continuing about Cody

The pictures in the previous post include sculptures in the Buffalo Bill Museum sculpture garden, Nina picked Sacagawea as her favorite, she love Sacagawea, to the point that I had to look at every museum and park bookstore to find her a book about her, a kids' book that is, finally found one and she was delighted.

A few specifics on our visit: the Buffalo Bill museums were way more than expected. We heard it was a large complex, but we assumed it as a large collection of Buffalo Bill’s stuff, from his Wild West Show travels, perhaps childhood memorabilia, and the like. Boy, were we wrong. First of all, the center has five museums, all connected indoors, beautiful done, very accessible, and even though the collections are huge, it is not overwhelming, that’s how well it is put together. The five museums are:
1. Buffalo Bill--his life history, films of his show, memorabilia, and artifacts of his time, including my favorite photo of Annie Oakley that I mentioned earlier
2. Museum of the Plains Indians--a fantastic and comprehensive museum that teaches about the history and culture of native peoples in the plains of N. America; the Smithsonian’s Museum of Native Americans could learn a great deal from this museum, I can’t even begin to explain how wonderful the Cody museum is. It had arifacts, large structures of the various dwellings, including what native peoples moved into after they were forced out of native dwellings. It had great sound bytes, interactive displays, all done in such a way that it doesn’t overwhelm, yet it displays a great deal. I have no idea how they did it, but they did.
3. Natural History Museum: same as above, lots of information, not overwhelming, well thought out displays, accessible information. A note about all the parts so far, often there were little quiet corners with loads of books about the certain section (Indians, Natural History, etc…) where anyone could sit and browse, read, rest.
4. Whitney Art Museum: a wonderful display of fine art depicting the wild American west, history, landscapes, native, so on. It included two reproductions of artists’ studios, Remington’s in NY and another (I’m drawing a blank). It was interesting to see these two artists who are considered experts on America’s west have studios in the east, that looked like they belonged somewhere in Wyoming, South Dakota, Oklahoma, or the like. The only complaint I have about this museum was that the bookstore did not have a comprehensive catalogue of the collection, which I was ready to buy because I fell in love with the art, definitely not celebrated enough in my humble opinion. I think when official shows are put on, such the national Fourth of July, too much is concentrated on either Broadway culture of NYC or something a bit too general to really fit any region of the States, I would like to see students in schools learn more about these American treasures, the artists in this stunning collection. The museum also included a small gallery of contemporary artists, mostly those of the west in USA, but some who have concentrated on the western American culture. Great stuff!
5. For this fifth one, I can’t comment, we were out of time and I did not make time for this part. It is the Firearms Museum. Not of my interest, so I can’t fairly report on it. Danko did take a peek and it didn’t peek his interest, but he said it had lots of lots of guns, including a Gatlin gun. In his opinion, it had too much, but to be fair he took a peek at the end of our visit.

NOTE: the museum entrance fee is good for two days, and I understand why, because you absolutely need more than one day. However, in our four hour visit we got a good taste and a good education, so much that I really can’t put it all in words here. We walked a lot, yet it was relaxing. I cannot stress how much I feel the Smithsonian staff, in fact ALL museum staffs, should visit this museum and get their ideas, philosophies, and somehow incorporate the ideas to fit their own places. Do you all get the idea that we cannot stress enough how wonderful the Buffalo Bill Museum Complex is? A MUST to see for everyone. And I understand our Smithsonian American History Museum is undergoing renovations: think they could copy Buffalo Bill’s place? Now THAT would be awesome.

Okay, so we ate dinner and headed off to the Cody Rodeo, that is part of the professional rodeo circuit, meaning these cowboys and cowgirls make a living from these events.

We had no idea how much we would enjoy the rodeo. The Late Night Rodeo of Cody is geared to visitors and tourists, so they are kind enough to explain the events we watch. We saw amazing cowboy and cowgirl talents: lassoing a calf (important to catch a calf on the range); riding bulls (not sure why one needs to ride a bull, but it was quite a feat); talented western riding, around barrels and such (I forgot the name for it); and finally, the big event, bronco busting. Solomia got a great photo of one. We were told how the way the rider sits, what he or she may do on the ride along with length, no longer than a certain number of minutes depending on the event, determine one’s score. Cowgirls did everything but bull riding and bronco busting (riding a wild or non-broken horse). We saw contestants from various states (none from back east, but Texas, Kansas, Washington state, etc…) saw some young cowboys and cowgirls in the events as well, perhaps some as young as six, it was hard to tell from where we were sitting how old these cowpokes were, but they were tiny.

The kids all wanted to go to another rodeo, alas we won’t have time, but perhaps someday we’ll get to one again, maybe we’ll even start following the circuit on ESPN.

ADDENDUM II
Some thoughts on past postings:
Regarding the federal monetary gift for Crazy Horse, we were not under the impression that if the foundation building the sculpture accepted the money the monument would be government-run. In fact, we were under the opposite impression, that it was a “no-strings attached” gift, a grant. Again, it was not clear in the spiel during the orientation film, during the “give donations” spiel that is. I understand the foundation needs finances, but just after we paid $25 to enter the monument, we were directed immediately to the orientation film, and a good portion of the film was a donation spiel. So, made us a little anxious as to why not take the federal gift. So, that’s some clarification or rather a few more specifics as to the financial state of Crazy Horse Memorial.

Regarding the part in the second post about my “kvetching” about the state of things in the world. I say kvetch with a jest, because as many of you who know me, when I do criticize I always offer an idea for a solution and am always ready and willing to offer any of my energies toward a solution (mine or other). I believe life is too short to settle for mediocrity and we all need to reach for the stars, especially in matters that concern raising our children. A little info for those that didn’t realize that I do realize what I’m saying when I’m saying it and I have a purpose to my actions (a method to my madness, if you will ☺ ).