See Bartlett, , pp. 152–154. The museum continues to depend almost exclusively on private financing from entrance fees, donations and grants. State and federal funds have served a minor role in funding this museum (J. Hedderman, personal communication, March, 8, 2004).

See Bartlett, , p. 119. The Center draws visitors from across the country and around the globe. According to the Center’s records, visitors come to the Center from nearly every state in the US while less than 5% of the visitors are from other countries. Most visitors come from the West, in particular California, with Colorado, Texas, Washington, Montana and Wyoming also ‘well represented’ (J. Hedderman, personal communication, March, 8, 2004).

We will be engaging in a reading of the museum guided primarily by structuralist reading practices. Audiences do not necessarily accept the invitations offered by the text; indeed, some actively resist them. We suggest, however, that history museums may be particularly powerful as structures of meaning. Further, as important as polysemy and resistance are, exploration of preferred meanings and structured invitations remains a crucial component of criticism. The literature on this debate is too large to cover here. For excellent contributions to this debate see Fiske () and Condit ().

Museum visitors are further assured of Cody’s authenticity by the placard’s second paragraph, titled ‘Civil Honors’, which highlights his relation to other well known historical figures. ‘We live in a skeptical age’, the placard continues, ‘Many people doubt that anyone like Buffalo Bill, particularly a showman, could measure up to the legends. But at the turn of the century, Buffalo Bill was probably the best‐known American in the world. He was consulted on western matters by every president from Grant to Wilson. He counted among his friends such artists and writers as Frederic Remington and Mark Twain. He was honored by royalty, praised by military leaders, and feted by business tycoons’.

The notion of a ‘timeless’ West is evident in a wide variety of discourses throughout the BBHC, such as this quotation from the Treasures from our west () catalogue: ‘Cody died in 1917, but he, and the West in which he lived, did not vanish’ (p. 8).

According to White (), ‘Cody’s Wild West told of violent conquest, of wrestling the continent from the American Indian peoples who occupied the land. Although fictional, Buffalo Bill’s story claimed to represent a history … The bullet, the Wild West program declared, was “the pioneer of civilization” ’ (p. 9).

Annie Oakley, referred to as ‘little sure shot’ in promotional literature for the Wild West, did not significantly challenge or disrupt the masculine image of the cowboy. She was by far the most famous female performer to participate in ‘cowboy activities’ such as sharp shooting, bronc riding, and steer roping. ‘Women constituted roughly just ten percent of an exhibition’s cast’ (Wood‐Clark, , p. 16), and they were more commonly cast in stereotypically feminine roles such as ‘the prairie flower’ or ‘damsels in distress’.

Bartlett, writing in , continues to connect William Cody and Buffalo Bill through Cody’s real life exploits:

• Here was a man of humble origin so respected that millionaires vied for the opportunity of entertaining him—and found him as suave and sophisticated as any gentleman born to the purple. Here was a showman who was heeded as a spokesman for the West, for the Indian, and, overseas, for America. Here was a man with a dime‐novel reputation who had really earned fame on the frontier as a scout and guide, who could ride with any horseman and shoot with any marksman, and who followed animal tracks and read Indian sign as surely as the fictional Leatherstocking. William Frederick Cody was his real name, but the world knew him best as—Buffalo Bill. (pp. 3–4)

Near the end of his life and in the years after the Wild West was no longer profitable, Buffalo Bill took several farewell tours across the United States. Slotkin () suggests that the appeal of these tours was not so much a nostalgia for the West before its ‘closing’, but instead a nostalgia for the spectacle of the Wild West (p. 87). This nostalgia for both the West and Wild West is alive and well in the BBM. Indeed, in the museum the difference between the West and the Wild West is slim.