Academic and Writer Tom F. Cunningham gave a fascinating presentation of the Historic visits of the Famous Buffalo Bills Wild West Show to Glasgow in early 1890s and 1900s.
Firstly the myth of whether the legendary Indian Chief Sitting Bull attended was , literally , laid to rest.He died about an year prior to the Show first arriving in Glasgow.
The other mystery as to why a whole generation of Indian Chiefs would subject themselves to what may appear to be a humiliating climbdown in dignity of participating for casual public entertainment was cleared up.After the Battle/Massacre of Wounded Knee the leadership of the Indians were held as a form of captives bound over to keep the peace.With the alternative of continuing in Captivity in a closed Zone under the watchful eyes of US Marshalls or joining up with the scheme of being led by Buffalo Bill Cody to tour the US and Europe , the appeal to be part of a mobile captive unit was a preferable and strongly appealing option.
Cunningham has written a Book about the Wild West Shows connections with Glasgow.
One notorious connect between The Wild West show and Celtic is the new years day match in 1892 between Celtic and Dumbarton as was the tradition of having New Years games being kick-off by a celebrity attraction.Celtic ended up losing the match 0-8 , a record defeat for the club.
Glasgows reputation as an avid supporter of cultural and theatrical events was proved when the week spent by the Wild West Show in 1904 raised the biggest attendance of any venue outside the Shows major US centre of Chicago.
The video below is rare archive footage of the show taken from circa 1902.
Ultimately the novelty and appeal of The Wild West style shows began to ware off with the advent of Cinema and other forms of popular entertainment.
Sadly , Bill Cody got caught in a spiral of debt which he was never quite able to shake off , he passed away with a decent though dwindling fortune in 1917.
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