Medicine Bow

History

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. The community was named after the Medicine Bow River. 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 stayed in or near the town during their search for large dinosaur skeletons. The town had a railroad and was near the fossiliferous 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. In the 1910s, part of the Lincoln Highway was routed through Medicine Bow. That highway, now U.S. Route 30, was the main route through southern Wyoming until Interstate 80 replaced it in 1970.

Geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of , all land.

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• Golden Eagle

  Aquila chrysaetos (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  104
• Bald Eagle

  Haliaeetus leucocephalus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  61
• Horned Lark

  Eremophila alpestris (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  44
• Common Raven

  Corvus corax Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  39
• Ferruginous Hawk

  Buteo regalis (G.R.Gray, 1844) · Aves
  29
• Red-winged Blackbird

  Agelaius phoeniceus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  29
• Killdeer

  Charadrius vociferus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  28
• Mallard

  Anas platyrhynchos Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  28

Most recent

• M 3.4 — 2024-09-14
  9 km SSE of Saratoga, Wyoming
• M 3.3 — 2023-06-03
  8 km SSE of Saratoga, Wyoming
• M 3.6 — 2023-06-02
  9 km SSE of Saratoga, Wyoming
• M 2.5 — 2023-04-29
  3 km NE of Saratoga, Wyoming
• M 2.8 — 2022-09-26
  20 km WNW of Encampment, Wyoming
• M 3.3 — 2022-08-26
  27 km E of Bairoil, Wyoming