Camp in the Black Hills, South Dakota (with cow patties)

Recently, we have been watching the engaging television drama _Deadwood_. Following in the likes of Robert Altman’s 1971 film _McCabe and Mrs. Miller_ with Warren Beatty and music by Leonard Cohen, the television program _Deadwood_ is an anti-western in the sense that it subverts many of the conventions of the over-simplistic Westerns of the 1950s, which tended to focus on a conflict between good and bad and utilized the services of a strapping hero to save the day. The anti-western recognizes that life involves many more complex decisions, the day was never really “saved,” and that we are all both good and bad. The original outpost Deadwood in the Dakota territories of the Black Hills Gold Rush fame in which 10% of the world’s gold supply was found, was filled with bigger-than-life characters—Wild Bill Hickok (of Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West show fame), Calamity Jane, Charlie Utter, Sheriff Seth Bullock and the best character from the television program, the gambling whore man Al Swearengen, who effectively runs the town and controls the sheriff from his brothel—that really did inhabit Deadwood. Following their stories, we visited the old Dakota Territory outpost along with a few thousand Harley-riding characters on their way to the Sturgis motorcycle rally.

Because of its “illegal” status as a territory promised to the Lakota Indians, stolen by whites when gold was discovered on an expedition by Colonel George Armstrong Custer in 1874, Deadwood and South Dakota had a staunchly anti-government, anti-fed, non-conformist past, which in many ways, still continues today. This non-conformist aspect makes South Dakota a perfect home for the Sturgis rally, where over half a million bikers come to take part in debauchery every year. We had a nice breakfast in Deadwood, replete with some Heavy Metal coffee, which we sipped while admiring the bikers for their spirit of community and their passion for their bikes. A gang of them with black leather jackets embossed with the Illinois Deaf Bikers logo enthusiastically signed to each other; you could tell they were having a good time. There really is no better way to see this country than on a bike.