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Russell-Majors-Waddell

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…

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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 >

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