JC Penney: Bidding Farewell to a Fixture of Local History

Considering the tidal wave of shifting consumer trends, it is a testament to the Sheridan community’s small(ish) town grit that our JCPenney store resisted closure as long as it did. When this once enduring fixture of Sheridan’s downtown folds, it will take almost a century of history with it—and a chunk of local culture.

Once the Golden Rule Mercantile, the store we know and love did not officially become J.C. Penney until January 1928, when James Cash Penney bought the Golden Rule chain. For the past 89 years, Sheridan’s JCPenney store has remained in the same location, even keeping its original store number, 954.

During the store’s time in Sheridan, it provided a staple for local shoppers, surviving the stock market crash of 1929 and a 50% annual sales drop in the ensuing two years. Pushing full steam ahead, our store rebounded, later piggybacking local benchmarks on corporation anniversaries. JCPenney’s 75^th year anniversary was marked locally with an April ceremony in 1977, marking the Sheridan store’s 49th year. Cake was served.

Upon marking its 100^th anniversary at the location** in 2008, the Sheridan store looked back on recent accolades. In 2005 and 2006, the JCPenney Company named ours store of the year and awarded it with the Chairman’s Award for managerial excellence (having previously won two Chairman Awards in the 90s). Our store recently continued its tradition of giving back to the community, such as its donations to the YMCA amd Tongue River High School.

In just under two weeks, we will be walking, riding, and driving by an empty husk where this once robust retail giant housed Sheridan shoppers’ treasures.  Maybe we can fill that empty husk with our fondest memories. What are yours?

Images: A scan of a 1946 store receipt; a picture of the original Golden Rule storefront; and a clipping from the January 4, 1928 issue of the Sheridan Press announcing Penney’s grand opening.

**City directories in the Wyoming Room show that the Golden Rule store moved three times between 1907 and 1928 before taking the name J.C. Penney.

Click here to go to the library's Facebook post.

Historical Sheridan Rodeo Parade Photos

Every summer for decades, Sheridan sported--and continues to do so-- a major rodeo and rodeo parade. Here are some photos of rodeos and parades past (they appear at various times on different library Facebook posts).

September 6, 1915. From the Peggy Cooksley collection.

1936 parade. From our collection.

Johnson Calf Operating Table float. 

From the Peggy Cooksley collection.

A driver identified as Chas Kane urges his 

horses on in a horse team pulling contest. 

From the Peggy Cooksley collection.

Main Street parade, no year. 

From the Peggy Cooksley collection.

Animal diversity in parades. 

Also from the Peggy Cooksley collection.

1925 Photo of the Indian Warbonnet Race

From our photo collection, the Indian Warbonnet Race of 1925. Click on the image to enlarge.

Click here to go to the library's Facebook post.

Bellevue Memorial Cemetery -- a.k.a. The Witches' Circle

Sheridan has its share of urban legends but one of the most enigmatic involves the strange circle of stone pillars by the Sheridan Municipal Cemetery. Keep going West on Huntington Street past the Ash Street turnoff and you’ll run smack dab into a gravel path circling a clutch of stone pillars facing the Big Horn mountains. Click on the images to enlarge.

Longtime Sheridan residents know the structure as the ‘Circle of Light’, with younger generations preferring the ominous ‘Witches’ Circle’ with stories of spooky goings-on during the twilight hours.

Properly known as Bellevue Memorial Park, its developers conceived it as a for-profit cemetery. George G. and G.W. Carroll spearheaded the project in the late 1920s, with Mrs. Goelet Gallatin, who designed the structure, overseeing its construction.

Bellevue opened in 1930, according to one of Charles Popovich’s books on Sheridan area history. The cemetery offered 225 plots and serves as final resting place for several souls. Some were moved to Sheridan Municipal after Bellevue’s closure, and new graves have been added in the years since.

Mounting difficulties maintaining the park coupled with the financial drought of the Great Depression caused Bellevue’s closure after just five short years of business, thrusting the Carrolls into foreclosure limbo. According to a 2012 Sheridan Press article, the park found renewed life when Boy Scouts spruced up the area in the early 1980s after it was mapped by the Sheridan Genealogical Society.

