Mile 764: Register Cliffs
"Later investigation proved that the jutting points of the bluffs all had initials, and sometimes full name and address and date, carved upon the soft stone surfaces. They are called…
Mile 760: Mexican Hill
"For the better part of a mile we kept to the edge of the bluffs, separating and spreading over a wide strip of territory as we hunted for the place…
Nile 754: Black Hills
"The road leading west from Fort Laramie was anathema to the overloaded Argonauts, for it marked the beginning of the Black Hills, whose low, rough summits shouldered the sky just…
Mile 753: Fort Laramie
"Recorded history of the section immediately west of Scott's Bluff begins about the year 1818 when Jaques La Ramie, a French Canadian, built a trapper's cabin near the junction of…
Mile 689: Robidoux Pass
"The river lapped at the very base of Scott's Bluff. The wagons must go inland. This was the more difficult because the bluff is not an isolated rocky formation, but…
Mile 680: Scott’s Bluff
"The third of the soft stone landmarks is Scott's Bluff, slightly more than twenty miles from the Chimney. Scott's Bluff owes its name to an incident of the fur-trapping days.…
Mile 655: Chimney Rock
"On the north side [of Courthouse Rock], between it and the river, a large area of swampy ground makes the going uncertain, and Chimney Rock, the next famous landmark, looms…
Mile 636: Courthouse Rock and Jail Rock
"Late in the afternoon, when the evening sky was lemon-colored and placid, we distinguished the dark bulk of Courthouse Rock outlined against the sunset and knew that this day's journey…
Mile 554: Lodgepole Creek Valley
"Here is the valley of Lodgepole Creek through which passed historic trails, telegraph lines, and railroads. The famed Pony Express followed the valley in 1860-61. “Nine Mile” Pony Express station…
Mile 475: O’Fallon’s Bluffs
"We passed a marker of the site of Bishop's Station and soon came to the first of the famous trail landmarks south of the river: O'Fallon's Bluffs. This unspectacular elevation…
The Platte River
"The Platte, in trail days, was tremendously wide and shallow. It was of a temperament entirely different from the tossing flood of the Missouri, the deep and steady Kansas, of…
Mile 0: St. Joseph Founding
"In the beginning St. Joseph was the pet project of Joseph Robidoux, one of the six Robidoux brothers of pioneer and fur-trading fame. He commissioned two men to submit plans…
Kansas City
"The two French settlements [Chouteau's headquarters and a few houses] were located, without fuss about mosquitoes or controversy over pure water, by simply arriving at the most convenient spot for…
Like the Ascent of Capitol Hill
"Though scattered references to easy passage over the Rockies had been appearing in newspapers for the previous decade, it was explorer John C. Frémont who ignited the South Pass enthusiasm…
Great American Desert
"These frequently mentioned fears of overland travel derived in large measure from the commonly accepted geographic concept of the so-called 'GreatAmerican Desert,' an area thought to extend westward from approximately…