Habeas Corpus: Can Buffalo Bill Ever Rest in Peace?

"I know we’ll have to fight every person in Colorado, but we want to bring him back to his home." Thus on October 28, 1927, Mary Jester Allen, niece to Buffalo Bill Cody, started a movement to take Cody’s body to Wyoming. A month later, the Denver Post reported that Johnny Baker had reburied the Codys under twelve feet of reinforced concrete.

According to Baker, "This work forever settles the idle talk about the possible removal of the bodies of Colonel Cody and Mrs. Cody from the resting place they chose." Baker contended that "our work has been done to make perpetual the lasting resting place of Colonel and Mrs. Cody and to provide a sure foundation for any monument that may be erected in the future."

Johnny Baker, foster son to Colonel and Mrs. Cody, was only following their wishes in his efforts to keep their bodies on Lookout Mountain. When Buffalo Bill died, Mrs. Cody revealed that he had asked to be buried on Lookout Mountain near Denver. This was very disturbing to the folks in Cody, Wyoming, who thought he would be buried there. Mary Jester Allen was one of the only Cody family members who took their side. Buffalo Bill’s daughter, his two remaining sisters, and his foster son all supported his burial on Lookout Mountain. Foster son Johnny Baker even built a museum and gift shop, Pahaska Tepee, near the grave site.

Mary Jester Allen was not the only person who threatened to remove Cody’s body from Lookout Mountain. In 1948 the Cody American Legion pledged $100,000 in cash to anyone who would steal the body, and the Cheyenne American Legion offered to do the honors. It was probably just a publicity stunt but, deciding to take no chances, the Leyden-Chiles-Wickersham American Legion post in Denver stationed a guard at the grave.

Few burial spots have been marked by the controversy that has surrounded Buffalo Bill’s final resting place on Lookout Mountain. At the time of his burial, there were accusations that Buffalo Bill’s widow had taken a bribe to bury her husband on Lookout Mountain. And as late as 2000 one gentleman claimed that his grandfather had stolen Cody’s body from the mortuary and buried it in an unmarked grave in Cody, Wyoming.

The simple act of burying someone nearly 100 years ago continues to spark conversations over coffee and articles in national media. But Buffalo Bill and Mrs. Cody remain on Lookout Mountain today, as do Johnny Baker’s Pahaska Tepee gift shop and the Buffalo Bill Museum.

Red Rocks has been blown up!

"From his first visit on a geology field trip from East High School, young George Cranmer became fascinated with the natural acoustics of Red Rocks. This fascination became a dream that would not leave him. Years later, when Denver Mayor Benjamin Stapleton appointed him Manager of Parks & Improvements, Cranmer’s planning began in earnest. But how would he fund it?

Simultaneously President Franklin D. Roosevelt was creating the Civilian Conservation Corps as part of his solution to the rampant unemployment and economic chaos that gripped the country. With this action, the President brought together two wasted resources: the young men and the land, in an effort to save both. Using designs by Denver architect Burnham Hoyt, Cranmer presented his plan to the National Park Service. On May 17, 1936 came the exciting news of the approval of the development of the Red Rocks Theater by the CCC – and work was to start at once!

Now Mayor Stapleton was not a big fan of the theater. In fact, the Mayor believed theater was evil and that actors and actresses were generally evil as well. Mayor Stapleton really envisioned this site as a large rock garden, and in fact the area where the seating is now was filled with huge red boulders.

Cranmer and architect Burnham Hoyt had a different idea – the one we see today. That idea required removing the boulders, and that couldn’t be done without breaking them up. Cranmer later recalled his remarks to the CCC foreman* Edward Teyssier, “I explained to him the various problems that I faced – Mayor Stapleton’s basic antipathy to the idea of a theater, and the criticism that I was receiving from the newspapers and the City Council. I pointed out to him that the first part of the job, getting the big boulders off the hillside, could not be a piece-meal job; that the whole job would have to be done at one time.”

So, over a period of time the workers drilled holes in the bases of all the boulders and inserted dynamite in order to blow them all within a few minutes. The foreman called Cranmer late one night and told him, “Tomorrow is the day we do the big job.” Cranmer promptly went on an inspection trip the next morning to Daniels Park – which conveniently had no phones! Returning to his office late in the day, his secretary informed him that the Mayor had been looking for him all day – “the entire Red Rocks Park has been blown up!” Fortunately the Mayor was a good sport and was a proud as anyone when the theater came into use. And the rocks? Well, they became a part of the necessary landfill in the south side of the seating area."

- Milton E. Bernet, The Incomparable Red Rocks

* Edward Teyssier was actually Superintendent of Construction on this project. He worked for the National Park Service, which was the oversight agency for all CCC projects in Jefferson County.

The Building of the Amphitheatre

Red Rocks Amphitheatre is one of the grandest achievements of the Civilian Conservation Corps. The CCC existed for nine years and three months and has remained one of the most popular of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal programs. More than 3 million men went through the corps between 1933 and 1942.

Company 1848, Camp SP-13-C, Mount Morrison, Colorado consisted of approximately 155-200 members. Each member was paid $30 per month. $25 of that amount was sent directly to their families. CCC veteran Walt Purvis of Aurora, Colorado recalled, "A dollar a day was good money then, because there were no jobs to be had, period. The money they sent home made the difference between my brothers and sisters getting shoes or not. By teaching us trades and skills and how to get along with other people, the CCC gave us a start in life," he added.

The amphitheatre project required them to remove 25,000 cubic yards of rock and dirt and used 90,000 square feet of flagstone, ten carloads of cement, 800 tons of quarried stone, and 30,000 pounds of reinforced steel.

"The building of this theatre is not a steam-shovel job. The work is being done by man-power. After the excavation is finished most of the work will require skilled labor. Here the boys of the company will be repaid for the long hours spent with pick and shovel. The fellows will be given an opportunity to learn a trade from actually doing the work. Just a few of the jobs where skilled labor is required are: stone masonry, electrical engineering, cement and carpentry work, surveying, blasting and landscaping. The members of this company are not just working for a dollar a day for the Government--they are building an amphitheatre that will stand for centuries, and in generations to come this work will remain a symbol of advancement of the western culture of today… This amphitheatre will be an enduring monument to the Civilian Conservation Corps in Colorado for years to come."

— History of the Civilian Conservation Corps in Colorado

A Grand Finale, from Tom Noel, in the Rocky Mountain News

"Ray Koernig, a Littleton City councilor, remembers formidable female performers at Red Rocks. Ray writes: "In 1958, Red Rocks put on Die Walkurie. The conductor was Saul Caston of the Denver Symphony.

"At the end of the opera, the character Wotan takes revenge on Brunhilde by ordering her to be ‘jailed’ in a ring of fire and guarded by the Walkurie. Wotan had put Brunhilde on a rock and was prepared to light the fire that would surround her. The Walkurie were on the rocks with their wings, tridents and horned helmets. The wind started to come up during Wotan’s final song, and was fierce by the time he started the fire.

"As he sang . . . the wind was in almost hurricane blast. The Walkurie were hanging onto the rocks for dear life. The fire was blown into the orchestra pit, and we could hear the dropping of instruments as the musicians panicked. Saul Caston was yelling ‘come back, come back’ and Brunhilde was gamely holding on so that she wouldn’t be blown into the fire. Wotan was trying desperately to look heroic, while at the same time trying to keep his cape down and his skirt from going up. “Caston got the orchestra back, they began playing and Wotan finished his aria. It was a grand finale."