Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid
From the earliest period of western history there existed a series of escape routes and wilderness trails used by those pursued or wanted by the law, trails which existed in areas either unfamiliar or unsafe for the law to follow; and thus a refuge for the lawless.
But it was not until the advent of Butch Cassidy that a series of trails were organized into one of the most amazing escape systems in the history of the West.
Butch Cassidy was incarcerated in the Wyoming State Penitentiary from July 15, 1894 to January 19, 1896. On August 13, 1896, Cassidy Elza Lay and "Bub" Meeks robbed the bank at Montpelier, Idaho and 5 days later, were at Brown's Park. Here, on Cassidy Point, plans were laid among the assembled outlaws to form what Cassidy proposed to call "The Train Robbers' Syndicate," but which has since come to be known as "The Wild Bunch."
The Outlaw Trail
Cassidy proposed a system of connecting trails through the most remote and inaccessable parts of the West, all joining to form a main "stem" from Canada to Mexico, and which he called the "Outlaw Trail." Along this trail were "way-stations" every fifteen miles on the average where fresh horses and supplies could be purchased in relays, usually at a friendly ranch, and thus in a form of "criminal pony express" and outlaws could be across state boundaries in a matter of hours.
The first station on the outlaw trail was Big Beaver, Canada, and the trail then wound southward through
the back reaches something as follows: from Beg Beaver to the Little Rockies near Landusky, Montana and across the
border through the southwestern tip of North Dakota to Deadwood, South Dakota, through the Black Hills country to
Belle Fourche, westward across the boundary into Wyoming near Sundance, Crook Country to Hole-in-the-Wall, a major
station and stopover.