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OCTA > Specialty Items > 2006 OCTA Convention Booklet (St. Joseph, MO)

2006 OCTA Convention Booklet (St. Joseph, MO)

2006 OCTA Convention Booklet (St. Joseph, MO)

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OCTA Convention booklet for St. Joseph, Missouri in 2006

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Oregon-California Trails Association

5 hours ago

On this day in history, July 3, 1864, 3-year-old Ada Magill died of dysentery about five miles west of what is now Glenrock, Wyoming. Her parents, Caleb and Nancy, were traveling from Brown County, Kansas to Dallas, Oregon with their six children when Ada became ill after leaving Ft. Laramie. She gradually worsened and died this day 156 years ago. She was buried in her "Sunday best tiny calico dress" and buried on a small rise of ground.

In 1912, Wyoming planned a highway that would pass right over her grave. The grave was moved 30 feet north to its current location. State highway engineer Loren Clark Bishop created an exact replica headstone that now marks the final resting place of young Ada Magill. OCTA added an interpretive panel in 1987. An Oregon Trail monument stone was also added when she was re-interred in 1912 and a Pony Express marker can also be seen at the site.

For more information visit https://www.wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/ada-magill-grave. ... See MoreSee Less

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Oregon-California Trails Association

1 day ago

Today in history, July 2, 1850, 19-year-old Alvah Unthank dies and is buried near what is now Glenrock, Wyoming. On June 23, he'd inscribed his name on Register Cliff, near the present-day town of Guernsey, Wyoming. Nineteen years later, his cousin Oliver Unthank would add his signature to Register Cliff. Oliver's son, a traveling salesman from Sheridan, Wyoming would add his own signature to the cliff in 1931.

For the first month of Alvah Unthank's trip, things were mostly routine, but his company's troubles began a few miles west of Ash Hollow on the Platte River in what’s now western Nebraska when Joe Lauter and Addison Lamb died of cholera within a day of each other. Several others were also afflicted but eventually recovered. Then, on June 26 at LaBonte Creek near present-day, Wyoming Douglas, Alvah began complaining of ill health. He seemed well enough to travel, however, so they kept moving.

Three days later he had a serious relapse. The company stopped to “doctor and nurse Alvah.” It soon became clear there was little hope of his recovery. Two company members, Pusey Graves and Henry Puckett, narrate his decline and death in journals written as letters they sent home.

On June 30, Graves wrote, “Alvah getting worse. Is quite hopeless; appears to care but little; complains none.” On July 1, “Alvah is rapidly sinking. Lying by with heavy hearts.” And on July 2, Graves noted, “This morning I was awakened to see the last of Alvah. He passed quietly away his countenance wearing a pleasing smile as his inner being entered his spiritual possessions in the second sphere of life immortalized. Bid his father be of good cheer; his child has paid the great debt of Nature … He expressed no concern whatever concerning his past, present, or future; He lay calm, bore his suffering patiently and uttered not a murmur or groan.”

Puckett wrote on July 2, “Alvah died this morning about 3 o’clock. We buried him at 1 P. M. This mournful event caused quite a sensation in our little company. On account of our more intimate acquaintance, and the associations of childhood, most of us felt his death much more severely than that of the others who had died … The bluffs near us afforded some very nice smooth stones, upon one of which we recorded in the best style our imperfect implements would allow, his name, age, state, etc., and placed it at the head of his grave.”

Sol Woody used a sharpened nail as a chisel to inscribe the headstone. Woody’s inscription reads “A.H. Unthank, Wayne Co. Ind, Died Jul. 2 1850.” A few of Alvah’s closest friends lingered at the grave after the others had left, covered it over with large stones, and transplanted over the grave a few bunches of cactuses in full bloom. Later that afternoon they moved on to Deer Creek at present-day Glenrock, Wyoming.

For much more on the fascinating stories of all three Unthanks, read OCTA's Randy Brown and his full story at the link here https://www.wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/alvah-unthank-grave. ... See MoreSee Less

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Oregon-California Trails Association

2 days ago

Today in history, July 1, 1847, 18-year-old Frederick Richard Fulkerson dies and is buried next to Devil's Gate in Wyoming. The grave site was long identified as the final resting place of T.P. Baker. However, it was later learned that Baker inscribed his name on the marker in 1864. OCTA preserved and interpreted the site in 1996 and a picture of the grave is featured on the cover of "Graves and Sites on the Oregon and California Trails." (https://octa-trails.org/product/graves-and-sites-on-the-oregon-and-california-trails/)

The grave was noted by 49er J. Goldsborough Bruff on July 26, 1849 as he traveled through what he termed "Pass of the Rattle-Snake Mountain to the left of Devil's Gate." The survival of the large granite boulder used as the Fulkerson headstone and the sketch made of it by Bruff allows us to locate this grave precisely. (To read Bruff's journal and see his sketches, see "Bruff’s Wake: J. Goldsborough Bruff & the California Gold Rush" by H. L James at https://octa-trails.org/product/bruffs-wake/.)

