Today a bed and breakfast…yesteryear…a saloon and gambling hall. That’s right! The Trail City Bed and Breakfast is actually a renovated saloon that was built circa 1885 in Trail City, Colorado. The building was moved across the border to Coolidge, Kansas (its present location) in approximately 1887. In 2011 Proprietors Larue Lennen and Lori Lennen purchased and renovated the historic building to provide a luxurious western living experience for their guests. Check it out!
Trail City Bed and Breakfast Proprietor, Larue Lennen tells the story best…
Close your eyes for a moment and imagine that the year is 1884.
Can you smell the dust that thousands of cattle stirred up? Do you hear the rinky dink piano music pouring out of every saloon door? Do you see a street full of boisterous cowboys shooting it up: and riding through the city with naked dance hall girls aboard? You’re in Trail City!! Or as it was sometimes affectionately called, “Hell’s Half Acre”.
Unbelievably, a wealthy Texan, named Martin Culver, dreamed it up. He intended for it to become the most fascinating progressive city of the wild and wooly west.
Click here to read a fun and historic account of Trail City, its saloon heyday and how it is now a Western Kansas destination and cornerstone in an American story of ghost town to economic revival.
I am interested in the history of this area because my Great Grandfather Otis Newton Ford was reputed to have been a deputy sheriff there around 1900-1910. I was wondering if this could be confirmed and how?
Mr. Ford:
Would this be him?
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/97211545/otis-newton-ford
or
https://www.ancestry.com/genealogy/records/otis-newton-ford_22169101
Sheriff Mike Keating, Ret.
Hamilton County
Park City, Ks.