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Get ready for a chilling walk down memory lane as we take you on a ghostly journey through Dodge City with our mischievous guide, Luke McGlue. Picture this: it's Halloween night, and the usually bustling streets are eerily silent. Luke has a mission - to administer the infamous Keely Cure to a stubbornly intoxicated judge. Sounds simple, right? But things aren't always as they seem in this legendary Wild West town.

In the second act, we take a haunting detour to the city's graveyard with our special guest, historian Brad Smalley. Uncover the tragic tales of Lizzie Palmer and J.M. Essington, victims of the city's lawless past. Ever wondered about the spectral figure of Billy Brooks, Dodge City's first appointed Marshal? Hear a captivating recount of his life and the mystery surrounding his ghostly presence. And don't worry, we won't leave you in suspense. Stick around after the show as Brad and Mike unravel the intriguing blend of truth and tales that make up this riveting episode. So, are you ready for a wild ride through Dodge City's shadowy past?

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In November 2026, The Wild West Podcast will launch a new month-long series, Beyond the Legend: The True History of the Frontier, that deconstructs popular Hollywood myths about the 19th-century American West. Drawing on primary sources, court records, and historical archives, the series will examine the facts behind romanticized cowboy clichés to reveal a grittier, darker, more complex frontier. The series will debunk the cinematic "quick-draw" duel and explore the ruthless, flawed realities of famous lawmen such as Wyatt Earp. The narrative will also clarify regional historical facts, showing that primary nineteenth-century sources consistently referred to the cattle route into Dodge City as the "Western Trail" or "Western Cattle Trail," and examine frontier gun-control ordinances that directly contradict cinematic depictions of a lawless, unrestricted jurisdiction.

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If you'd like to buy one or more of our fully illustrated dime novel publications, you can click the link I've included.

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Halloween night in Spearville, Kansas, arrived with a blizzard so dense it erased the horizon and pressed the cold into the marrow of every bone. The wind rattled the windows of the Ford County Bank, carrying with it the scent of scorched kerosene and the faint, metallic tang of fear. Inside, Oliver Yantis, Bill Doolin, and George "Bittercreek" Newcomb moved with the practiced urgency of men who had robbed banks before. Yantis’s gloved hands shook as he stuffed silver coins and crisp Treasury notes into a battered canvas sack, the fabric stiff with frost. Outside, the storm thickened, and a darkness seeped through the mortar, heavy with the odor of old crypts and dried blood. The outlaws fled into the Cimarron breaks, their horses’ hooves muffled by the snow, only to find themselves swallowed by a white, endless void. In a sagging line shack, the stolen money lay between them like a curse, while the wind clawed at the boards and shadows stretched across the walls, alive with a slow, deliberate pulse.

Alone now, Yantis crouched in a dugout carved from frozen earth, the air thick with the smell of damp rot and gun oil. Somewhere beyond the door, a rider approached—headless, astride a pale horse whose breath steamed in the moonlight. The apparition’s coat flapped in the wind, canvas stiff with the memory of old blood. Yantis fired his revolver, but the bullets shattered like ice against the rider’s chest, falling useless to the dirt floor. Panic clawed at his throat as the dugout seemed to shrink, the darkness pressing in until he could taste the soil on his tongue. Desperate, he burst into the open, blinded by moonlight and snow, and ran straight into the waiting rifles of Sheriff Chalk Beeson and Deputy Tom Hueston. The shots echoed across the prairie, but the nightmare did not end. In the telegraph office, the wires began to chatter, keys clacking out warnings in the empty night. Even now, as October winds howl through Spearville, doors are bolted tight and children hush at the sound of phantom hoofbeats—Oliver Yantis, still running, forever lost in the frozen dark.

Support the show

If you'd like to buy one or more of our fully illustrated dime novel publications, you can click the link I've included.