The Bucking Horse and Rider is a trademark of Wyoming and is featured on everything from license plates to coins, which illustrates how much everyone in the region identifies with this image and symbol. It’s part of the reason Wyoming is popularly known as the “Cowboy State,” and it’s also the reason that eight-foot tall cowboy boots are spread across Cheyenne.
The Cheyenne Big Boots have been carefully painted by local artists to show off Wyoming’s and Cheyenne’s history. Although their origins reside in a fundraising project, they’ve come to represent something far more significant and lasting for both residents and visitors.
“These Boots are Made for Talking”
The Cheyenne Big Boots program was originally a joint project of the Cheyenne Depot Museum Foundation and the Downtown Development Authority. Called “These Boots are Made for Talking,” local artists were contacted and commissioned to paint a boot and given very simple instructions: “If this boot could talk, what story would it tell?” Artists focused on a variety of important historic, cultural and scientific milestones of Wyoming and Cheyenne in order to tell these stories.
The boots were sponsored by local businesses and auctioned at a fundraiser. The nearly $100,000 raised went to the Cheyenne Depot Museum Endowment Fund to benefit the museum. More than 25 of the boots were displayed throughout the community. Since then, new boots have been added on a regular basis, and some of the original boots have changed their location.
The success of the original initiative compelled further fundraising efforts, and even prompted the Cheyenne Depot Museum Foundation to offer custom made boots to businesses, organizations and individuals around the nation. Many of the boots have found permanent places throughout Cheyenne, while others are continually moved and replaced. The evolution of the “These Boots are Made for Talking” campaign from a simple fundraising project into something much more has meant that it will never actually be complete, and will instead simply continue to change and evolve with the people and city.
This evolution isn’t especially evident when trying to track down all of the boots that are located throughout the city, and the experience associated with doing so is what drives that interest and appeal for residents and visitors.
Up Close with the Gambler’s Boot, Licensed to Boot and More
The Bucking Horse and Rider might be pervasive in more ways than one throughout Wyoming, but that still doesn’t prepare visitors for the eight-foot tall cowboy boots that are decorated with everything from the memories of the Old West to the blue skies over Cheyenne to deers and antelopes playing cards. All of the Cheyenne Big Boots tell a story, but their approach to doing so varies from the simple to the absurd.
A downloadable map allows visitors to discover the specific location of each boot, and those boots and locations have changed over the years, and the map notes that boot locations change from time to time. Boots such as the Governors of Wyoming, the Gambler’s Boot, Downtown Cheyenne and Licensed to Boot are for the most part guaranteed to stay in the city and at their locations, but the ephemeral nature of the boots and their locations adds to the importance of trying to see them all.
A good number of the boots can be reached on foot when starting from the Cheyenne Depot Museum, where a handful of the boots reside. Others are isolated in spots that aren’t especially close to this central location, and only have a single boot in them. Atmospheric Research is miles away from downtown Cheyenne, while People Places and Things is just located at almost the same distance in the opposite direction.
Being able to get up close with the boots and appreciate their scale and detail makes it worth the effort, but the ability to view and take pictures of these boots isn’t the only experience associated with seeing then. Visitors can call a number for further details on each boot to hear the free boot audio tour. They can then listen to the artists reflect on their own contributions to this project, along with the significance of the story being told across each boot.
That the pieces all came from a campaign called “These Boots are Made for Talking” is no surprise, since all of them tell their stories in a very direct way, even if they all have different approaches in doing so. Part of this is due to the variety of artists that created these boots, but it’s also due to the varied history and culture that is evident in the area. The boots are a direct representation of all this history and culture, which is something residents and visitors are able to appreciate in different ways.
That impact has enabled a significant and positive influence on the socioeconomic landscape of the city and region.
A Destination for Visitors and Area Residents
The visual distinction the boots represent for Cheyenne is easy enough to recognize with the eight-foot tall cowboy boots spread across the city, but the impact the Cheyenne Big Boots have facilitated is about far more than aesthetics. Since people and businesses have the opportunity to commission their Big Boot that can be included in the boot tour and drive traffic to those businesses, the community itself has direct control over what these changes look like.
This popularity has enabled the boots to become a destination themselves, as one of the people working for the Cheyenne Convention & Visitor’s Bureau mentioned that they see tourists taking photos of the Boots every single day, and also the reason the Cheyenne Big Boots are an essential part of many promotion material for the city. They’ve been part of and driven the popularity of cowboy boot items that are on sale across the city, and it’s easy to see how these commercial opportunities could be further leveraged. With boots like Book Boot and Patriotic, residents and tourists would have plenty of reason to further support the economic endeavors of the boots.
What’s just as significant is how other pieces of art and history of the city and region are interwoven with the boots. As residents and visitors scour the area to find the location of all the boots or just the one they’re looking for, they’ll also come across everything from statues dedicated to the role of women in settling the west, plaques for landmarks like the Cheyenne Opera House and directions to the Sand Creek Massacre Trail. All of these attractions are that much more easily discovered and experienced because of the interest the boots have generated.
Much like other monuments in Wyoming, the fact that the Cheyenne Big Boots have become a destination in and of themselves for visitors and area residents alike is incredibly important. However, their real significance is about something deeper.
The Spirit of Cheyenne
Given the harsh weather conditions in Cheyenne, the fiberglass boots are not going to be around forever, but that doesn’t represent a problem for the city or the program. As some boots get worn out, others can be swapped in, and those new ones can represent a different historic, cultural and scientific milestone of Wyoming and Cheyenne. This continual process will provide anyone who has already seen the boots with a new reason to come out, and create a whole new history for everyone to appreciate.
It’s a process that represents the real legacy of the Big Boots, and something that should outlive everything else associated with the original fundraising endeavor. The spirit of Cheyenne is captured in all of these boots, and will be similarly captured by future ones. That legacy will prove to be the most enduring and significant aspect of the “These Boots are Made for Talking” campaign.
