Originally featured in Points West magazine in Winter 2012
The Irma Hotel’s “Wheel of Fortune”
The Irma Hotel became the center of the town of Cody’s social scene with its grand opening on November 18, 1902. There were more guests in attendance than lived in the town at the time (population approximately three hundred in 1900), and the gala was talked about for months. The hotel, built at a cost of roughly eighty thousand dollars, had forty guest rooms, including several with bathrooms, a dining room, a bar room with two pool tables, and a lobby with comfortable seating areas. The cherry wood bar remains in the same place today as in 1902—though the room is now the main dining room—and is still the main focal point of the hotel.
Somewhere in the hotel, but not visible in any known photographs from those early years, was this “Wheel of Fortune” which is now on display in the recently redesigned and reinstalled Buffalo Bill Museum. It measures fifty-five inches across and is decorated with mirror surfaces and brass stops.
Wheel of Fortune, ca. 1905. Gift of Quintin Blair Family. 1.69.5375
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