The Starting Point







Salt Lake City, Utah where I now live, sits near the confluence of a number of trails which have had important roles in the lives of the people who have used them as the thoroughfares of their lives. The first inhabitants traversed the canyon trails of the Wasatch Range and the desert  trails of the Great Basin on seasonal quests for food and trade. the horses so prized by the Shoshone and Utes made there way up the Old Spanish Trail and developed into successful emigrants. Fur trappers followed the trails of their indigenous predecessors and used this knowledge to aid explorers like John C. Fremont.




In the 1840's it got serious. The almost simultaneous incidents of the discovery of gold in California, the Mexican War, and the Mormon settlement of the Salt Lake Valley, turned the Oregon trail, California Trail and Mormon Trail into well used highways of migration west in spite of the difficulties they presented. Some of the feats accomplished during this era defy the imagination. The infantry march of the Mormon Battalion from Council Bluffs Iowa to San Diego via the Santa Fe Trail and Tucson (1846-47) was the longest in U.S. history. They capped this by later developing a route back to Utah. Not many years later, the Ute leader Wakara led several expeditions from Utah into southern California to raid the settlements for horses.



The 1850's brought more westward expansion much of it stimulated by the search for gold and silver, while the post-Civil War era brought the railroads. The Union Pacific and Central Pacific Railroads met in Utah and Ogden became one of the biggest rail hubs in the west. To the south, the Santa Fe linked the Midwest and later Texas with southern California. these rail routes in many cases approximated the old Oregon, California, and Santa Fe Trail routes. The geography hadn't changed but the mode of transportation had.


The era of the automobile brought the Lincoln Highway, an early attempt at a cross-country route which bravely crossed the west desert in Utah. U.S. highway 30 is a remnant of this pioneering effort. Highways 50 and 6 also cross Utah and still connect the east and west coasts for those ambitious enough to travel off the interstates. Of course the Interstates Highways have replaced the old roads and wagon trials and in many cases have changed the routes that were followed for so many years.

The decline of the traditional cross-country routes has obscured the history and tradition these trails represent. It is my intention to explore the remnants of these trails and share what I can of the history and points of interest they transect. My first adventure which will begin on April 29, involves traveling south from Salt Lake City to U.S. Highway 50 which I will take to eastern Colorado to join the Santa Fe Trail. This I will follow east to its starting point in New Franklin, Missouri. From there I plan to drive south and join Route 66 southwest of St. Louis. I will head west on 66 following the old "mother road" as much as possible to Flagstaff, Arizona where I will return to Salt Lake City via Highway 89.

I hope you will follow me as I explore the historic sites and National Parks and  Monuments that line this route. I hope I can share some photos and anecdotes that you will enjoy and I hope you will share the love I feel for our country, its people and Its past.

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