# Were real, Western-style horse-drawn stagecoaches still used at all in the 1920s? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 13, 2021, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402 "2021-01-13T04:50:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/1 "2021-01-13T04:50:25Z")
I recently listened to _The Dain Curse_ by Dashiell Hammett, a then-contemporary story written in the late 1920s. At a couple of points the first person narrator mentions taking “the stage” from a small-town train station to the local hotel. Would that have been an actual Wells-Fargo style stagecoach with horses, or some kind of small bus? At the time, were stagecoaches still being used in remote places, presumably ones that didn’t have the infrastructure to support a lot of motor traffic? The story happens in California, but keep in mind that 90 or 100 years ago the state was far, far less populated than it is today. The town mentioned in the story is on the coast, which even today is relatively underpopulated in northern California. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/2 "2021-01-13T05:05:31Z")
Many California (nontransit) bus operations still have “stage” as part of their name, and it’s likely that Hammett was just reflecting local usage. It seems to just be regional argot, as almost none of those operations predate the development of motor buses and paved highways. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/3 "2021-01-13T05:14:13Z")
Seems highly doubtful that a horse-drawn stagecoach was being used in the 1920s: > [@](#): > > Stagecoach robberies on the road to Yosemite persisted into the 20th century. In summer 1905 highwaymen allowed one passenger to take a remarkable photograph of the robbery in progress. In 1911 robbers hit the last stagecoaches just before auto stages took over the route. And, yes, you guessed it—a new era was initiated on July 24, 1920, when highwaymen stopped and robbed five auto stages. From here; last paragraph: > **[Stagecoach to Yosemite: Robbery On the Road](https://www.historynet.com/stagecoach-to-yosemite-robbery-on-the-road/?f)** > > The back-to-back robbery of two stages headed for California’s Yosemite Valley led to more than a few trials and tribulations. First described by members ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/4 "2021-01-13T05:14:28Z")
This 1922 newspaper article describes the “Merced-Yosemite Stage Line,” which transported guests into Yosemite National Park. It notes that the company started out with actual stagecoaches, but when motorized vehicles were allowed into Yosemite Valley starting in 1915, they switched over to Pierce Arrow touring cars, though the company retained the “Stage Line” name. > **[Mariposa Gazette 15 July 1922 — California Digital Newspaper Collection](https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=MG19220715.2.53&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN--------1)** > > California Digital Newspaper Collection ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/5 "2021-01-13T12:22:46Z")
There was a fair bit of linguistic confusion in what to call motorised vehicles, which probably was still being played out in the inter-war period. There was some fondness for the older names and applying them to motorised vehicles. ‘Coach’ was as much of a fossil of the horse-drawn era as ‘stage’ was. My personal favourite is ‘charabanc’, [pronounced sharabang] which was a 19th century horse-drawn wagon, arranged bus style with rows of seats, which then gets used for motorised buses and coaches until mid-century. In outback Australia the last commercial stagecoach route [only closed in 1924](https://maas.museum/inside-the-collection/2013/06/12/cobb-and-co-coach/#:~:text=The%20last%20horse%2Ddrawn%20Cobb,In%20Australia%20it%20was%20different.). ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/6 "2021-01-13T14:24:44Z")
On the Mt Washington (NH) Auto Road they still call the vans they use to drive people to the top “Stages”. > **[FAQ | Mt. Washington Auto Road](https://mt-washington.com/faq/)** > > Do you have questions about our Tours & Events here in Mt. Washington Auto Road? Find your answers here. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/7 "2021-01-13T14:54:09Z")
> [@Mr\_Downtown](#): > > Many California (nontransit) bus operations still have “stage” as part of their name, and it’s likely that Hammett was just reflecting local usage. It seems to just be regional argot, as almost none of those operations predate the development of motor buses and paved highways. And many of those bus lines (Greyhound, Peter Pan, etc.) call the vehicle a “motorcoach”. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/8 "2021-01-13T18:22:20Z")
