Buffalo Bill - Early Life and Education

Early Life and Education

William Frederick Cody was born on February 26, 1846 on a farm just outside of Le Claire, Iowa. He was baptized as William Cody in the Dixie Union Chapel in Peel County (present-day Peel Region), Ontario, Canada in 1847, not far from his family's farm. His parents Isaac and Mary Cody were Canadians. The Chapel was built with Cody money and the land was donated by Philip Cody of Toronto Township. The Cody family were originally Quakers and opposed to slavery. They had emigrated from the United States with other Quaker families from Vermont, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania, shortly before or after the Revolutionary War, when slavery was still legal in those states, to buy land and farm in York, Peel, and Ontario counties.

In 1853 Isaac Cody sold his land in rural Scott County, Iowa for $2000 and he and his family moved to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas Territory. In these years before the Civil War, Kansas was high with emotion and physical conflict on both sides of the slavery question. When his father was invited to speak he gave a antislavery speech at Rively's store, a local trading post where pro-slavery men often held meetings. They became angry and threaten to kill him if he didn't step down. One man from the angry crowd jumped up and stabbed him twice with a bowie knife. His father would have died from his wounds if it wasn't for Mr. Rively who rushed him to safety. His father never fully recovered from his injuries.

In Kansas, the family was frequently persecuted by pro-slavery supporters, forcing Isaac Cody to spend much of his time away from home. His enemies learned of a planned visit to his family and plotted to kill him on the way. The young Cody, despite his youth and the fact that he was ill, rode 30 miles (48 km) to warn his father. Cody's father went to Cleveland, Ohio to organize a colony of thirty families to bring back to Kansas. During his return trip he caught a cold, which he eventually died from. The combination of his stab wound, that he never fully recovered from, and complications from kidney disease became too much and he died in April, 1857.

After the father's death, the Cody family suffered financially. At age 11, Bill Cody took a job with a freight carrier as a "boy extra." He would ride up and down the length of a wagon train, and deliver messages to the drivers and workmen. Next he joined Johnston's Army as an unofficial member of the scouts assigned to guide the Army to Utah to put down a rumored rebellion by the Mormon population of Salt Lake City. According to Cody's account in Buffalo Bill's Own Story, the Utah War was where he first began his career as an "Indian fighter".

Presently the moon rose, dead ahead of me; and painted boldly across its face was the figure of an Indian. He wore this war-bonnet of the Sioux, at his shoulder was a rifle pointed at someone in the river-bottom 30 feet (9 m) below; in another second he would drop one of my friends. I raised my old muzzle-loader and fired. The figure collapsed, tumbled down the bank and landed with a splash in the water. 'What is it?' called McCarthy, as he hurried back. 'It's over there in the water.' 'Hi!' he cried. 'Little Billy's killed an Indian all by himself!' So began my career as an Indian fighter.

At the age of 14, Cody was struck by gold fever, but on his way to the gold fields, he met an agent for the Pony Express. He signed with them, and after building several stations and corrals, Cody was given a job as a rider, which he kept until he was called home to his sick mother's bedside.

Cody was active in the concordant bodies of Freemasonry, being initiated in Platte Valley Lodge No. 32, North Platte, Nebraska, on March 5, 1870. He received his 2nd and 3rd degrees on April 2, 1870, and January 10, 1871, respectively. He became a Knight Templar in 1889 and received his 32 degree in Scottish Rite Masonry in 1894.