National Historic Trails Auto Tour Route Interpretive Guide: Nebraska and Northeastern Colorado

2010·5.4 MB·English

by  National Park Service

National Trails System
National Park Service
U.S. Department of the Interior
29.9/2:H 62/8/2010
ClemsonUniversit
3 1604 019 589 813
National Historic Trails
Auto Tour Route Interpretive Guide
Nebraska and Northeastern Colorado
FEDERAL
PUBLICATION
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ChimneyRock, inwesternNebraska, wasoneofthe mostnotablelandmarks
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NATIONAL HISTORIC TRAILS
AUTO TOUR ROUTE INTERPRETIVE
GUIDE
Nebraska and Northeastern Colorado
Prepared by
National Park Service
NationalTrails Intermountain Region
324 South State Street, Suite 200
Salt Lake City, Utah 84111
Telephone: [phone]
www.nps.gov/cali
www.nps.gov/oreg
www.nps.gov/mopi
www.nps.gov/poex
NATIONALPARKSERVICE
DEPARTMENTOFTHEINTERIOR
August2006
SecondPrintingSeptember2010
CONTENTS
Introduction
1
The Great Platte River Road 2
From Path to Highway 4
—
"A Whiz and a Hail" The Pony Express 8
A "Frayed Rope" 11
The Platte Experience 15
Natives and Newcomers: A Gathering Storm 18
War on the Oregon & California Trails 21
Corridor to Destiny 25
Sites and Points of Interest 26
—
Auto Tour Segment A Odell to Kearney 27
—
Auto Tour Segment B Omaha-Central City-Kearney 37
—
Auto Tour Segment C Nebraska City-Central City-Kearney .44
— .
Auto Tour Segment D Kearney to Wyoming Border 47
For More Information 66
Credits 66
Regional Map Inside Back Cover
AutoTourRouteInterpretiveGuide
Nebraska
INTRODUCTION
M
any ofthe pioneer trails and other
historic routes that are important in
our nation's past have been designated by
Congress as National HistoricTrails. While
most ofthose old roads and routes are
not open to motorized traffic, people can
drive alongmodern highways that lie close
to the original trails. Those modern roads are designated asAuto
Tour Routes, and theyare marked with highway signs and trail logos
to help today's travelers followthe trails used bythe pioneers who
helped to open a new nation.
This interpretive publication guides visitors alongtheAutoTour
Routes forthe Oregon, California, Mormon Pioneer, and Pony
Express National HistoricTrails as theyapproach and parallel the
Platte River across Nebraska and cut across the northeastern corner
ofColorado. Site-by-site driving directions are included, and an
overview map is located inside the back cover. To make the tour more
meaningful, this guide also provides a historical overview ofthe four
trails, shares the thoughts and experiences ofemigrants who followed
those routes, and describes howthe westward expansion impacted
native peoples ofthe Great Plains.
IndividualAutoTour Route interpretive guides such as this one are in
preparation for each state throughwhich the trails pass. In addition,
individual National Park Service interpretive brochures for the
Oregon, California, Mormon Pioneer, and Pony Express National
HistoricTrails are available at manytrail-related venues, and can
be requested from the NationalTrails System Office at 324 South
State Street, Suite 200, Salt Lake City, Utah 84111. These brochures
provide more detailed information about each ofthe trails. Additional
information on each trail also can be found on individual trail web
sites. Links are listed on the title page ofthis guide.
"
AutoTourRouteInterpretiveGuide
Nebraska
THE GREAT PLATTE RIVER ROAD
"Too thick to drink, too thin toplow, toopale topaint " "A mile wide
andan inch deep." "A streamflowingupside down.
Covered wagon pioneers ofthe 19th century liked to joke about
Nebraska's Platte River, a stream unlike anytheyhad known
back East. But the Platte, strange as it looked, was no joke. A summer
shower could send it raging over-bank and through camp; its soft
quicksand bottom could swallow up an ox team. River crossings were
ordeals to dread.
The river's setting, too, seemed strange. Surroundingprairie,
frequently cleansed bywildfire, was burned bare oftrees right up to
the water's edge, and a line oflow sand hills, looking like a storm-
wracked beach, rimmed much ofthe rivervalley.