Set on one of Sheridan’s highest points, the pillars represent an ancient astronomical calendar built on a site important to Native Americans, concluded then Sheridan resident, O.B. Williams, an Army Corps of Engineers retiree, in a 1984 Billings Gazette interview. Williams devoted years of his life researching the circle, which he called The Sun Temple of Osiris, describing it as a “replica” of many similar structures throughout the world honoring the Egyptian sun god, Osiris, and his wife, Isis.

While he did not find a concrete connection between ancient myth and Gallatin’s or the Carrolls’ intended purpose, Williams claimed that the structure served as “a sun calendar device dividing the year” into summer and winter. Looking at the black and white picture below of the structure upon its completion, it’s easy to get drawn into the mystery of the so-called Witches’ Circle.

Whether the Circle of Light’s purpose lies in Ancient Egypt sun worship, witches’ rituals, or simply the aesthetic taste of the Carrolls and Goelet Gallatin, what tantalizes is the mystery itself.

Will any sleuths take up the call, maybe one day discovering the Circle of Light’s definitive origins? If that’s you, or you’re just interested in learning more about this strange piece of Sheridan’s past, stop by the Fulmer Library’s Wyoming Room, which houses the research used for this post— and so much more!

Click here to go to the library's post.

"The Bridal Procession of John Alden and Priscilla" Now On Display

We received a wonderful donation from Christine Valentine, "The Bridal Procession of John Alden and Priscilla," by CY Turner. John Alden was 21 years old while serving aboard the Mayflower as the ship's cooper. 

William Bradford's history of the colony indicates that Alden was given the choice to either stay at Plymouth or return to England with the crew in April 1621. Alden and Miles Standish were bitter rivals for the hand of Priscilla Mullins. 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow recounted the incident in his epic poem, "The Courtship of Miles Standish." Click the image to enlarge.

Click here to go to the library's Facebook post.

Historical Picture of Pioneer Park

A picture from the Peggy Cooksley collection of children playing in Pioneer park, now Kendrick park. The date and names of the children are unknown. Click on the image to enlarge.

Click here to go to the Facebook post of this content.

Photo of the Eggleston House, ca. 1895.

A photo from the Kendrick collection of the Eggleston House, located on the corner of Works and Tschirgi streets. Click on the image to enlarge.

Click here to go to the Facebook post of this content.

1911 Hill School 8th Grade Class Picture

A photo from our own collection of the 8th grade class at Hill School in 1911. Click on the image to enlarge.

Click here to go to the Facebook post of this content.

Sheridan Train Pictures from the Peggy Cooksley Collection

The first photo depicts a Burlington Northern train plowing snow with a grader/wedge plow. The second photo is of the first train to pass through Sheridan, Engine #173. Years unknown.

Both photos are housed in the Peggy Cooksley collection. Click on the images to enlarge.

Click here to go to the Facebook post of the train pushing snow and here to go to the Facebook post of Engine #173.

1904 Train Wreck Photo

From the Glenn Sweem collection, a photo of a 1904 train accident at the Sheridan train yard. Click on the image to enlarge.

Click here to view the post on the library Facebook page.

1938 Threshing Operation

From the Brewer collection, a photo of a threshing operation at the Sheridan Heights Ranch. Click on the image to enlarge.

Click here to view the post on the library's Facebook page.

1920 Photo of Crystal Ice Company Wagons

From the Webb collection, a 1920 picture of the Crystal Ice Company's delivery wagons. Click on the image to enlarge.

Click here to go to the library's Facebook post.

Miss Indian America XIV

From our collection, a photo of Sarah Ann Johnson, the fourteenth Miss Indian America. Click the image to enlarge.

Click here to go to the library's Facebook post.

1952 Miss Indian America, Lucy May Yellowmule

From our collection, a photo of Lucy Yellowmule, the first Miss Indian America and 1952 Sheridan Rodeo Queen. Click on the image to enlarge.

Click here to go to the library's Facebook post.