 Have you ever driven between Deadwood, South Dakota and Cheyenne, Wyoming? This scenic trip will take you about four and a half hours. This route was well traveled in the late 1800s by way of the Cheyenne and Black Hills stage and express line, better known as the Deadwood stage. The first stagecoach made this 50-hour journey in 1876, a risky prospect due to previous Indian attacks. At the time, there was a big gold boom in Deadwood. The gold was moved to the Union Pacific Railroad in Cheyenne via stagecoach, making the cargo extremely valuable, and, as you can imagine, a prime target for outlaws. The most historic stagecoach traveled between Deadwood and Cheyenne for many years. It was the center of several incidents where bandits killed drivers and robbed the treasure. Buffalo Bill Cody found this abandoned stagecoach and rescued it. The coach continued on the stage line until it became the centerpiece of Buffalo Bill's Wild West shows all over America and Europe. The run of the Deadwood stage was notorious but short-lived. The railroad moved into Central Wyoming and the Black Hills in 1886 and the last coach ran in February of 1887. So next time you run for the passenger seat yelling, Shotgun! Think of the roots of that saying, brave men riding beside the drivers with shotguns to defend the stagecoach from highwaymen and bandits. From the University of Wyoming Extension, I'm Mae Smith, Exploring the Nature of Wyoming.