With Thanksgiving just around the corner, the nation’s attention turns—as it has for more than a century—to one dish that symbolizes the holiday more than any other: the turkey. Whether roasted, stuffed, or smoked, the bird has become so deeply tied to Thanksgiving that many Americans can scarcely imagine the meal without it.
Yet the turkey’s rise from wild game to centerpiece of the nation’s holiday table is a story of both tradition and innovation. Native peoples were the first to hunt and domesticate the wild turkey, long before Europeans arrived. Spanish explorers carried the bird back to Europe in the 1500s, where it was further domesticated and eventually returned to North America with settlers.
For centuries, turkeys remained semi-wild, raised on open range farms for local consumption. That began to change in the early 20th century. With the invention of the incubator and the development of new breeds—such as the Broad Breasted Bronze—the commercial turkey industry took off. Thanksgiving itself played a central role in this boom. Declared a national holiday by Abraham Lincoln in 1863, it soon became synonymous with images of golden-roasted turkeys, cementing the bird’s place on the American table. By the 1920s, the turkey market revolved almost entirely around the holiday season.
Here in Fremont County, the 1920s also marked the start of an ambitious local experiment to turn Wyoming into a turkey powerhouse.
In February 1926, Riverton turkey producer Mabel Piggott declared boldly in The Riverton Chronicle:
“Wyoming can and will be one of the largest turkey producing states in the Union, and the Riverton Valley with its wonderful climate, its clear running water, the dry atmosphere, abundant sunshine, and its fine fields of growing grain and alfalfa, is an ideal range for turkeys.”
Piggott had started modestly in 1918 with three hens and a tom. By her second season, she was convinced of the bird’s potential. “I could have sold five times as many had I had them,” she wrote.
Her enthusiasm reflected a wider local movement. In 1925, Fremont County turkey growers formed the Wind River Cooperative Market Association, modeled after the state’s livestock associations. The cooperative united producers from Riverton, Lander, Hudson, Arapahoe, Shoshoni, Dubois, and Sweetwater, allowing them to market their birds together and secure better prices. By Christmas of that year, more than 140 growers had signed on.
The strategy worked. Buyers competed for Wind River turkeys, and prices reached record highs. County agent T.S. Brown predicted even greater success, announcing a five-year program to improve flocks and boost production. He foresaw a jump from five to twelve railroad cars of turkeys shipped in 1926, with each car worth some $7,000—a tidy profit for local families.
By 1927, turkey raising had spread to 400 producers across the county. Interestingly, the work was often considered “women’s business,” a side income managed by wives alongside their husbands’ grain and alfalfa harvests. That same year, Riverton hosted a milestone event: a turkey show at the Tonkin schoolhouse. It was the first such exhibition not just in Wyoming, but the first in the Rocky Mountain region, and only the second in the entire nation. University of Wyoming extension agents judged birds and held programs on breeding, raising, and marketing.
Pictured from left are Joe Vincent, Evelyn, and Margaret Lawer with their mother’s (June) turkeys on Jackson Street in Riverton (near the current grade school) in 1928.
For a moment, it seemed Fremont County might indeed become a national turkey hub.
But the promise was short-lived. By the late 1920s, southern states with longer growing seasons and easier access to markets began to dominate. Overproduction drove down prices, and Wyoming’s distance from major buyers proved costly. By the early 1930s, enthusiasm dwindled and the Wind River Cooperative Market Association faded away.
While commercial turkey farming never took root in Wyoming, the bird found a different niche in the state’s story. In 1935, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department introduced wild turkeys into the state. The experiment flourished, and today turkey hunting is a thriving tradition. Thousands of licenses are issued each year, turning the once-domesticated dream of Fremont County into a modern conservation success.
So as families gather around their Thanksgiving tables this year, carving the bird that has become the holiday’s hallmark, it is worth remembering that nearly a century ago, Fremont County once dreamed of leading the nation’s turkey trade. Though the boom went bust, the legacy of that bold experiment still lingers—in old newspaper clippings, family memories, and the wild gobbles echoing across Wyoming’s hills.
By April Peregoy: Riverton Museum
Next up for the Fremont County Museum
September 27,10:30am at the Dubois Museum, “Kids Corner: Cyanotype Print Making” Bailey Tire/Pit Stop Children’s Exploration Series
October 2, 6pm at the Riverton Museum, “Riverton in Color: The Art of Dan Weeks”
Oct 4, TBA at the Lander Community Center, “Rare Relics Roadshow” Wind River Cultural Centers Foundation
October 15, 6pm at the Riverton Museum, “Fremont Haunts w/Alma Law” Wyoming Community Bank Discovery Speakers Series
October 17 & 18, 6-9pm at the Pioneer Museum, “Halloween Night at the Museum” Bailey Tire/Pit Stop Children’s Exploration Series
October 18, 5:30 with the Riverton Museum, “Downtown Riverton Haunted Trek” Wind River Visitors Council Adventure Trek Series
October 24 & 25, 11am at the Dubois Museum, “Kids Corner: Spooky Halloween Characters” Bailey Tire/Pit Stop Children’s Exploration Series
October 25, 2pm at the Riverton Museum, “Fall Fun Fest”
October 25, 3pm at the Dubois Museum, “Annual Halloween Carnival
Thru December, 9-5 at the Riverton Museum, “History Day Exhibits” Shoshone Schools
Call the Dubois Museum 1-307-455-2284, the Pioneer Museum 1-307-332-3339 or the Riverton Museum 1-307-856-2665 for detail regarding their programs.
The Dubois Museum, the Pioneer Museum in Lander and the Riverton Museum need your financial support. In the current economic environment, the museums are more reliant than ever on donations from the private sector to continue to provide the quality programs, collections management, exhibits and services that have become their hallmark over the last four years. Please make your tax deductible contribution through the Wind River Cultural Centers Foundation www.windriverccf.com or by sending a check to Fremont County Museums 450 N 2nd Rm 320 or taking it directly to the museum you choose to support.
