"Joe, please tell me a ghost story!"
"Okay, Edward, it's short and creepy. Not long ago, a woman visited a small circus and wanted to ride one of the animals. But because the animal wouldn't let her ride it, she got mad and hit the animal. The animal then turned into a horrible creature, escaped along with the woman, cursed never to dismount again, and has been travelling in the desert with a skeleton on its back ever since. This beast is now called the Red Ghost."
"Wow!"
Hello cowboys and cowgirls!
Entertainment in the Old West was manifold: dance, music, theatre, circus (where the enterprising entertainment magnate P.T. Barnum excelled), vaudeville or exhibitions. Pretty much everything was represented that was already common practice on the East Coast, only on a smaller scale. It was late in the Old West that another attraction was added.
1890 - We turn our gaze to Denver, Colorado, where the future "Lady of the Gardens", Mary Elitch Long opened her zoological garden, the first between Chicago and the West Coast (the first in the West opened in Portland in 1880).
Mary was the daughter of a farm owner in California, married young and followed her husband to San Francisco first, where they opened a restaurant in a theatre building. This established their association with theatrical bigwigs. In 1880, the Elitches moved to Durango, Colorado, where they opened another restaurant. Shortly after, they moved on to Denver.
In 1888, the Elitches bought the Chilcott Farm in northwest Denver, renamed it the ‘Elitch Farm’, and bought animals from the aforementioned P.T. Barnum. After the first four turbulent years, Mary's husband died in 1891 and she briefly lost control of the zoo, Mary became the world's first zoo owner and operator.
She ran the park for over 20 years before selling it. The original park, which had been developed into an amusement park, no longer exists.