Howdy folks, it’s the second week of November 2025, and welcome to This Week in The West.
I’m Seth Spillman, broadcasting from the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City.
On this podcast, we share stories of the people and events that shaped the history, art and culture of the American West—and those still shaping it today.
It was a comfortable fall day for the 3,000 people who gathered on the hill about six miles northeast of downtown Oklahoma City that November afternoon.
The day had already been busy, with the trustees settling some business and debating the biographies of great men.
Then came the ceremony. Horsemen, kids and a guest speaker named Will Rogers Jr. Finally, Oklahoma governor Raymond Gary stepped up and handed over the deed for the land.
This would be the spot of our birth: After many years, the National Cowboy Hall of Fame and Western Heritage Center was real. It’s not every day you get to celebrate an anniversary as significant as this, so we hope you’ll indulge us a bit as we recognize the founding of what would become the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum on this week, November 11, 1955.
This November is both the 70th anniversary of our founding and the 60th anniversary of our opening the doors to the public. We’ll be celebrating all year and kicked things off with last week’s National Rodeo Hall of Fame inductions, honoring the idea that started it all.
It was in the chutes and dirt of rodeos where Chester Reynolds first got the notion that there should be a museum honoring cowboys, a truly American icon. Reynolds had been a salesman for Lee Jeans, outfitting rodeo stars and working ranchers around the country.
The idea percolated in Reynolds’ mind until July 1953, when he held a press conference at the Cheyenne Frontier Days rodeo announcing he would be reaching out to 17 Western state governors to rally them behind the idea of a “Rodeo Cowboy Hall of Fame.”
In the years after 1953, Reynolds worked tirelessly to organize a plan for the museum. By January 1955, delegates had decided that there should be a site committee and that, according to legendary New Mexico cattleman Albert K. Mitchell, the scope of the effort shouldn’t just be the rodeo cowboy, but the story of cowboys and the American West. Rodeo was dropped from the name. It should be the Cowboy Hall of Fame.
The next step was deciding where the hall should be located. Several cities threw their hats in the ring for consideration, but the competition came down to 3 finalists: Oklahoma City, Colorado Springs and Dodge City, Kansas. On April 14, 1955, a meeting was held in Denver to choose the location. Each city made its pitch. Dodge City even showed up with a (literal) parade of 85 horse riders and more than 600 supporters.
But what put Oklahoma City over the top was an offer of 37 acres for the location, $500,000 toward the building, and the fact that those donated 37 acres on Persimmon Hill were right next to the bustling traffic on Route 66, which sat just south of the proposed location. It also helped that Oklahoma was home to a large number of rodeo events and members of the Rodeo Cowboy Association;
When the votes were in from 32 trustees, Oklahoma City had 20, Dodge City 11, and Colorado Springs 1.
Oklahoma City went right to work. Fundraisers and membership rallies were held around the state leading up to the big day in November.
The 11th started with the first full Board of Trustees meeting and the decision on the first five Great Westerners to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. They were Theodore Roosevelt, great Western artist Charles Russell, humorist and Oklahoma’s favorite son Will Rogers, cattle drive legend Charles Goodnight and rodeo cowboy Jake McClure.
After the dedication, Reynolds was already thinking about the future. The doors wouldn’t open until 1965, but in a letter to Glenn Faris, the project’s general manager, Reynolds wrote: “I visited our Persimmon Hill before starting on my return trip to Kansas City. Seeing the site was an emotional experience for both Mrs. Reynolds and myself. It was not hard for me to visualize our dreams. In my mind’s eye, I could see our building and hear people coming up the walks.”
As the decades have rolled on, Reynolds’ original vision has evolved.
In 1973, the Museum became home to what would become the Prix de West, the country’s most prestigious exhibition and sale of Western Art.
In the 1990s, it expanded, adding the Edward L. Gaylord Exhibition wing on the west side of the Museum, growing our footprint.
Twenty-six years ago, the Traditional Cowboy Arts Association began its annual exhibition and sale here at The Cowboy. And this year, we also celebrate the 20th anniversary of our Small Works, Great Wonders exhibition and sale, which opened on November 1.
Persimmon Hill is now topped by our 220,000 square-foot building and more than 37 acres of grounds. The Museum’s collection of historic documents and artifacts, housed in the Dickinson Research Center, includes approximately 710,000 photographic images, 45,000 books, and 600 cubic feet of archival material, including manuscripts, maps, film posters, and the donation collections of Roy Rogers and John Wayne. And there’s a reason why many still refer to us as “The Hall.” We are still home to the National Rodeo Hall of Fame, our Hall of Great Westerners, Hall of Great Western Performers and the Professional Bull Riders Heroes & Legends.
We have more planned in the future, with a groundbreaking immersive experience and an exhibition about Route 66, the road that helped bring The Cowboy home in the first place.
It’s quite a story and one we are very much obliged to keep telling.
And with that, we’ve added one more day to the history of The Cowboy and “This Week in the West.”
Our show is produced by Chase Spivey and written by Mike Koehler.
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Come visit us in Oklahoma City! You can now buy tickets online at thecowboy.org-slash-tickets
We leave you today with the words of Chester Reynolds during the museum’s dedication ceremony on November 11, 1955: “We are here today with a high resolution to see that the memory, deeds and rich tradition of all who will later be honored in the shrine to be built on this site, shall not be forgotten.”
Much obliged for listening, and remember, come Find Your West at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum.
