enough to believe was true, gives a picture of who he was as a man. He had sold the ranch the Wild Bunch used but didn't give the buyer a piece of paper as a deed. It was a handshake sale. Cassidy said he'd send the deed later. A year later an Indian showed up with the deed and would only give it to the correct man. The people of the area said they accepted the Indian as a friend because if Butch had trusted him, he must be all right. The Indian stayed in the area for some time.

Heck, I would too. I would love to have a small place in that country, but it's not small place country. This is big ranch land and the kind of place, with its rugged mountains, red rock formations, and roaring rivers, that most of us can only enjoy in stories or as we pass through. To be honest, I'd rather it stay that way than to see it carved up into little ranchettes and vacation homes. The land remains though and the buildings that don't work out soon are absorbed back into it.