Wild West Podcast

Entrepreneurship and Enforcement in the Wild West: Tracing the Vibrant Life and Unyielding Spirit of Ham Bell

March 12, 2019 Michael King/Brad Smalley
Wild West Podcast
Entrepreneurship and Enforcement in the Wild West: Tracing the Vibrant Life and Unyielding Spirit of Ham Bell
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Show Notes Transcript

Prepare yourself for a riveting journey back in time as we ride through the dusty streets of Dodge City, Kansas, following the multifaceted life of the legendary Ham Bell. From his humble beginnings as a clock cleaner, to his ventures into entrepreneurship and law, Ham Bell epitomized the true spirit of the Wild West. We'll recount how he drove the town's economic and cultural life with ventures ranging from a sod livery stable to a dance hall, and his audacious introduction of the exotic Can Can dance to the citizens of the prairie.

Ham Bell was not just a man with entrepreneurial vision, he was also a respected lawman with a unique rule of never shooting his gun. We'll explore his commendable law enforcement career that lasted an impressive 36 years, his stint in politics, and his pioneering contributions in bringing modernity to Dodge City. From introducing the first women's restroom, to the first motorized ambulance and hearse, to running a pet shop, Ham Bell's life offers a rich tapestry of fascinating tales. Brace yourself for an unforgettable exploration of a man who truly embodied the spirit of the Old West.

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to Wild West Podcast, where fact and legend merge. The Wild West Podcast presents the true accounts of individuals who settled in a town built out of hunger for money, regulated by fast guns, who walked on both sides of the law, patrolling, investing in and regulating the brothels, saloons and gambling houses. These are the stories of the men who made the history of the Old West come alive, bringing with them the birth of legends brought to order by a six-gun and laid to rest with their boots on. Join us now as we take you back in history, to the legends of the Wild West. Ham Bell of Dodge City, kansas, became such a legend, notable for his frontier spirit. He was an entrepreneur, a person who was defined by his willingness to risk a loss to improve the quality of life for others.

Speaker 1:

Ham Bell, and whose arms Alf Walker had fallen at AJ Peacock's saloon after the Ed Masterson shooting, had been born Hannibal Bettler Belts in Washington County, Maryland. When he was nine, he and two siblings became orphans Five years later. After living with an uncle, he set off on his own when he was 19, he was a restless jewelry store salesman in Pennsylvania. In 1865, the newspaper editor Horace Greeley had exhorted Go West, young man go west and grow up with the country. Ham Bell in 1872 became another young man who took Greeley's advice. This was, of course, the same year Greeley was unsuccessfully running for president against the incumbent Ulysses S Grant. One of the skills Bell had acquired was cleaning clocks, and doing so paid his way to Kansas.

Speaker 1:

Like many pioneers of the Old West, ham Bell may have found a need to reinvent himself as he traveled at age 18 from Maryland to Kansas. In route he changed his name to Hamilton Butler Bell. His first stop, a brief one, was in Lawrence. He moved on to Abilene, ellsworth and then Great Bend. When Ham arrived in Great Bend, kansas, he was 19. Ham Bell hunted Buffalo a while, then got a position with a Santa Fe agent whose office was a boxcar and worked there until his appointment as assistant marshal under Great Bend Marshal James Gainesford. He worked several jobs, including driving freight wagons and delivering ice. Not surprisingly, given the heat of the West Kansas summers, there was a great demand for ice on the frontier, and by the summer of 1874, bell had a contract to deliver ice, railroad ties and other material to the Atchison, tobeka and Santa Fe Railroad.

Speaker 1:

As it steadily worked its way through Kansas and into Colorado, hambell made Dodge City his headquarters and it would be home for the rest of his life. His future there was confirmed that summer when he married Josephine Dugan, the daughter of a local farmer. His first business in Dodge City was a sod livery stable, which later grew into the largest structure in Western Kansas, an 85 by 125 foot stable known far and wide as the elephant livery stable, with an elephant painted on the side. It served as a rendezvous and betting down plays for horses and mules, as well as people from throughout the region. Another of Hambell's ventures was a dance hall on Front Street, and in 1878 Bell was the first to introduce the Can Can to Dodge City.

Speaker 1:

Bell had read about the dance that was the rage in Europe and had learned that a troupe performing it was touring the western half of the United States. He thought the citizens of and visitors to Dodge City were ready for such exotic entertainment, so he booked a dance company. The first performance of the lovely, high-kicking ladies was on July 4th 1878. Suddenly, the frontier did not seem as far from the sophisticated East Coast in Chicago. Though his variety saloon only lasted one season, the lively Parisian dance was the talk of the town. Either Wrath, daughter in law of the businessman Charles Wrath, once reminisced about Bell that he had the bluest of blue eyes and brown hair was spare of Bill, but broad shoulder. He had a decided Roman nose and a very determined chin. His distinctive looks had to help him during his forays into politics, which included two terms as mayor of Dodge City and two terms as a Ford County Commissioner. But it was as a lawman that many people came to know Ham Bell, considering he spent 36 years at it. There was a lengthy break while he established himself in Dodge City and in 1880 he would be appointed Deputy US Marshall, a position he would hold for 12 years. He would also be the sheriff of Ford County, first elected in 1888. Bell left the office in 1910 to become the head of Dodge City's police department.

Speaker 1:

Part of Ham Bell's legend may have been recreated through the model of from Matt Dillon on the popular TV show Gunsmoke During the decades. As a police officer he never shot a man because he was so quick on the draw that the other man froze before he could clear leather. One point about his gunplay, or lack of it, came about in a 1931 interview the idea that I never drew a gun on a man when I was sheriff here in the early days is all wrong. I just never shot a man, said Ham. That was mainly because I was always careful to draw my gun in plenty of time before the other man drew his. If I'd never drawn a gun I wouldn't have lived a week.

Speaker 1:

Ham gained some fame of a sort by saying, as he looked the ruffian straight in the eye, a kid will shoot quicker than a man. Other endeavors by Ham Bell included the first constructed women's restroom on the Santa Fe Trail. Operating furniture store and mortuary business, ida Ellen Rath noted one nice detail. The best thing we remember him for was that he always laid a floral tribute on the casket of anyone who passed away in Dodge City. The industrious and far-sighted Bell would go on to own the first car dealership in southwest Kansas and as proprietor of an ambulance service he introduced the first motorized ambulance in Dodge City. And in case that transportation had not always gone swiftly enough, bell also introduced the first motorized hearse. When he died in 1947 at 94, he was operating a pet shop. During World War II, an Army Air Corps plane featured his handprint that was named for Ham Bell.