Christmas was celebrated in the early days in Wyoming, a century and a quarter ago, much like it is today with family dinners, parties, church services and school programs. Some of the festive occasions were reported in the newspapers of the time and an examination of press accounts reveals some of the interesting ones.

In Cheyenne in 1877 the ladies of the African Methodist Church cooked a Christmas dinner for church members and friends. "About 250 presents hung upon the tree," the newspaper item reported.

The Presbyterian Sabbath School in Cheyenne elected their new officers for the coming year, according to the same 1877 Cheyenne newspaper. Elected secretary-treasurer was photographer-banker D. D. Dare who several years later fled to the Near East after two banks in which he had an interest failed.

The Evanston newspaper mentioned a Christmas present given to the local judge. It was a "magnificent gold cane," the judge told the Evanston editor.

It is difficult to determine just how "merry" Christmas was at Fort Laramie in 1877. One writer in a letter to the editor wrote: "Good old Christmas was fitly celebrated in Fort Laramie. . . .Every window in the Post was brilliantly illuminated with a dozen candles each, the quarters were decorated with evergreen... Wine flowed freely, and many a hearty toast was drunk to the happiness of old friends...."

A second letter written several days later offered a different view. "Seeing the brief but improper item in your columns (about Christmas at Fort Laramie). . .the would-be correspondent gives not only an improper description, but a selfish account of the whole affair. But few evergreens were seen, the only being in the Band quarters. The tree was nine inches high (when placed on a bunk) and was decorated with old cigar stumps. Our would-be correspondent does not for an instant speak of the quality of the wine which flowed so freely. I have not the least doubt but some of that wine is flowing yet."

There was less debate on the festivities at Laramie that year. The "Wanless Hose Company" sponsored "a grand ball at a hotel Christmas night." Near present-day Newcastle, prospectors celebrated Christmas with the news of an oil strike close to Jenney's Stockade.

An 1879 newspaper reported festivities near Lander. "Fifth Cavalry held a grand military ball on Christmas Eve." The report added that "Lander...was well represented by 'the fair.'"

On Christmas Day, 1878, a huge Christmas tree decorated with "glittering tinsels and golden winged images" highlighted the program at the Indian agency near Lander. Presents were handed out by Santa Claus who "sprang out in his suit of furs and robes.' After the gifts were presented "all assembled again and listened to the reading of the sermon by the agent.

The Christmas tree at Lander was not the first one raised in Wyoming, however. Nineteen years earlier in 1858 missionaries at Deer Creek (near present-day Glenrock) chopped down a spruce tree in the nearby hills and decorated it. That evening they entertained members of Capt. W. F. Raynolds' topographic expedition and Indians with violin music, Bible readings and German Christmas carols.

The Christmas tree was a standard part of celebrations in the 1870s. Residents of Rock Springs held a Christmas party at their one-room schoolhouse in 1878. The Christmas tree was decorated with cranberries and popcorn strung by the school children. According to one account, gifts were distributed. "Occasionally some old hardened sinner crouching in a seat at the rear of the building would be startled and surprised when Santa Claus, calling him by name, announced in ringing tones a gift for that man. When the child acting as Santa's messenger carried the prize to him, his old eyes would moisten and often tears trickled down his cheeks.. .The knowledge that someone cared for him enough to manifest it with a token of remembrance affected him."

At the beginning of the twentieth century early auto tourists had few choices for a room after traveling miles in an open automobile. An occasional wayside inn, a hold-over from stage coaching days, might offer the tired motorist a bed.

Downtown hotels had dominated the lodging industry for more than half a century in Wyoming because of their ready access to the railroad station and downtown businesses. Even though the auto tourist trade was only a trickle along Wyoming's roads during the early decades of the century hotel owners felt that automobile travelers were an important revenue market and actively sought their business.

