Wild West Podcast
Welcome to the Wild West Podcast, winner of the 2026 Best of Western Podcast award, where fact and legend merge. We present the true accounts of individuals who settled in towns 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 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 as we take you back in history to the legends of the Wild West. You can support our show by subscribing to Exclusive access to premium content at Wild West Podcast + https://www.buzzsprout.com/64094/subscribe or just buy us a cup of coffee at https://buymeacoffee.com/wildwestpodcast
Episodes
353 episodes
Blood, Dust, and Defiance: The Wagon Ring of Fire
In this gripping final episode of our Wild West Podcast series, the sun-scorched plains of the Texas Panhandle erupt into a brutal struggle for survival during the late summer of 1874. When a sprawling government supply train led by Ca...
Nelson Miles's 1874 Southern Plains Campaign
In August 1874, Colonel Nelson Miles launched an expedition from Fort Dodge into the Texas Panhandle to force hostile tribes onto reservations during the Red River War. His force—comprising eight cavalry companies, four infantry companies, and ...
Ambush on the Prairie: The German Family Tragedy and Rescue
On September 11, 1874, the John German family was journeying westward toward Colorado along the Smoky Hill River route in Kansas when they were violently ambushed by a band of 17 Cheyenne Dog Soldiers led by Medicine Water. In the surprise atta...
Beyond the Ambush: Retelling the German Family Captivity Featuring Scott Dean
This podcast episode explores the September 11, 1874 German family ambush near Fort Wallace, Kansas, during the Red River War, told from the perspective of guest Scott, the great-grandson of survivor Julia German. After years of post–Civil War ...
Audiobook CHAPTER 7: Life in the Lodges
Arriving at the sprawling Cheyenne encampment amidst the horrors of their family’s murder, Catherine and Sophia are immediately torn apart to endure harsh captivity in separate lodges. While twelve-year-old Sophia faces grueling phys...
Audiobook CHAPTER 6: The Rescue at McClellan Creek
Lieutenant Frank D. Baldwin led a ferocious, five-hour cavalry and infantry assault against a Cheyenne camp at McClellan Creek, sending the encampment into chaos as warriors mounted a desperate rearguard defense. Amid the gunfire and smoke, sol...
Audiobook CHAPTER 5 Abandoned on McClellan Creek
In late September 1874, as General Miles’s cavalry closes in, a fleeing Cheyenne raiding party abruptly abandons young Julia and Adelaide German in the high grass of the Texas Panhandle, forcing their older sisters to ride on and assume they ar...
Audiobook CHAPTER 4 Into the Staked Plains
Following the violent destruction of their family's homestead in Kansas, the German sisters—Catherine, Sophia, Julia, and Adelaide—are taken captive by a Cheyenne raiding party and driven relentlessly south. Traveling primarily under the cover ...
Audiobook CHAPTER 3: Dawn on the Smoky Hill
On the cold, frosty morning of September 11, 1874, the German family's journey across the windswept flats of Logan County, Kansas, was violently cut short. As John and Lydia led their canvas-topped wagon toward Fort Wallace alongside their olde...
Audiobook CHAPTER 2 The Prairie Trail
On a sweltering September afternoon in 1874, the exhausted German family trudges along the abandoned Smoky Hill stage road in western Kansas, their livestock near collapse and water rations nearly depleted. Relief arrives when two passing buffa...
A Voice from the Kansas Frontier
Step beyond official military dispatches to uncover the harrowing, forgotten world of the 19th-century frontier wife. In late 1866, Isadore Bowman Douglass journeyed 240 freezing miles across the plains to Fort Dodge with three young children, ...
Chapter One: The Shadow of the Blue Ridge
A Legacy of Hardship and HopeIn the spring of 1870, the impoverished German family—led by Civil War veteran John German and his wife, Lydia—prepares to flee the ruined soil and lingering trauma of Fannin County, Georgia. Strugglin...
Echoes of the High Plains:
Step into the brutal reality of the 1874 High Plains with the debut episode of The German Sisters: A Story of Survival, a gripping new audiobook series from Books on Tape, expertly brought to life through ElevenLabs narration. Drawing ...
Unraveling the True Frontier: The Hidden Legacy of the Texas Longhorn
Step into the captivating world of the American frontier, where history, grit, and surprising truths converge to reshape everything you thought you knew about the Old West. In this engaging address, our speaker Dr. Frank Sharp peels back the la...
Five Thousand Strong: Caught in the Stampede
Imagine standing atop Pawnee Rock in May of 1872, looking out over the vast, windswept plains of Kansas. As far as the eye can see, the earth itself seems to move—a living, breathing ocean of dark fur and thunder.Welcome to The Wild ...
"Whiskey, Wagons, and Warning Shots: The Birth of Buffalo City”
Journey into the raw, untamed frontier of June 1872 with former buffalo hunter turned saloon owner George W. Brown. In this gripping episode, Brown details the chaotic birth of Buffalo City—a bustling boomtown sparked when a strict military ban...
Buffalo Days: The Prairie Dog Business
Step back in time to the summer of 1872 and experience the raw, untamed spirit of the American frontier. Narrated through the vivid recollections of George W. Brown, this episode transports listeners directly onto the sun-drenched plains of Kan...
Uncover the Truth of the Trail: The Wild West Podcast Takes You Inside Dodge City’s Longhorn Legacy!
Saddle up and tune in to this thrilling episode of the Wild West Podcast, hosted by Brad Smalley! The show shines a spotlight on an upcoming doubleheader event in Dodge City, Kansas, featuring Dr. Frank Sharp—an educator, author, cattl...
Part 6: Blood, Mud, and Wasted Hides
In episode 6 of Buffalo Days, the narrative opens with a sudden and intense prairie storm that triggers a massive buffalo stampede. As lightning strikes and kills a bull in the herd, the animals scatter in panic, threatening to crush t...
Part 5: The Sharpshooter's Stand
Before sunrise, Josiah Wright Mooar sets out with Jim White to learn the technique of buffalo hunting from a stand. Moving six miles out, they locate a massive herd, utilizing the cover of sandhills and a riverbank to approach the animals while...
Part 4: Echoes of the Saline: Buffalo Soldiers, Indian Fight and Jim White's Confession
Part Four of Buffalo Days details the intense encounters between the U.S. Army and 400 Native Americans and a regiment of "Buffalo Soldiers"—and the resilient Indigenous warriors of the Great Plains.The section also features a m...
Part 3: The Buffalo Rig Deal: A Bargain at Fort Hays
Part Three of Buffalo Days details Josiah Wright Mooar's transition into the life of a buffalo hunter on the American Great Plains during the 1870s. Mooar recounts the arduous process of outfitting an expedition, highlighting the logis...
Part 2: A New Enterprise on the Western Frontier
Josiah Wright Moore, a young New Englander who traveled to Fort Hays, Kansas, in 1870 to make his fortune, recounts his initial struggles and a pivotal meeting with an experienced buffalo hunter named Jim White. After deciding to transition fro...
Part 1: The Shifting Plains: Buffalo and the Frontier Economy
The Seline River Valley in Kansas was once home to immense migrating herds of shaggy buffalo that darkened the plains as far as the eye could see. These animals grazed on succulent buffalo and grama grass, drank from the local creeks and rivers...
The Masher’s Mockery: How Luke McGlue Framed the Dodge City Lady-Killer
This historical yarn recounts the classic frontier hazing of "Herb," a boastful Dodge City resident who claimed to be an irresistible lady-killer but instead fell hook, line, and sinker for a mail-order prank. Orchestrated by local tricksters, ...
