History: Oregon Trail, Part One

On May 19 of 1846 President Polk approved an act that provided for military posts for protection of travelers along the Oregon Trail.

The Oregon Trail runs across south-central Wyoming, from Fort Laramie to Wyoming’s western boundary near Fort Bridger.

It traveled through the present-day town of Guernsey where ruts can still be seen; along the Platte River near present-day Casper; past Independence Rock near Alcova Reservoir; through South Pass, and back down to Fort Bridger before crossing into to Utah and on to the Great Salt Lake.

Oregon Trail Marker

Although the trail does not run through Sheridan County, it had an impact on our history and the history of our state.

Emigrants traveled the trail, heading for a new life in the west, or seeking the glittering gold metal that was found in California and later in Montana. To protect these travelers from hostile tribes on Indians, the government set up and manned military installations along the trail.

The Oregon Trail brought gold seekers to Fort Laramie, and in the 1860s, it connected to the Bozeman Trail which swung north to the Virginia City, Montana, mines. With this northern migration, Fort Phil Kearny near Sheridan was established in 1866.

This story from the The Green River Star, on January 24, 1913, it talks about preserving the adding informative markers along the trail to honor those who made the perilous journey. The story talks about much of the history of the Oregon Trail.

Today, there are several historic markers and sites along the trail, and it is a designated National Historic Trail, with markers along the route.

The Green River Star January 24, 1913

Marking the Old Oregon Trail – The national society of the Daughters of the American Revolution of Wyoming will ask to have a bill introduced in the Twelfth state legislature appropriating $12,500 to assist in the marking of the old Oregon Trail within the boundaries of this state. This request of the Daughters will not be unusual, though somewhat tardy, for Missouri appropriated $3,000 to mark one hundred and fifty miles of the Santa Fe Trail over which the ox teams and caravans carried the adventurer and merchants to the Spanish city of Santa Fe, New Mexico. In 1909 they made a generous appropriation to assist the Daughters of the American Revolution in further marking this southern trail of commerce and exploration.

Diorama at The National Historical Trails Interpretive Center in Casper, Wyoming

The state of Kansas has placed eighty-nine markers along this old trail, most of the expenses being met by a special appropriation from the Kansas state legislature. Colorado with her generous legislative appropriation of $2,000 completed the marking of the Santa Fe Trail as of October, when a noble monument was unveiled at Bent’s Fort by the Daughters of the American Revolution of Colorado.

Now that this southern line of frontier travel has been properly marked, through the generosity of the various legislatures and the ardent labors of the Daughters of the American Revolution, by monument or stone every five miles over its seven hundred and seventy-five miles of length, the states through which ran the northern road to the west are attempting to properly mark its line of battle.

It was indeed a battle-field, on which the lines of the persistent trader, trapper, explorer, frontiersman, gold seeker, soldier and settler left his bones, mile for mile, to bleach in the sun, wind, rain and snow. These sacred monuments showing the way to the land of promise to the west were only temporary, for time, sand and wild animals have obliterated all trace of these human landmarks.

The Daughters of the American Revolution are endeavoring to perpetuate the memory of these soldiers of western expansion by properly inscribed granite markers and having them placed along the trail. While the Santa Fe Trail was some seven hundred and seventy-five miles long the old Oregon Trail was two and one-half times as great.

Crossing the Platte River, diorama at The National Historical Trails Interpretive Center in Casper, Wyoming

From Independence, (Missouri) the starting point, about five miles east of the present Kansas City, to the end of the weary journey, Fort Vancouver, the headquarters of the Hudson’s Bay company, there was a stretch of prairies, mountains, plains, hills and rivers covering a distance of two thousand and twenty-miles. The Santa Fe Trail remained a trade route to the end; the Oregon Trail almost from the first, was a colonist’s route. The Santa Fe Trail, proper, had little to do with the mountains the Oregon Trail crossed three great ranges. The Santa Fe Trail was harassed by three tribes of Indians; the Oregon Trail by ten. The Oregon Trail was very much the longer and more difficult but it was proportionately more useful in the development of the far west.

If “Equality” were not the most appropriate name to call Wyoming, she might with equal propriety be dubbed the “Trail” state for through, across, up and down all over Wyoming are the fast disappearing trails made by buffalo, Indians, traders, trappers, explorers, scientific expeditions, missionaries, soldiers mountain and plainsmen and the home-seeker, until the center of our state resembles a hub from which radiate trails to all quarters of our common wealth and even some of the best, Indian, pack train, wagon roads are now usurped by the iron trail and its locomotive.

The entire development of this great Oregon Trail which the Indians in time called the”Great Medicine Road of the Whites”, is a fascinating story which has engaged the pen of many of our literary and historical writers. Washington Irving in his “Astoria ” and “Adventures of Captain Bonneville” and Parkman in his “Oregon Trail’ have given to the world literary classics containing the adventure and experiences of those who first marked out the Oregon Trail.

