The Buffalo Bill Center of the West
Near Cody, Wyoming
Just west of downtown sits one of the finest museum complexes in the American West. The Buffalo Bill Center of the West traces its origins to nineteen seventeen, the year of Cody's death, when admirers set out to preserve his legacy. What began as a memorial has grown into five museums gathered under one roof.
The Buffalo Bill Museum tells the story of the man and the character he created. The Plains Indian Museum presents the cultures, histories, and living traditions of Plains Native peoples. The Whitney Western Art Museum holds paintings and sculpture of the West.
The Draper Natural History Museum explores the wildlife and ecology of the greater Yellowstone country. And the Cody Firearms Museum, built around the factory collection of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company, which was moved here from New Haven, Connecticut, in nineteen seventy six, displays thousands of firearms. Since two thousand eight the Center has been a Smithsonian Affiliate, the first museum complex in Wyoming to earn that distinction.
It bills itself as the oldest and most comprehensive museum of the West, and few who walk its halls would argue.