Yetthe yellow Platte, thattreeless "Coast ofNebraska," was an
—
emigrant's lifeline awater source that snaked 800 dustymiles
between the Missouri River and the uplands ofcentral Wyoming.
Though a choked and sandy disappointment ofa stream, the Platte
always was and still is a natural east-west corridor across the central
plains. Migratinggame and moccasin-clad feetwore paths through
"FortKearny&theSouthPlatte
River"by WilliamHenryJackson
AutoTourRouteInterpretiveGuide
Nebraska
the valleythousands ofyears before anywhite man ventured there.
Like those firsttravelers, covered wagon emigrants and their slow,
plodding oxen found water, grass, and fuel alongthe river. They also
found the valleyfloor to be fairlylevel and smooth, a fine setting for
roads in the 21st centuryas well as the 19th. Whenyou drive the
riverside routes oftoday's U.S.-26, U.S.-30, and 1-80 across Nebraska,
you are followingthe footsteps ofnative explorers, hunters, traders,
and fighters, and ofmountain men, soldiers, and countless pioneers.
This broad highway alongthe Platte Riverwas known in the 19th
centurybyavariety ofnames, depending on atraveler's purpose and
destination. Some native peoples called itthe Great Medicine Road;
othertravelers called itthe OregonTrail, the MormonTrail, the Pony
Express Route or the California Road.
Buttaken all together, the footpaths and wagon ruts that flanked the
roiling, yellow Platte into Wyoming now have one name in common:
The Great Platte River Road.
—
[ThePlatteRiver]wasfearfulto look at, rushingandboilingand
yellow with mud, a mile wide, andin manyplaces ofunknown depth.
— —
The bedwas ofquicksand this was the worstdifficulty. Margaret
A. Frink, emigration of 1850
H
:
BuffaloStampede"alongtheSouth
PlatteRiverby WilliamHenryJackson
tx**W£
AutoTourRouteInterpretiveGuide
Nebraska
FROM PATH TO HIGHWAY
Supply caravans hauling supplies to the annual fur trappers'
rendezvous began following Indian paths alongthe Platte River
and into the Rocky Mountains in the 1820s. Their pack trains and
wagons wore rough tracks, or "traces," alongboth sides ofthe river
across Nebraska and up the North Platte into Wyoming. In May
1840, as the profitable trade in beaverpelts drewto an end, emigrants
Joel and MaryWalkertook four children and two wagons to join up
with the last supply caravan leaving Independence, Missouri, forthe
final "Trappers' Rendezvous." From the rendezvous site inwestern
Wyoming, the Walker family continuedwestwardwith agroup of
missionaries and trappers, reaching Oregon's Willamette Valleyin
mid-September. Theywere the first emigrant familyto cross the
continent onwhatwould become the OregonTrail, and theirtrek
marks the beginning ofthe overland emigration era.
In 1841, the first fullwagon train ofwestbound settlers headed up the
Platte. More wagons set outthe following spring, and the next, and
the next, graduallybeating awell-definedwagon road alongthe south
side ofthe river and into the Rockies. Maps ofthe emerging emigrant
trails were published in 1843 and 1845 government reports prepared
by explorerJohn C. Fremont, who was delighted to encounter
pioneers usinghis workto guide themwest. Fremont's mapping
expeditions forthe U.S. Corps ofTopographical Engineers made
him a national hero, and the dashingyoung officer inspired many
Americans to start across the Nebraskaprairie.
The neglected old teamsters' trace alongthe Platte's northbank
was revived in 1847, when apurposeful party ofLatter-day Saints
(Mormons) began developingits own road, apart from the main
Oregon and California migrations. Thus began a distinct and separate
current ofthe westward overland movement along Nebraska's Platte
River.
Afteryears ofconflictwith anti-Mormons across several states,
church leaders decided to move theirpeople west to live and
govern themselves accordingto their beliefs. Church President
Brigham Young led the firstphase ofthe Mormon emigration from
AutoTourRouteInterpretiveGuide
Nebraska
Nauvoo, Illinois, to Winter Quarters (Omaha), Nebraska, in 1846.
