#332 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Friday April 22)
Good morning,
Any number of books and movies can help one understand the remarkable courage, ingenuity, religious faith, blind faith, desire to escape society, and just plain luck that motivated settlers to “go west” and face the brutal journey and inhospitable weather. The story of these immigrants, panners for gold, cowboys, and opportunists have given rise to endless histories, novels, TV shows and generations of movies.
One cannot imagine the massiveness of this enterprise—to ride wagons, ride horses, and walk across the endless Great Plains, scale the Rocky Mountains, trudge across expanses of desert, only to finally meet the Sierras or the Cascades—unless one “steps in their shoes.” One can follow much of the trail, taken by over 400,000 immigrants,
One can actually do this. One can travel from Independence, Missouri all the way to Portland, Oregon along the Oregon and Lewis & Clark Trails. Many people will take in portions of the trail on different trips. Our first trip tracing part of this path was from mid-Nebraska through to Western Wyoming. Later we met the trail on a trip to Oregon. One can appreciate the way west and see many of the highlights of that trip in the comfort of one’s air-conditioned car. Here are some highlights, moving from east to west, encompassing several trips:
Fort Kearny. Years after the trip which I recount here, Lauren and I stopped at Fort Kearny on our trip from Chicago to Aspen and later Los Angeles after her graduation. We were driving in “the toaster,” Lauren’s white Jeep Renegade that starts to shake at 85 miles an hour.
What people don’t realize is that many of the “forts” across the West were little more than enhanced trading posts. The image of massive stockades really is a misnomer. These were more small villages with moderately fortified military installations. Fort Kearny isn’t that much—a group of adobe buildings along the extraordinarily flat landscape of the Great Plains. The fort is important insofar as it was the last semblance of civilization before the travelers began their arduous journey. People would stop here and provision before taking off, no doubt convinced the journey wouldn’t break them. But after a while, the sharp slopes after departing the fort foreshadowed the tough journey ahead—a journey that would break many a spirit and cost many a life.
Courthouse Rock. This was the first of the major “landmarks” along the route. These outcroppings were reported by nearly everyone writing a journal of the trail. Needless to say, they resembled a courthouse (well sort of…it takes a little imagination).
Chimney Rock. Chimney Rock was an amazing monolith (and yes, it looks a fair bit like a chimney) that appears above the plains of Western Nebraska, serving almost as a sentinel warning that the toughest part of the journey was about to unfold. S.E. Hardy described it in 1850 as looking “like a big sweet potato hill with a pile of rocks on top something like a chimney.” It was visible three days before arriving. At this notable landmark immigrants left their carved names. What was graffiti has survived as history today! Since the late 19th century, successive lightning strikes and erosion have shortened Chimney Rock, though it is still imposing.
Scott’s Bluff. Scott’s Bluff was named for a trader named Hiram Scott, who traveled alone, after having been abandoned by his colleagues. His skeleton was found at the foot of the bluff. There were some people who, when seeing this bluff far in the distance, mistakenly believed that this was the start of the Rocky Mountains they had heard so much about. A not infrequent observation was that it “wasn’t so bad.” But this was, to use a hiker’s vernacular, merely a “false peak.” The Rockies lie ahead as a challenge many could not overcome. Some scaled the bluff while they were there, some leaving their graffiti. Some celebrated making it this far and rested (never a good idea…), while others quickly moved on.
Fort Laramie. The fort stands where William Sublette, one of the great fur traders of the 1830s, established his trading post. He was one of the characters (along with John Johnson and Jeremiah Smith) upon whom the character Jeremiah Johnson was based (and who was played by Robert Redford in the movie of the same name). Eventually the name of the fort became Laramie, after a French trapper. The military purchased it in 1849, after which it was a military outpost, but also a trading post and a spot for respite for emigrants. At the height of the western movement of emigrants in the 1850s, over 50,000 emigrants stopped to reprovision here. Until 1890, when the Army sold the fort, it served as the headquarters of the Northern Plains. If you find your way here, it’s a great place to visit, with many refurbished buildings and examples of fort life.
Independence Rock / Casper. Independence Rock was by far the rock with the greatest graffiti remains (over 5,000 in total). While some say the name is because the rock stood alone and was “independent,” its name more likely reflects the fact that one had to get to this rock by July 4th in order to ensure reaching the destination before Winter hit. If you missed July 4th here, problems lied ahead. Just ask the Donners. As the “Great Pathfinder,” John C. Fremont (leader of the Bear Flag Rebellion in California and the first Republican candidate for President) wrote: “Everywhere within six or eight feet of the ground, where the surface is sufficiently smooth, and in some places sixty or eighty feet above, the rock is inscribed with the names of travelers. Many a name famous in the history of this country, and some well known to science, are to be found among those of traders and travelers.”
Oregon to Portland and Astoria. Oregon was the terminal point of the Oregon Trail, just as it was for Lewis & Clark earlier in the century. One also can visit landmarks on the Lewis & Clark Trail. The remnants of their voyage are not as prevalent (although “Pompey’s Tower,” named for Sacajawea’s son), is noteworthy.
In Astoria is a recreation of the Lewis & Clark party’s winter camp near the Oregon Coast. How crazily exciting and awe inspiring it must have been, after months of travel across the country, to see the Pacific Ocean before them. William Clark’s words, among the many memorialized in his journal, encapsulates this feeling: “Ocean in View! Oh! The Joy!” What the settlers to follow must have thought after the rigors and deprivation of the trip west when they, too, reached their destinations.
Oh! The Joy!
Glenn
From the archives: