Shoshoni, WY

Ice Creaming at Yellowstone Drug

The rumble of cars headed to Yellowstone National Park 150 miles away and the whistle of the ever-present Wyoming wind fill the air daily on the block-long Main Street in Shoshoni, Wyo. (pop. 635).

Those familiar sounds mingle with the voices of hungry customers waiting in a line that snakes from the white-washed brick building on the corner of Main Street and Highway 26. The patient customers chat—sometimes in German, French, or Japanese—as they wait. The bell on the door jingles as people walk in and out.

Welcome to Yellowstone Drug. You can’t get a prescription filled here, but shiny canisters overflow with rich ice cream used to make world famous malts and shakes.

Each year, thousands from around the globe stop for a malt or shake, lending an international flavor to this oasis on the arid high plains of central Wyoming.

“We have had (customers) from Russia, Japan, Germany, France, Australia,” says Bev Surrency, who owns the store with her husband, Ted. “About five years ago, a lady and her husband came in from Germany, and they said their neighbor came back from a trip to the U.S. and said, ‘If you go to Yellowstone, stop here.’’’

Most days, the iron-backed soda shop chairs are filled as customers crowd around tiny round wooden tables in the old-fashioned soda fountain, complete with a shiny counter along one side and the aroma of sizzling hamburgers.

Many customers are on their way to or from popular destinations such as Thermopolis, Cody, and, primarily, Yellowstone National Park.

“Being in the middle of the state at a big hub where the highways meet brings traffic through. Our population and what day it is have nothing to do with how many we serve,” Bev says.

Shoshoni, which gets its name from an Indian word meaning “little snow,” is surrounded by farms and ranches. The town also is known for ice fishing in the winter at Boysen State Park. The Boysen Reservoir is a popular boating and fishing spot in the summer, too.

Shoshoni Mayor Tim Isabell agrees Yellowstone Drug brings a lot of people through town who would not stop otherwise.

“Yellowstone Drug has enough traffic this time of year (summer and fall) that they have people draw numbers and they call them out to them. They can’t get everybody inside the building,” he says.

Bev says the store set its last record on May 29, 2000. “We made 727 shakes in one day. That’s one every 44 seconds. And we didn’t stay open late,” she adds.

What makes people stand in line? The shakes and malts are hand-mixed from hard ice cream.

“We have to make sure we have ice cream with a good percentage of butterfat. We use lots of ice cream and less milk. There’s lots of cream,” Bev says.

Customers can choose from 59 flavors of ice cream or combine any two flavors—everything from the simple vanilla, chocolate, and praline to chocolate macadamia nut, licorice, or Mexicali mocha.

Chance brought the Surrencys here after they stopped for malts in 1996 on their way to Yellowstone from their home in Casper. Bev, an accountant, and Ted, a salesman and rodeo cowboy, later learned Yellowstone Drug was for sale. They made an offer.

“We were ready for a change of pace,” Bev says.

Besides ice cream, Ted stocks boots, tack, and other Western items. Tourists can find everything from Tums to Wyoming jade earrings or sets of plastic farm animals to amuse the kids in the car.

Built in the early 1900s, the building over the years has housed the post office, a grocery store, two mercantile stores (one owned by C.H. King, grandfather of President Gerald Ford), the First National Bank of Shoshoni, and the Masons.

Nowadays, it’s home to the milkshakes that have put Shoshoni on the map.

Mayor Isabell says townsfolk have spotted the “I had a malt at Yellowstone Drug” bumper stickers as far away as Arkansas, Arizona, and Alaska.

Ice cream to make a town proud.

Mary Angell is a freelance writer in Cheyenne, Wyo.

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