If you’ve never been to Dodge City, KS–and, honestly, anyone interested in the history of the American West should visit there, it’s really fun and interesting–you would probably find it hard to believe what has become of the old Fred Harvey hotel building, the El Vaquero, and the adjoining train depot.

It has been fully and wonderfully restored, and is now the home to a really smart and innovative theater company, The Depot Theater, with a state-of-the-art stage and complete digital recording facility.

We visited Dodge during the research for Appetite for America, and details on how to do the trip appear in the appendix of the book. For anyone looking to do an extended “Tour de Fred,” it’s a perfect stop between Kansas City and the Great Southwest.

And if you’re going by train, the town is small enough that you could get off the train, take in the major tourist sites, get a meal and a hotel room, and get back on the next morning without bothering to rent a car.

If you decide to do it, don’t miss the Boot Hill Museum, which includes the famous cemetery with the boots sticking out of the ground but is more fascinating for Fredhead because the complex includes the actual downtown home of rancher Jack Hardesty, Fred’s brother-in-law, with whom he was very close. Hardesty was married to Fred’s sister-in-law, Maggie; Fred, Sally and their kids spent many a Dodge City vacation at this house, which isn’t so much restored as was left exactly the way it was found during the last years when the Hardesty family lived there.

Black Bart and I hope to get back to Dodge City soon!

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