Calamity Jane (Doris Day) rides into Deadwood, South Dakota, Dakota Territory as shotgun messenger on the stagecoach. The local saloon bar, the Golden Garter, sends for beautiful women to appear on the stage and entertain the residents of a town with few females. Unfortunately, the men are anything but pleased when the latest "woman" turns out to be a man named Francis Fryer (Dick Wesson (actor)), who does a stage act in drag (reluctantly) and goes under the name Frances Fryer. The saloon owner was misled by the girlish-sounding name when reading an advertisement in the newspaper. The men begin to storm out. Calamity, thinking quickly in all the panic, vows to get them the one woman they are all drooling over: singer Adelaid Adams (Gale Robbins), who is in Chicago. Francis Fryer points out that Adams wouldn't be seen dead in that town but Calamity is still determined to bring her. Wild Bill Hickok (Howard Keel) laughs at the idea and tells Calamity that the night Adams steps on the stage, he will come to the opening dressed as a Sioux squaw lugging a papoose.