Skip to content
Pony Express Ride
  • Home
  • Route Info
    • Current Weather on the Route
    • Route Reports
      • Missouri
      • Kansas
      • Nebraska
      • Colorado
      • Wyoming
      • Utah
      • Nevada
      • California
    • Quick Facts
    • Online Sources
    • General Pony Express Info
  • Ride Prep
    • Scouting the Route in California
    • Scouting the Route in Nevada
    • Reading List
      • Articles
      • Books
      • Book Reports
    • Recipes
  • Blog
  • FAQs
  • About
  • Home
  • Route Info
    • Current Weather on the Route
    • Route Reports
      • Missouri
      • Kansas
      • Nebraska
      • Colorado
      • Wyoming
      • Utah
      • Nevada
      • California
    • Quick Facts
    • Online Sources
    • General Pony Express Info
  • Ride Prep
    • Scouting the Route in California
    • Scouting the Route in Nevada
    • Reading List
      • Articles
      • Books
      • Book Reports
    • Recipes
  • Blog
  • FAQs
  • About

Preparations

California Mustangs

"'The worst imps of Satan in the business. The only way I could master them was to throw them and get a rope around each foot and stake them out,…

Mochilas Were a Later Innovation

"The mochilla [sic] system developed out of necessity—an adaptation made to problems encountered in the daily operation of the Pony Express. There is no indication that these special pouches were ordered and…

75 Ponies

"It took Seventy-five ponies to make the first trip from Missouri to California. The riders of these ponies had 'shoved a continent behind their hooves,' and many people recognized this important fact.…

Breaking Oxen

"Most of [the oxen] were broken to work, but some were not. Over by the corrals sweating bullwhackers were busy making up their teams, yoking them together, and allowing them…

Leavenworth, KS

"Leavenworth, Kansas, at that time a squatter town on the Delaware Indian Reservation two miles south of the Fort, was chosen [in 1855] as headquarters for the firm  [Russell, Majors…

Organizing the Pony Express Line

"Ficklin, meanwhile, set about reorganizing the line for the coming Pony Express. The stagecoach route—previously divided into three stagecoach divisions between st. Joseph and Salt Lake City—was now reorganized into…

First Order of Business

"The first order of business  in pursuit of Russell's dream [the Pony Express] was revamping the stagecoach line's existing operations. The trusting general superintendent Beverly Williams was replaced by the…

Logistics of Establishing a Pony Express

"But the logistics of a mail relay stretching 1,966 miles from the Missouri River to Sacramento was so daunting that only an incurable dreamer like Russell would have considered implementing…

Quick Facts Tags

Army Butterfield Cholera Conflicts Descriptions Disease Emigration Equipment Finances Food Forts Freighting General Geography Idioms Jack Slade Legacy Lexicon Mail Mail Appropriations Majors & Waddell Mormon Conflict Mormons Native Americans Origins Oxen Paiute War Politics Pony Express Pony Express Mail Pony Express Riders Pony Express Route Popular Myth Preparations Rivers Route Report Routes Russell Schedule South Pass Spotted Tail Stagecoach Stations Surveys Winter Conditions

Subscribe

Receive an email whenever a new blog entry is posted


 

Connect

  • Opens in a new tab
  • Opens in a new tab
  • Opens in a new tab

About

Scott AlumbaughIn early March 2020, I decided to bikepack the length of the Pony Express Trail in Summer 2021, following the Pony Express Bikepacking Route, a nearly all off-road route created by Jan Bennett. You can learn more here >

© Copyright 2021 - Pony Express Ride. All Rights Reserved
Search for: