By Steve Bergsman

My reason for coming to northern Wyoming was to see the region through the eyes of Craig Johnson, the author of the "Longmire" series of books. While I hadn't read the popular books about Sheriff Longmire, who solves crime in the rural lands of Wyoming, my wife and I are fans of the television show made from Johnson's series.

As a novelist myself ("The Death of Johnny Ace" was published last year), I was interested in comparing notes with Johnson about portraying locality as he so endearingly does in his books. An intermediary put me in contact with the author, and we exchanged a few e-mails. We decided I would visit northern Wyoming in the dead of winter 2013, but he got called away to a book show in Europe and I cancelled that trip.

After that my year got complicated and so did his. I even missed the Longmire Days festival in Buffalo, Wyo., due to scheduling conflicts. However, my wife and I finally flew into Sheridan, Wyo., on a gorgeous Rocky Mountain summer day. The temperature was a little warm, but the sky was wide open and bursting with puffy white clouds.

It turned out that the Sheridan Inn, which is on the National Registry of Historic Places, was temporarily closed, but the building was still approachable. When we peered through the windows we could glimpse the turn of the 20th century. The hotel, which was once owned by William F. "Buffalo Bill" Cody, has played host to Hollywood luminaries, the queen of England and the first great American author to spill ink upon the local lands, Ernest Hemingway, who, after holing up in a mountain cabin came to the Sheridan Inn to celebrate finishing "A Farewell to Arms."

Sheridan, which was founded in 1882 and named after famed Civil War general, Philip Sheridan, still retains the ambience of the Old West, partly because it has the largest group of turn-of-the-century buildings in a region with 46 on the historic register.

Past the Sheridan Inn is Main Street and the Mint Bar, which first opened in 1907 as the Mint Saloon. Since it was a warm afternoon, I decided to stop in for a cold beer. There is a picture of the original saloon inside, and it sure looked like I was sitting at the same bar, which was handsomely carved from local burly pine. This is definitely Wyoming territory because the walls were adorned with stuffed Rocky Mountain fauna of every type, like almost every public place in the state.

In recent times Kenny Rogers filmed a western at the Mint Saloon (he was thrown through the front window), and the rock band ZZ Top stopped in for drinks, as did the cast of the "Longmire" television show.

Stepping out of the cool confines of the Mint Bar and looking across the street, I saw a nondescript storefront that read "King's Saddlery." This was clearly a case of looks being deceiving because beyond the doors was one of the most fascinating sights to see in Sheridan, if not all of Wyoming.

The store is well known for selling saddles and ropes, some of which are hand-woven, especially those for working ranchers and rodeo types. Although the retail shop doesn't look much different from any other store, this is just the front of a huge enterprise. A whole world is in the buildings beyond.

Don King, who began making saddles in 1946, became quite famous for his work, and his saddles are on display in the Cowboy Hall of Fame and the Rodeo Hall of Fame. His success engendered this store, most of which lies behind the storefront. At the back is a rope section where hundreds of different coils abound. King's Ropes are so well known that a baseball cap with the King's Ropes logo on it is a prized possession. Johnny Depp has been photographed with such a cap, and a character in the "Longmire" television show also wore a King's Ropes cap. Bruce King, Don's son who now runs the enterprise, told me that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas visited the store, but I forgot to ask if he bought the cap.

At one point King began acquiring Western and Native American memorabilia and artifacts, including hundreds of old saddles. After he died, his boys continued collecting, and that display is open to the public in the Don King Museum.

This is no small collection. It grew to thousands of items and is housed in two floors of what looks like an old warehouse. It includes hundreds of old saddles, rodeo memorabilia, a horse-drawn hearse, and rifles and guns — including one found on the site of Little Big Horn, where Gen. Custer met his demise. A Plains Indian drum from the mid-1800s is also there.

Although at some point the Kings actually organized and laid out this important collection museum-style with display cases and artfully designed attachments to the walls, today the place is filled with crowded clutter that entails the history of the American West.

Collecting Western arcana must have been popular in the 20th century because the 1,500-item collection of Buffalo, Wyo., pharmacist Jim Gatchell was the basis for the town's surprisingly robust history museum.

Buffalo, about a half-hour drive to the south of Sheridan, is the venue of "Longmire Days" because Johnson lives a few miles outside the town. However, he is not the most famous writer to spend time in Buffalo. The renovated and handsomely revived Occidental Hotel has been around for more than 100 years, hosting many well-known people, including Presidents Herbert Hoover and Theodore Roosevelt and the writers Ernest Hemingway and Owen Wister, who holed up at the Occidental to write the first great novel of the American West, "The Virginian."

In the end I still didn't get to meet Johnson. While I was in Buffalo I heard that he was coming back from a road trip. By then, however, it was my last day in town. I still get e-mails from him, and I just downloaded one of his "Longmire" books for my Kindle. I guess this is about as close as we'll ever get.

WHEN YOU GO

My visit to Sheridan was part of driving loop I did through northern Wyoming. I flew into the city via Great Lakes Airlines (www.greatlakesav.com) and then drove to the Big Horn Mountains, Cody, Thermopolis, Buffalo and back to Sheridan.

In Sheridan, try the Sheridan Mill Inn (www.sheridanmillinn.com). But if you want to get a head start on the loop, Bear Lodge Resort (www.bearlodgeresort.com) in the Big Horn Mountains might be a better idea. When you're in Buffalo, there are great accommodations at the historic Mansion House Inn (www.mansionhouseinn.com).

King's Ropes in Sheridan, Wyo., is also the home of the Don King Museum, which houses historic Western artifacts. Photo courtesy of Steve Bergsman.

The Mint Bar in Sheridan, Wyo., formerly the Mint Saloon, has hosted the ZZ Top band and was in a movie that starred Kenny Rogers. Photo courtesy of Steve Bergsman.

Steve Bergsman is a freelance writer. To read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.