The Oregon Trail, by Francis Parkman (1847)
Some forty years after the storied
Lewis and Clark Expedition, the scion of a wealthy Boston family took a personal journey into the interior of America on the Oregon Trail, which traveled from Independence Missouri, through the trackless expanses that now make up our western United States, ending at the Willamette Valley of Oregon.
Francis Parkman was born a blue blood of Boston society and earned a law degree at his father's behest, but his first love was always the outdoors and he spent all the time he could learning to live off the land, much to the consternation of his parents. He camped out and rode horses incessantly, even learning to ride bareback; despite suffering from an unidentified debilitating disease that left him weak, unable to walk, and blind at various times. This disease affected him during his jaunt on the western plains and it seems like a miracle that he was able to come back and tell the tale, but he did.
After reading the book, I think the title is misleading, as Parkman never crossed the Rocky Mountains or got west of what is now the state of Wyoming. His real contribution to history is the description of life with the Plains Indians, some of which he was quite friendly with. No matter, as Parkman's Oregon Trail is considered one of the best American history books ever written for that particular period.
There were apparently not all that many books written by authors who actually went out past the settlements. You can find this when you start searching for information on early explorers of the western plains.
George Custer came along about twenty years after Parkman with his book concerning life on the plains, which was a decade or so before he met his fate at the Little Big Horn. Much of the information relied on by later historians comes right out of Parkman and Custer, so they are important pieces of our national heritage.
Parkman writes in the first person and he doesn't preface it with much about his early life; that information is given in the forward. He starts out with his friend Quincy Adams Shaw, who accompanied him on his journey along with a couple of seasoned mountain men.
They started with a company of pioneers and headed towards Ft Leavenworth where they parted company. Parkman and his small party headed to Ft Laramie in present day Wyoming. From there they joined a Dakota (Sioux) Indian tribe and migrated with them to their grounds in the Black Hills. This was the Black Hills somewhere in Wyoming, not the ones in South Dakota.
There they got the poles they needed for their teepees. During this prolonged period the life of the Indians as they were is chronicled and this is where the biggest value in the book lies. How they tanned the buffalo hides for their homes and clothing. The migratory pattern; the continuous eating when food was available; and smoking the pipe with the community of elders and warriors were well explained. Of course, the descriptions of living out in the elements and coping with the various dangers on the trail added interest and kept the story moving. Comic relief comes in the frequent escapes by their horses when set to grazing for the night. The long duration foot races and exhaustion is funny, as long as you are not the one doing it.
Parkman afterward returned to Ft Laramie and thence to Bent's Fort from which he headed back to what would become known as Kansas City.
The book is about 400 pages long and is easy reading. Parkman's writing style is old fashioned, but not irritatingly so.
I would recommend
The Oregon Trail to anyone who wants a better understanding about Plains Indians.