But downtown hotels had disadvantages for the automobile traveler. Many were inconvenient. Located in crowded downtown areas and lacking adequate parking and oriented for train and pedestrian trade, older downtown hotels made no or could not make special provisions for automobiles.

One alternative for the auto tourist was to camp along the roads. This "squatter" period gained popularity just before the start of World War I and continued until the 1920s. Destruction of private property and litter forced many landowners to post "no trespassing" signs and fence off former camping spots.

Due to the growth of automobile traffic during the 1920s a new development emerged in the form of municipal camping grounds. Located along principal road ways in city parks or near downtown business districts, these encampments offered parking, camp sites, and sanitary facilities, all at little or no cost.

As the auto camps grew in popularity they also became objects of significant community pride to Wyoming cities. Municipalities augmented their facilities with bathrooms, picnic tables, electricity, and even recreation areas.

But the popularity of municipal campgrounds with auto tourist and city leaders was amazingly brief. By 1925, most towns started to charge entrance fees, and additional costs for telephone use, firewood, shower and sanitary facilities. By requiring tourist to pay for a night's lodging and services the community campgrounds would oddly enough create their own demise. Private commercial campgrounds would replace city auto camps once the opportunity to make money from camping fees became apparent.

The private camps were substantial business ventures that offered more than just a place to pitch a tent. Campers could buy groceries and cook their meals in a communal kitchen, wash clothes in a laundry, use a telephone, and fill their automobile with gasoline. Once it was learned that motorists would pay for more substantial and private accommodations operators began to offer cabins.

During the 1930s, motel owners presented a fresh refined image of overnight lodging. They changed the words "camp" to "court" and "cabin" to "cottage." Motor courts and cottage courts took on the look of middle-class suburban homes. Cottages were furnished, like suburban houses.

The start of World War II abruptly diminished tourism in America. Automobile production was diverted to war machines and gasoline became rationed. Americans returned to riding trains and public transportation. Hotels experienced a renaissance with train-bound travelers looking for lodging.

The postwar years were the beginning of a construction boom in the roadside lodging industry that would last up to the late 1960s. The hospitality industry also began to use the more progressive word "motel." Even though the term had first been used in 1926 and occasionally during the 1930s it now became the standard word to describe the thriving lodging business of the late 1940s. A contraction of "motor" and "hotel" the word "motel" became the common name marketing a wide variety of highway accommodations.

The motel's appearance went from the individual cabin to a string of rooms intergraded into a single building. By the mid-1950s, many motels began to display soaring roofs, rakish canopies, and vaulted entrance porticos. Owners also spent considerable money on room furnishings in an attempt to make guests comfortable and get repeated stays. Air conditioning, telephones, and radios became standard features. Motels increasingly built the popular swimming pool, which was located in the center courtyard.

During the 1960s motel chains opened across Wyoming. Holiday Inn, Ramada Inn, Imperial 400, Downtowner Motor Inn, and Little America all competed for the motorist's lodging dollar. The new motor inns brought not only national brand-name recognition to the hospitality industry but corporate regimentation to motel architecture. Motels within the chain would all look alike.

During the late 1960s and 1970s traditional motel design gave way to the construction of a multistory box structure, which utilized more available space for rooms. These new structures became hotel like and were located near highways. By the 1980s the typical motel became a "highway hotel" that followed new commercial development located near highways and interstates. These facilities offered by the chain franchises have come to be barely distinguishable from one another.

Today chain-owned highway hotels now dominate Wyoming's roadside hospitality industry. These new highway hotels are nondescript, multistory boxes with one or two doors leading to the lobby and hallways. Gone is the direct access from car to room that once autotourist favored.

The word "motel" has become obsolete. Today, corporate and franchise chain motels are called inns, hotels, lodges and even suites.

But there are still small family owned and operated motels hidden across Wyoming. Bypassed by interstate highways and the fast pace of life these rare motels offer a glimpse of Wyoming's vanished, early roadside lodging industry.

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