Field City

After leaving Newcastle, we girls passed through the site of Field City. (Click on picture and read sign). This town was created in 1889 and before the year was over, it had gone bust.

Before the railroad laid its iron rails, a speculator by the name of DeLoss Tubbs from nearby Custer, SD, took a gamble. Tubbs planned to erect a city along what he believed to be the most logical path for the railroad to follow. Called Tubbtown (in reality Field City), the little frontier community provided a great deal of excitement during its short existence. With few laws and many saloons, Tubbtown was located east of Newcastle near the hand-dug oil well site. One of its more famous visitors was Calamity Jane.

Tubbtown lost its entire population when it was bypassed by the railroad. On September 10, 1889, when lots went on sale in Newcastle, Tubbtown moved lock, stock and whiskey barrel to the new town.

Leftovers from the town...

Included in the town is the sight of the world's only hand dug producting well...

South Dakota With The Girls

Back in September, Trina, Jeannette and I left our husbands at home and headed out for a Girl's Day Out - in South Dakota. It was Trina's birthday and after Joe and I celebrated with her and her husband at a ranch in Montana, we had to do something different this year. So, Trina decided that we needed to go to South Dakota to see Bear Country. Trina's hubby was in working in a North Dakota oilfield and Jeannette and I left our hubbies home.

We left Casper about 7:00 a.m. and drove to Trina's home about 1 hour north. Driving along the road, we spied these birds. I don't remember what kind they were, but they were interesting.

I had no idea that the Texas Trail come up so far until we saw this historical marker...(click on the picture and read the interesting facts).

We passed through a small town just before heading into South Dakota called Newcastle and spied this sign and went to check it out.

The museum was named after Anna Cecelia McMoran Miller, the daughter of a pioneer family, and the widow of Sheriff Billy Miller, who was killed in what is known as the last Indian battle in the area. She was Newcastle’s first librarian, a pioneer schoolteacher and school superintendent

The Jenny Stockade Cabin shown below is the oldest existing building of the Black Hills gold rush. It was also a stage station along the Cheyenne Deadwood Trail.

An outhouse...

Typical school in 1890...

The old school bell...

Typical pioneer cabin...