When the original John Jacob Astor attempted to establish western headquarters for his gigantic fur trade from the Great Lakes to the Pacific, he sent an overland party from St. Louis to the mouth of the Columbia. The men of this expedition, were the first white men to traverse the territory now known as Wyoming. In August, 1811, when Wilson Price Hunt. the commander of the Astoria expedition, came into what is now our state by the way of Crook county leaving by way of the Tetons. However, to Robert Stuart, leader of the returning Astoria party, must be accorded the honor of first traveling in Wyoming the road which in time became the Oregon Trail. This was the party that built the first house, or cabin, in 1813 within Wyoming, located opposite the mouth of Poison Creek just southwest of Casper.

The next path breakers on this trail in 1823 were Ashley and his men, fur traders from St. Louis, at which time one of the party, Etienne

Provost, discovered South Pass, the most significant find in the history of the trail. Then we have Bonneville and his party in 1832, who went over the trail with the first wagons to enter Wyoming.

Country around South Pass

In 1833, Robert Campbell and William Sublette, also fur traders, built Fort Laramie for the Rocky Mountain Fur company, the most prominent fort on the entire trail and which in time came to be the most famous resting place along the route. This fort or post at different times in its history has borne the name of William, John and Laramie.

The Oregon Trail for many years was the road for the old scout, Jim Bridger and his men whom 1843 built the fort bearing his name in Uinta county. Laramie and Bridger, hundreds of miles apart at the entrance and exit of what is now Wyoming have each in their turn been trading posts, military forts and stations on the Oregon Trail.

To meet the plea of the Indians in the far west who were anxious to have the”White Man’s Book” brought to them, missionaries were sent from the east. First of these to help make the Oregon Trail more indelible were the Methodists, Janson and Daniel Lee, who in 1834 went over this trail. These were followed by the Presbyterian and Congregational missionaries, Rev. Samuel Parker and Dr. Marcus Whitman. When these men of God reached the Green River rendezvous on this trail Whitman saw such a fruitful field for his work that be returned for helpers. Parker, the old man, journeyed into the wilderness and the young man returned to civilization, but not until he had vindicated his right to the title of doctor by removing from the back of Jim Bridger, an arrowhead that he had carried around in his shoulder for three years.

When the spring of 1836 came we find Whitman again on the trail but this time with his bride and Rev. Spalding and his bride. These were the first white women to go over the entire Oregon Trail. South Pass was reached on July Fourth when with proper ceremonies the party took that part of the country inin the name of the United States.

Returning in 1843 to the far west, he accompanied the largest party that had yet gone over the trail, hundreds of people with thousands of cattle. By this time this road to the west was growing broader and deeper for now not only were four-wheeled vehicles carrying farm implements, seeds, grain and many cherished pieces of furniture, making indelible tracks but the domestic cattle were doing their part to tramp down the native sod.

Father DeSmet Marker at Lake DeSmet

Then in 1840, came the pious Father DeSmet, the first “Black Robe” to help make the trail. His paths were many and varied though he was often on the Oregon Trail, as late as 1868 he visited Cheyenne when he told of the gold that would someday be discovered in the Rocky Mountains. When the emigrant band of Mormons went over the trail in 1847 they made the path wider and wider for they only went a few miles each day in order to allow their cows and cattle to eat the grass on both side of the trail For this reason the trail became broader and wider than an ordinary wagon road.

Diorama at The National Historical Trails Interpretive Center in Casper, Wyoming

Fremont on his scientific explorations in 1842 with Kit Carson as a guide visited Fort Laramie, pushed westward over the trail, bent his course to the north where he climbed the peak now bearing his name. The next year he again explored over the trail, writing back to civilization that he had discovered Salt Lake; but he was mistaken for Jim Bridger and other trappers had been on the lake in their bullskin boats many years before.

Next we find on the trail the gold hunters who in 1849 in their mad rush to California helped to make the trail more lasting. The finding of gold all over the west brought upon the trail the miner, his wife and children. But the Indian by this time was contesting every step made by the white-man upon his ancestral hunting grounds. Many were the depredations committed upon the trail, testified to by bleaching bone of red and white men making the trail more visible.

The frontiersman and pioneers were now crying for the help and protection from the government. Soon the horses of the United States cavalry made this trail more lasting and finally when the surveyor came to the west to blaze a way for a railroad, troops had to be on guard night and day. In other states the railroads follow the path of both the Santa Fe and the Oregon Trail but in Wyoming the first transcontinental road passed to the south of the old trail.

The old Oregon Trail should be marked before all trace, of this historic highway are obliterated. Not only the road should have suitable markers placed along its track at stated intervals but monuments should be erected on the most noted landmarks along the trail Forts Laramie, Fetterman, Casper, Stambaugh, and Bridger, South Pass and where the trail enters and leaves the state are suggested locations.

When the state of Wyoming and the Daughters of the American Revolution properly mark this part of the old road which stretched across our continent from the Mississippi to the Pacific ocean they will be doing honor to those who endured hardships and privations, encountered dangers and peril, who gave up their lives to make possible the civilization of the great west.

The Oregon Trail was the first emigrate trail across the western United States, and 179 years ago this month, President Polk ordered the military to come west and protect the Oregon Trail.

In next week’s column we will re-visit the Oregon Trail and more interesting facts about it and the people who braved the arduous journey west.

Feature photo, Wagon Ruts on the Oregon Trail Near Guernsey. (All photos taken by Cynthia Vannoy)