Russell, Majors & Waddell Supports Border Ruffians
Their goods [emigrants from Ottowa, Illinois], consisting of plows, scythes, clothing, and in fact articles of agriculture and domestic use of all kinds, together with arms, were taken, and are now…
Majors on the Platte River Road
Alexander Majors of the firm of Russell, Majors & Waddell termed the Fort Kearny route the best natural road on the continent and believed it the best in the world.
Russell Admits the Firm is Weak
Russell's "great faith" in winning the coveted mail contract was obviously from a more modest viewpoint than as the reigning lord of the Central. A few days after Godard Bailey broke confidence and…
Pony Express Finances
Theoretically, the combined assets of the partners exceeded liabilities by about $419,000. But unreported was a catastrophic loss of $150,000 in a herd of freight oxen, caught in a howling blizzard at Ruby…
Holladay & Russell
Obviously, he [William Finney] was a man of resourceful initiative. How much easier it would have been, in the face of the frightful Pah-Ute attacks, to close up shop and await the…
Ficklin and Russell
Shortly after Ficklin departed, Russell penned some derogatory statements about him to Joseph Roberson of the firm's St. Joseph office. Ficklin chanced to read them and fired a telegram to Russell: "Send a…
Russell and Majors Competing in 1853
Having had a taste of government hauling, he [Majors] wanted more. In December he entered a bid at Fort Leavenworth with Major E. A. Ogden, quartermaster for the military posts west of…
Oversized Pony Express Bibles
It is not known how many, if any, were given to riders in this 1860-1861-time period from the company. Many twentieth century writers claimed that all riders were given a…
Pony Express Bible
Among Joe Nardone’s gifts to the Library is an original “Pony Express Bible.” It is 5–7/8 inches high, 4 inches wide, and 2–1/8 inches thick, and exceedingly rare. Two thousand…
Reason for the Founding of the Pony Express
At this point in his career Russell revealed the fact that he possessed a keen instinct for advertising values and methods. In this he was at least half a century…
Winter Over the Central Route
One of the most damaging arguments put forward against [the Central Route] was that it could not be traveled in the winter time. . . . The following May {Leavenworth & Pikes…
Deficit of the Leavenworth Pikes Peak Company
From the very beginning of the Leavenworth & Pike's Peak Express Company, Majors and Waddell watched it with forebodings of disaster. In this they were justified, for after about nine months of…
No Contract for Russell, Majors & Waddell
What had happened was this: the Post Office Department cut off mail service to California via steamer from New York with the expectation that the bill to forward it overland would pass Congress.…
Freighting delays in 1860
The contract for freighting supplies on the New Mexico Route in 1860-61 provided for loading and starting at the usual time, in May or June. Russell, Majors & Waddell, as usual, bought wagons,…
St. Joseph Contract
In consideration of these things the C.O.C. & P.P. got a block of twelve lots in Pattee Addition, eighteen in the town of Elwood, Kansas, the use of a building for an…