Editing Medicine Bow, Wyoming (section)

==History==
[[File:Virginian Hotel, Medicine Bow, WY.jpg|thumb|left|Virginian Hotel]]
The community largely owes its existence to the [[first transcontinental railroad]], built through the area in 1868.  A post office called Medicine Bow has been in operation since 1869.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.postalhistory.com/postoffices.asp | title=Post Offices| publisher=Jim Forte Postal History | access-date=January 5, 2017}}</ref> The community was named after the [[Medicine Bow River]].<ref>{{cite book|last1=Moyer|first1=Armond|last2=Moyer|first2=Winifred|title=The origins of unusual place-names|url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=wu.89058322223;view=1up;seq=87|year=1958|publisher=Keystone Pub. Associates|page=83}}</ref>

[[Dippy (Diplodocus carnegii)|Dippy]], a well-known dinosaur skeleton, was found in a quarry nearby around 1898. In 1899, fossil hunters for the [[American Museum of Natural History]] and the [[Field Museum of Natural History|Field Museum]] stayed in or near the town during their search for large dinosaur skeletons.<ref name=":1">Brinkman, P. D. (2010). The second Jurassic dinosaur rush. In ''The Second Jurassic Dinosaur Rush''. University of Chicago Press.</ref> The town had a railroad and was near the fossilferous sedimentary hills from the [[Jurassic]] [[Morrison Formation]], making it an important stopping location for paleontologists, with fossils of ''[[Diplodocus]]'' and ''[[Brontosaurus]]'' found nearby at [[Como Bluff]] by the two institutions during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.<ref name=":1" />

The town was noted to be plagued by crime, with famous bandits such as Butch Cassidy and his Wild Bunch committing the [[Wilcox Train Robbery]] only a few miles away from the AMNH's fossil localities and Medicine Bow itself.<ref>"The Wilcox Holdup". [[The Pittsburgh Press]]. September 29, 1905. Retrieved February 4, 2013.</ref><ref name=":1" />

The [[Virginian Hotel (Medicine Bow, Wyoming)|Virginian Hotel]] is a historic hotel located in Medicine Bow. It was built in 1911 by August Grimm, and is believed to be named for the [[The Virginian (novel)|Owen Wister novel]], which is set in and around Medicine Bow. The hotel was added to the [[National Register of Historic Places]] in 1978.<ref name=nris>{{NRISref|2008a}}</ref>

In the 1910s, part of the [[Lincoln Highway]] was routed through Medicine Bow until [[Interstate 80]] replaced it in 1970.