Early in the summer of 1879, Rutherford B Hayes, then President of the United States, called the chief of the United States Secret Service - James Brooks - to the White House. The President has been aware for some time that there have been great developments out in the west, and he believes it to be his duty to go there and see what has been accomplished. The plan is to go directly from Washington to St Louis, and then take the new railroad to Kansas City, and then to the end of the line ... Dodge City.