What Medora Was Buying: The Cow Boy’s Ads

Saloons promising "Rest for the Weary," a brick kiln that guaranteed its brick or your money back, and columns of cattle brands. The Bad Lands Cow Boy ran 193 different ads, 127 of them for businesses in the Badlands. Each one is shown as it first ran, cropped from the original page.

Frontier prices

In February 1884 the Hotel De Mores, "the best hotel in Medora," charged transients $2 a day and regular boarders $6 a week. A month later J. Slatcher's Golden Gun Armory in Dickinson advertised Colt .45 six-shooters at $14. The Medora Brick Kiln sold brick at $8 a thousand, "guaranteed better than any brick made in Dakota, or money refunded."

The paper sold things too. Packard offered Medora town lots from the Cow Boy office in May 1884. In July 1886 the paper offered a set of 36 "instantaneous round-up views" of the cattle range, by the Miles City photographer L. A. Huffman, for $5, or $6 with a year's subscription.

Advertisement for Little Tom's Saloon in The Bad Lands Cow Boy: There's Rest for the Weary

Little Tom's Saloon, Little Missouri. The Bad Lands Cow Boy, February 7, 1884.

Advertisement for the Hotel De Mores in The Bad Lands Cow Boy

Hotel De Mores. The Bad Lands Cow Boy, February 7, 1884.

Advertisement for J. Slatcher's Golden Gun Armory, Dickinson, in The Bad Lands Cow Boy

J. Slatcher's Golden Gun Armory, Dickinson. The Bad Lands Cow Boy, March 27, 1884.

Advertisement for the Medora Brick Kiln in The Bad Lands Cow Boy

Medora Brick Kiln. The Bad Lands Cow Boy, May 15, 1884.

Advertisement for Huffman's instantaneous round-up views, sold by The Bad Lands Cow Boy

Instantaneous Round-Up Views. The Bad Lands Cow Boy, July 1, 1886.

Advertisement for the Northern Pacific Railroad in The Bad Lands Cow Boy

Northern Pacific Railroad. The Bad Lands Cow Boy, February 28, 1884.

Brands on the range

Ranchers ran small cards with their brand, ear marks and range so strays could be identified and returned. Some ran in every issue for nearly three years. The 29 brand cards in the paper read like a map of who ran cattle where.

Browse every ad

Filter by kind of business, or open any ad to see its full wording, what it sold and how it made its pitch.

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