I'm also writing my first western and it's around-ish that same timeframe, give or take, as I haven't fully pinpointed that. Mine is a sci-fi western, so I don't have to worry so much about finding real town names. It actually hadn't even occurred to me to try and base it off a real area. That might be a fun idea, though. Well, my character will spend most of his time in the wilderness running from spur hunters and night jackals while trying not to fall in the slipping sand and getting to play with sand penguins AKA desert monkeys because they are funny and will steal long vaguely fish-shaped objects like pens, knives, and rifles...if they can carry it off. The sand penguins are a recent addition as an homage to stevengepp's well-known love of penguins.

Anyway, all this to say I can't help, but thanks for causing me to think of the possibility of using some old real towns (maybe some ghost towns) and good luck to us both with our first westerns!

Oh, wait! One suggestion--I hear librarians can be really good at this sort of thing...finding info no one else can. Check your local library and if you have a university library nearby, check it, too. Most will let you go in and use the library, even if you can't check anything out. Take pics, notes, and/or photocopy anything of use while you are there.