Buffalo Bill

William 'Buffalo Bill' Cody didn't just live the Wild West—he packaged and sold it to the world. As a young man, he was a Pony Express rider, a Civil War soldier, a scout for the U.S. Army, and, most famously, a hunter contracted to supply buffalo meat for railroad workers, earning his nickname. But his true genius was showmanship. He transformed his authentic experiences into 'Buffalo Bill's Wild West', a sprawling outdoor extravaganza that featured real cowboys, sharp-shooters like Annie Oakley, and reenactments of frontier life, often with Indigenous performers, including Sitting Bull, playing themselves. The show toured the United States and Europe for three decades, mesmerizing crowds including Queen Victoria. He presented a romantic, action-packed version of westward expansion that obscured its brutal realities, creating an indelible folklore. Cody became the world's first global celebrity, a living symbol of a vanishing era he helped immortalize.