> [@Banksiaman](#): > > …My personal favourite is ‘charabanc’, [pronounced sharabang] which was a 19th century horse-drawn wagon, arranged bus style with rows of seats, which then gets used for motorised buses and coaches until mid-century… There’s a reference to a charabanc near the end of this 1970 _Monty Python_ skit (spoofing David Frost’s towering ego and indifference to other people’s problems): [Timmy Williams Interview - Monty Python Scripts](http://montypython.50webs.com/scripts/Series_2/42.htm) ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/9 "2021-01-13T20:28:48Z")
This article includes a couple of pictures of an automobile “stage coach” stopping in Pie Town, New Mexico circa 1940: > **[Vintage Photograph: Santa Fe Trailways, 1940 – Stopping In Pie Town, NM – The...](https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/vintage-snapshots-and-photography/vintage-photograph-santa-fe-trailways-1940-stopping-in-pie-town-nm-the-horseless-stage-coach/)** > > These two shots from Shorpy are some of my favorite ever. You want a glimpse back at a time when life in rural America was very different? Here you go. \[…\] ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/10 "2021-01-13T21:45:21Z")
It also pops up, unbidden and probably confusing to the average fan, in the Stranglers song Peaches. ---
**Author:** ![sitchensis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sitchensis/32/4892_2.png) [@sitchensis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sitchensis)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/11 "2021-01-13T22:00:22Z")
Was it ever common for Wells Fargo style coaches to be used to get people from a railway station to a hotel in a rural area? All the books (mostly fiction) I’ve read seem to suggest the Wells Fargo stagecoaches were for long distance travel. Hotels would usually send a boy with a freight style wagon for luggage and supplies and customers could either walk or catch a ride. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/12 "2021-01-13T22:09:08Z")
I have been to Pie Town! ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/13 "2021-01-13T22:42:05Z")
A ‘proper’ stagecoach was a hefty construction, usually meaning something with 4 horses or more. They had to be really solid constructions to survive crap roads. Carrying freight and post was probably as remunerative as passengers but just getting all your horses harnessed up was a production in itself. Shorter trips for just passengers or light luggage could be done with a sulky or other 2 - 4 wheel lightly built wagon. Any [pictures](https://chuckmanchicagonostalgia.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/south-water-street-horses-and-wagons-signs-1920/) of late 19th - early 20th century street scenes will show you the diversity of horse-drawn vehicles. Many of these will have been for hire like taxis or light trucks, because most people didn’t have the money, space, time or inclination to keep their own horses, and many of the rest were work vehicles. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2021, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/14 "2021-01-13T22:56:33Z")
> [@sitchensis](#): > > Was it ever common for Wells Fargo style coaches to be used to get people from a railway station to a hotel in a rural area? All the books (mostly fiction) I’ve read seem to suggest the Wells Fargo stagecoaches were for long distance travel. You’re right. Properly speaking, a stage coach was a transit system not a type of vehicle. The idea was that you established a series of stations along a route with each having a supply of horses. Then you had a wagon that traveled along that route with the horses pulling the wagon at a high rate of speed. The horse could not sustain this speed for the entire route but they could do it long enough to travel to the next station. And at the station you would swap out the tired team of horse for a fresh team (the wagons were designed for a quick exchange of horses) and keep traveling. The tired team of horses would be rested and fed and prepared for a future exchange. By this system of breaking the route up into stages, you could travel the entire route much faster than you could have with a single team of horses. This system would obviously not be needed for a trip in town from a train station to a hotel. But I suppose the trip might have been made with a stagecoach, which was the type of wagon used for this system. I would imagine by the 1920’s there must have been a lot of surplus coaches available that were no longer needed for actual stage travel. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2021, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/15 "2021-01-14T01:01:46Z")
Was it exceptionally expensive to travel a long route by stagecoach? I know it’s dangerous to believe Hollywood, but stagecoaches in westerns mostly only have four, maybe six passengers, that’s few compared to the four horses and two coachmen needed. Now a stagecoach also carried mail, and to believe Hollywood again, _always_ a case full of gold/money, but wasn’t it a very ineffective means of travel and therefore only for the wealthy? ---
