Per Historynet, he earned a bounty for the wolves he killed, and hunted other woodland creatures to help feed his family. The farm itself was one of the stops on the Underground Railroad, helping shepherd escaped slaves to freedom. It was a site often targeted by anti-abolitionists, and it’s said that young Hickok further honed his marksmanship skills by helping scare off those searching for slaves in the interest of not only protecting his family, but also the people on their journeys out of slavery. He would later continue his anti-slavery work by joining the Kansas Free-Staters, and then the Union Army during the Civil War.

After the war, he served for a time as a scout for the army. There he made such an impression on George Custer that Custer wrote in his 1874 book “My Life on the Plains,” “Whether on foot or on horseback [Hickok] was one of the most perfect types of physical manhood I ever saw. Of his courage there could be no question. His skill in the use of the rifle and the pistol was unerring.” High praise indeed.

Wild Bill’s quiet, formative family life of hunting and helping slaves on the Underground Railroad would eventually fade into near obscurity in the shadow of the deadly but glamorous life of the notorious gunslinger he would become. One could speculate that he must have missed his home on the farm while making a name for himself, but it’s doubtful that Hickok would ever admit such a weakness.