(The Nauvoo-to-Omahatrek is described in the AutoTour Route
Interpretive Guide for the Mormon Pioneer National HistoricTrail
Across Iowa.)
Mud and hardship dogged the Latter-day Saints across Iowa in
1846, leavingthem exhausted, sick, and hungrybythe time they
reached the Missouri River. Unable to go on, the Mormon pioneers
builttemporary shelters and settled in for the comingwinter. At
Winter Quarters and scattered settlements in Nebraska and across
Iowa, more than 700 Mormon emigrants perished from exposure,
malnutrition, and disease over the winter of 1846-47.
During those brutal months, Brigham Young and his advisers
prepared carefully for the final push overthe RockyMountains,
studying maps and reports and gathering equipment and supplies.
Young leftWinter Quarters in mid-April 1847with a handpicked
company of 143 young men, three women, and two children. For
safety and efficiency, the group formed two large divisions, which
laterwere divided into companies offifty and ten. This well-
disciplined lead partywould trek across the prairie and through the
mountains to the Valley ofthe Great Salt Lake to begin preparing
a place for the thousands offaithful to follow duringthe coming
summer.
.wefoundthattheRiverwe hadseen in the distance was none
. .
otherthan the celebrated "Platte," the highway ofourfuturejourney,
—
which causedjoy &rejoicingin my Soul. Thomas Bullock, 1847
. .
Mormon emigration
Keepingto the north side ofthe Platte Riverwas keyto Young's
emigration plan. The trail along the south bank would be easier and
grass for the cattle seemed to grow thicker there, but the Mormon
leaderwanted to avoid further clashes with anti-Mormons who might
be emigrating along the Oregon and California road. Young's north-
bank trail remained the primaryroute taken duringthe ongoing
"Gathering ofZion" that spanned the next two decades, although
many later Mormon parties did follow the Oregon-CaliforniaTrail on
the south side ofthe valley, instead.
AutoTourRouteInterpretiveGuide
Nebraska
Despite a tense encounterwith Omaha Indians, the loss oftwo
horses to Pawnees, and aprairie fire that forced the travelers to seek
safety on a Platte River island, the Nebraska leg ofthe 1847 Mormon
journeywent smoothly Alongthe way, Young's party improved the
road, setup trail markers every 10 miles, built ferries, and measured
and made notes ofthe route to aid those who would follow. When the
first Mormon wagons arrived in the Valley ofthe Great Salt Lake on
July23, 1847, the tired travelers immediatelybegan breakingground
to plantpotatoes and turnips. Over 2,000 Latter-day Saints were
expected to arrive in the valleythat summer. Theywould need food
to survive the winter.
In the spring of 1848, athird company ofnearly 2,500 Mormon
emigrants set out alongthe MormonTrail across Nebraska and
Wyomingto the settlementthatwould become Salt Lake City.
Although the Mormons abandoned Winter Quarters atthattime, later
Mormon emigrantswould continue to "jump off at Missouri River
crossings near today's Council Bluffs/Omahathrough the early 1870s.
BrighamYoung's hope ofkeepingMormon emigrants safely
segregated from other travelers was soon disappointed, though.
Discovery ofgold in Californiain 1848 opened the floodgates of
emigration the followi«ng spring,whentens ofthousands ofmen and
women, the "49ers," rushedwestward alongboth sides ofthe Platte
*n
River.
. . .When welefttheMissouriRiverwefollowedthePlatte.Andwe
killedrattlesnakes by the cordinsomeplaces; andmade roads and
—
builtbridges tilourbacks ached. Church PresidentBrigham Young,
1868 Utaft*
Foran indefinite numberofmiles thereseemedto bean unending
stream ofemigranttrains Itwas asightwhich, onceseen, can never
beforgotten—; itseemedas ifthe wholefamily ofman hadsetitsface
westward. William G.Johnston, emigration of 1849
Itwas alarmingtosee the longstrings ofwagons thatwere on the
road Itwouldappearfrom thesightbeforus thattheNation was
d—isgorgeingitsselfandsendingoffits whole inhabitance.
James Pritchard, emigration of 1849
6