**Author:** ![SmartAleq](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smartaleq/32/163_2.png) [@SmartAleq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAleq)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2021, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/16 "2021-01-14T01:54:17Z")
The stagecoach roadbed around Hug Point on the Oregon coast was blasted out in 1920 (before the roadbed the way around was by calculating low tide and hoping for the best, pretty much) and was in use up to when Highway 101 was finished to the California border in 1936. > **[How Hug Point got its name](https://www.dailyastorian.com/archives/how-hug-point-got-its-name/article_a4eb0c65-cf34-5a1e-9b80-555388901545.html)** > > One of our favorite stories at the Cannon Beach History Center & Museum is how Hug Point became known as Hug Point. The first photo dates to 1907 (photo 308 Here’s my doggos navigating that same roadbed circa 2016. Those stagecoach people were NUTS! [![](https://i.imgur.com/EnwImik.jpg) ](https://i.imgur.com/EnwImik.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2021, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/17 "2021-01-14T02:14:30Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > Was it exceptionally expensive to travel a long route by stagecoach? I know it’s dangerous to believe Hollywood, but stagecoaches in westerns mostly only have four, maybe six passengers, that’s few compared to the four horses and two coachmen needed. Now a stagecoach also carried mail, and to believe Hollywood again, _always_ a case full of gold/money, but wasn’t it a very ineffective means of travel and therefore only for the wealthy? Apparently it was an expensive way to travel. [This article](https://truewestmagazine.com/fare-railroads-stagecoaches/#:~:text=All%20stagecoach%20riders%20paid%20a,t%20cover%20the%20%241%20meals.) says it cost two to three times as much as traveling by train. If you want more detail, this [website](https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=pst.000015977724&view=1up&seq=91) gives the fares for various trips by stagecoach. (It also gives a list of fares by train.) The first article notes that the cost of a stagecoach ticket from Missouri to California was two hundred dollars (and didn’t include meals). I checked the second website for its section on wages. A general laborer in Missouri in 1885 earned somewhere between one to two dollars a day. So a stagecoach ticket to California would have represented over three months’ wages for that laborer. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2021, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/18 "2021-01-14T03:03:17Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Apparently it was an expensive way to travel. [This article](https://truewestmagazine.com/fare-railroads-stagecoaches/#:~:text=All%20stagecoach%20riders%20paid%20a,t%20cover%20the%20%241%20meals.) says it cost two to three times as much as traveling by train… And, depending on road conditions, was almost always more uncomfortable, too. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2021, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/19 "2021-01-14T04:19:14Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > stagecoaches in westerns mostly only have four, maybe six passengers, that’s few compared to the four horses and two coachmen needed. According to [this website\*](https://www.legendsofamerica.com/stagecoach/) the interior could seat as many as nine passengers, with three each on the front and back seats, plus three more on the backless middle bench. (Travel was hell in those days.) One or two more passengers might ride on top, or seated next to the driver. I’m pretty sure long distance stage routes went out of business almost immediately once the transcontinental railways came in. \*You need to scroll down quite a way to find the relevant passage. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2021, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402/20 "2021-01-14T04:30:49Z")
> [@sitchensis](#): > > Was it ever common for Wells Fargo style coaches to be used to get people from a railway station to a hotel in a rural area? I don’t know about train stations specifically, other than what I said in the OP, but in 1870s-80s Los Angeles the two leading hotels of the town ran stage coaches down to San Pedro for the ship passengers, often racing one another to get the business. Amazingly for L.A. one of the two hotels is still standing, though it hasn’t operated as a hotel since the early 1950s. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-real-western-style-horse-drawn-stagecoaches-still-used-at-all-in-the-1920s/930402.md?page=2)