Bio
Jeremy M. Johnston currently serves as the Historian of the Buffalo Bill Center of the West, the Hal and Naoma Tate Endowed Chair of Western History, and the Managing Editor of the Papers of William F. Cody. Born and raised in Powell, Wyoming, Johnston graduated from Powell High School. Johnston attended the University of Wyoming, from which he received his Bachelor of Arts in 1993 and his Master of Arts in 1995. Johnston earned his Ph.D. in American Studies at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland, in 2017. His doctoral dissertation examined the personal and professional relationship between Theodore Roosevelt and William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody, soon to be published by the University of Oklahoma Press under the title Two Rough Riders. He previously taught at Northwest College in Powell, Wyoming, for over fifteen years. Johnston also served as the Ernest J. Goppert Curator of the Buffalo Bill Museum at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West. Johnston published various articles in Annals of Wyoming, Colorado Heritage, the Buffalo Bil Center of the West’s magazine Points West, Readings of Wyoming History, the George Wright Forum, and Yellowstone Science. He released his first book, a photo history of Powell, Wyoming, in 2009, followed by a “then and now” photo history in 2012. Johnston is the recipient of the 2006 Coke Wood Award, sponsored by Westerners International, for his article “Progressivism Comes to Yellowstone: Theodore Roosevelt and Professional Land Management Agencies in the Yellowstone Ecosystem.” He is a past president of the Wyoming State Historical Society and currently serves on the Public History Committee of the Western History Association. Johnston has appeared on various Wyoming PBS documentaries, including Roy Barnes: Rocky Mountain Cowboy and Wyoming Voices, in addition to Tony Robinson’s Wild West for the Discovery UK Channel and Mysteries at the Museum for the Travel Channel. Collaborating with Dr. Charles Preston of the Center’s Draper Natural History Museum, he produced an annotated version of Ernest Thompson-Seton’s Wahb: The Biography of a Grizzly, published by the University of Oklahoma Press. Johnston and Lynn Houze co-edited the memoir of Buffalo Bill’s fellow town founder of Cody, Wyoming, George W. T. Beck, titled Beckoning Frontiers: The Memoir of a Wyoming Entrepreneur, to be released in Spring 2020 by the University of Nebraska Press. Johnston is completing a biography of Theodore Roosevelt for the South Dakota Historical Society Press.