Sources for Wild West Shows
Introduction
Among the English Manuscript collection there is a scrapbook of memorabilia relating to the shows of Buffalo Bill. William F Cody worked on the Pony Express and fought in the American Civil war before becoming the famous Showman, Buffalo Bill, and presenting his Wild West Shows across the USA and Europe.
‘Buffalo Bill’s Wild West’ was an extremely popular circus-like show which displayed many skills from performers across the globe within scenes of famous events which had taken place in the frontier. Famous performers included Annie Oakley, Calamity Jane and Sitting Bull, the political and spiritual leader of the Sioux warriors who destroyed General George Armstrong Custer’s force in the famous battle of Little Big Horn.
The scrapbook was put together by the Hipkins family of London and contains photographs, news cuttings, magazines, letters and other documents produced by or about the Wild West Show during its British tours of 1887, 1892 and 1903. During the 1887 visit, the show stayed in Salford for five months.
Access to the Scrapbook
Due to the delicate nature of the scrapbook, and the way material has been pasted within it, conservation work is needed on the item. During summer 2022, the scrapbook is being digitised and so will not available to view in person. This is so a surrogate copy can be produced, protecting the item and allowing access to the scrapbook for all.
There are currently a selection of images from the Scrapbook on Library Digitised Collections (LUNA), the Library’s image database.
The image below is from ‘Black and White’, an illustrated weekly newspaper.
Newspapers and periodicals are available through Library search and give vivid account of shows performed across the UK.
Additional Resources
The scrapbook is an important tool for research. History and the creation of history, anthropology, American Studies, race, imperialism and the rise of mass entertainment are just some of the themes covered by this scrapbook. Other repositories have more information in their holdings that can be used to research Wild West Shows, including on Buffalo Bill (William Cody).
The National Fairground and Circus Archive at Sheffield have a number of collections that contain poster, programmes and playbills.
Via their website, their holdings can be searched by subject ‘Wild West’. Go into ‘Wild West’ and click on the ‘posters’ ‘programmes’ and ‘handbills’ links and then do a search for Buffalo Bill and [William] Cody to find out if there is any material (noting the reference if you wish to see this). A lot of their material can be found on the Adam Matthew online database, under Victorian Popular Culture, alongside material from other collections and repositories.
Another collection at the National Fairground and Circus Archive is the Shufflebottom Archive. The Shufflebottoms were a Lancashire circus and fairground family who were influenced by seeing the Buffalo Bill Wild West Shows that came from the USA. Clothing made by family members and worn at early shows were based on the cowboy clothing they saw at the shows in Salford.
Manchester Central Library have resources including some oral history interviews listed on their archives database at various local studies across the region. Some of the performers from Buffalo Bill’s Circus stayed in the UK and there is some research in local history books by the late Frank Rhodes regarding this, which can be also be found at Central Library.
If you wish to view material from any archive, make sure you contact the repository directly with details of the material you wish to see. Do not make a trip to look at any archive material until you have been informed material is ready for you to view.
The University of Manchester digitised Special Collections material is made available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY-NC 4.0) wherever possible. For further information on digital images and to request high resolution copies please contact our imaging team.Other Sources for Wild West Shows
