The Oregon Trail

A virtual tour along the landscape

Oregon Trail Map

The Oregon Trail

• Pioneers: a.k.a. – Overlanders, parties, companies or teams (some groups: 1000)

• Traveled 2000 miles during summer months (April-Nov.) in 1830’s and ’40’s

• Young – adult males traveling w/ families

• Canvas Covered Wagons: clothes they wore, blankets, guns, ammo, knives, water canteen, blackened pot, sugar, salt, flour

• Many started in Missouri then…

A - The Great Plains

The Great Plains

• Several hundred miles of wide, rolling prairies (“Carpet of fresh green grass”)

• Native Amer. Territory • Buffalo• Violent Storms – Challenges?

– Cooking was tough– Getting stuck in mud– Crossing streams– Soaked clothing and bedding

B - Platte River Map

C - Platte River

The Platte River• Relatively easy portion of journey – sluggish, shallow,

½ mile wide• Friendly interaction with Natives until 1954• River crossings were difficult: Drownings, Quicksand• Dry, Dusty, Shadeless – Challenges?

– Lips cracking, dry nostrils, sickness: Cholera

– New animals, deceptive distances

– Monotony: tensions, tempers, weariness, boredom = Fractures

– Unpacking possessions to cross the river

Fort Laramie – Cut supplies

Independence Rock – “register of the desert”

Rocky Mountains - Map

D - Rocky Mountains

Approaching the Foothills of the Rockies

• Sweetwater River – O. Trail became more rugged (2-3 miles per hour)

• Challenges?– Trees cut, boulders pried/pushed aside– Detours around deep gulches– Wagons tipped– Creek crossings: unload, disassemble and load

Largest Mtn. Range in U.S. – snow capped peaks 3,000 ft. high – Passable?

Rocky Mountains – South Pass

Rocky Mountains – South Pass

• Dry, Rocky terrain of wild sagebrush, precipitous hillsides and prickly pear but gradual assent – Challenges?– Wagon unloading, ropes, pulleys, worn animal

hooves

Also…Unpredictable weather in high passes (snowstorms) – Challenges

– Slow travel, no grazing or hunting

E - The Great Basin

The Great Basin

• Northern most part, not a great descent (plains) but…

• One of driest parts of journey – Challenges?– Water unattainable, impassable gorges

Try Snake river but…– Difficult: deep, swift, submerged boulders

• Many rafts capsized

F - The Blue Mountains

Blue Mountains

• Very steep but comforting…Last range, near destination and crossed them before

• Challenges:– Similar to other mountains: ropes, pulleys, etc.– Health concerns: Very taxed at this point –

susceptible to dysentery and exposed to cholera, measles and Mountain fever:

• Sores on unwashed bodiesAlso, Heat exhaustion, children falling off wagons

G - The Columbia River

Columbia River

• Dalles settlement on south bank• VERY swift river, rapids – Challenges?

– Stood still for days– Fall in – many settlers died hereBarlow Road over Cascade mountains – Eastern

slope – Not bad; Western slope: swampy and heavily forested

• Used lines to slow wagons down slope

H - Willamette Valley

Willamette Valley

• Lush, flat valley

• On Barlow Road – cliff walls of valley were too high to cross:– Ferried river or – Native help– Most emigrants settled at the mouth of the river