“Liver Eating” Mountain Man Interred In Cody, Wyoming
Cody, Wyoming, certainly has its share of colorful characters, but only one of them was known as “Liver Eating.” John Jeremiah Johnston was a real person and not just a character portrayed by Robert Redford in a 1972 movie. The real Jeremiah Johnston was a mountain man who was born in 1824 in New Jersey, fought in the Mexican American War, married a member of the Flathead tribe, and embarked on a 25-year vendetta after his wife was killed by a young Crow brave.
He spent many years in Montana and was a town marshal in Red Lodge.
Johnston died in 1900 at a veterans’ home in Santa Monica, California, and was buried at a Los Angeles veterans’ cemetery. When a freeway was planned to go through that graveyard, some 25 seventh-grade students and their teacher embarked on a campaign to find a suitable location for Johnston’s final resting place. In 1974, he was reinterred at Cody’s Old Trail Town/Museum of the Old West. Among the pall bearers was Robert Redford.
Johnston’s epitaph reads “No More Trails.”
Portrayed by Robert Redford in a 1972 movie, Jeremiah Johnston was a real-life mountain man who spent many years in Montana and was ultimately interred at Cody’s Old Trail Town/Museum of the Old West. Photo courtesy of Cody Yellowstone
For more information on Cody Yellowstone, visit www.CodyYellowstone.org.
