The Wild West

Missouri connections to the Wild West include Calamity Jane, Jesse and Frank James, and the Missouri mule. Born Martha Jane Canary in Princeton, Missouri, Calamity Jane was a frontierswoman and professional scout known for claiming to have been acquainted with Wild Bill Hickok, for taking part in several campaigns in the long-running military conflicts with American Indians, for daring horsemanship and skill with a rifle, and for wearing men's attire; in 1893, she began appearing in Buffalo Bill's show Wild West as a storyteller. Born near Kearney, Missouri, Jesse and Frank James were raised in western Missouri as the sons of a Baptist minister, joined pro-Confederate bushwhackers during the Civil War, and in the 1870s and 1880s robbed banks, trains, and stagecoaches across the Midwest, gaining fame and often popular sympathy despite their crimes; Jesse was killed at age 34 by a member of his gang, and Frank later surrendered to authorities. The Missouri mule, adopted as the state animal in 1995, is considered smarter, hardier, and more sure-footed than a horse; as the offspring of male donkeys and female horses, mules excelled at endurance, often pulled wagons and plowed clay soil, inspired the expression "stubborn as a mule," and for many years made Missouri the mule-producing center of the U.S., providing 80 percent of the mules used in World War I.

Cape Girardeau, Missouri · United States