Frederick Richard Fulkerson, son of James M. and Mary Fulkerson, died July 1, 1847 while en route to Oregon. His father, James Monroe Fulkerson, was born in Lee County, Virginia on August 28, 1802. The family moved west to Tennessee in 1807 and then on to Missouri in 1817, where they settled in what's now Cole County in central Missouri. In 1823, James married Virginia-born Mary Ramsey Miller. By 1847, they had seven children. Frederick, their fourth child and oldest son, was born on October 11, 1829.

In the spring of 1847, the Fulkersons and many of their relatives became part of an Oregon-bound party composed primarily of members of the Old Florence Baptist Church located near Jefferson City. Some 300 congregation members joined a wagon train captained by James Curl. The company broke into four groups and had 120 wagons. The Fulkerson family joined "The Plains Baptist Church" group, which was captained by the Reverend Richard Miller, the brother of Mary Fulkerson (to further complicate the story, Reverend Miller was married to Nancy Leeper Fulkerson, the sister of James Fulkerson!.

Accounts of the death of Frederick Fulkerson vary. The Curl family wrote: "Mrs. (Caleb) Curl's [née Margaret Fulkerson] brother took three fever, and Mrs. Fulkerson, with two other families remained while the others went on. After nine days the young man, then aged eighteen, died near Devil's Gate." A granddaughter of James and Mary wrote: "When crossing the Platte River [Frederick] swam the river below the crossing to ford the stock over, as the river was so swift it tended to wash them downstream. He became so chilled and exhausted that he died and was buried near the crossing."

When Bruff passed the grave in 1849, he also noted, "inscribed on a rock above the grave 'J.M. Fulkerson, June 26 '47.'" The inscription, which no longer exists, confirms that the family must have camped for at least a week during the final sickness of Frederick Fulkerson. Upon his death a grave was dug at the foot of this rock. According to Bruff, the epitaph was painted on the face of the rock headstone, FREDERIC RICHARD, SON OF JAMES M. & MARY FULKERSON, DIED JULY 1, 1847. AGED 18 Years.

Two weeks later, Mary Fulkerson died of mountain fever and was buried atop Names Hill on the Green River crossing of the Sublette Cutoff. Bruff saw this grave on August 7, 1849, and noted the engraving on a sandstone slab above the grave: "Mary consort of J.M. Fulkerson. Died July 14, 1847." The site of Mary Fulkerson's grave became a burial ground for other victims of the trail and eventually developed into a pioneer cemetery. All these graves were destroyed by pipeline construction. ... See MoreSee Less

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Oregon-California Trails Association

2 days ago

OCTA is a contributing member of the Partnership for the National Trails System.Our June e-Newsletter is now available!

https://bit.ly/31wClhW

- Great American Outdoors Act Approved by Senate; House Vote Pending in July
- Fall National Trails Workshop Moves to Virtual Format in October 2020
- Upcoming July Webinars
- Trails Community Resources: COVID-19, Diversity and Inclusion, Forum
- #RecreateResponsibly Updated Guidelines
- Funding and Survey Opportunities
- Trails Enrich Your Community ... See MoreSee Less

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Oregon-California Trails Association

3 days ago

On this date in history, June 30, 1849, Alonzo Delano recorded in his diary:

"Fourteen miles brought us to the Dry Sandy----not inaptly named, for it was the dry bed of a creek where salt and unpleasant water could anywhere be found at a depth of six or eight inches below the sand. Once in every mile, at least, we saw the carcass of a dead ox, having closed his career of patient toil in this land of desolation in the service of his gold-seeking master, to become the prey of ravenous wolves, or food for croaking ravens, which covered his dead body, screaming at our approach. Six miles beyond Dry Sandy, where even the everlasting sage is scanty and of dwarfish growth, is Little Sandy----a fine creek of pure and sweet water."

Delano was born in Aurora, New York. His father, Dr. Frederick Delano, a physician, was an early settler of the town. Delano had ten siblings. The family descended from French Huguenots. His great-great-grandfather, Phillipe de la Noye, was also the great-great-great-great-grandfather of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

He left school when he was young and started working at age fifteen. His work as an itinerant merchant took him to frontier communities in Ohio and Indiana. By 1848, Delano had relocated his family to Ottawa, Illinois where he worked as a merchant selling bank stocks, flour, lard, silk, and whiskey, while becoming a well-respected community leader. He became ill that year with consumption, and following his physician's orders for a change of residence and more exertion, Delano decided to head west to California. Before departing, he made arrangements to send correspondence to the publishers of two newspapers, the "Ottawa Free Trader" and "True Delta" in New Orleans. At the age of 42, and being sick, he shipped his belongings, including cattle, to join the Dayton Company of travelers in St. Joseph, Missouri, the rendezvous point. His first week traveling was spent delirious with fever. He did not see his family again for six years.

When Delano reached Marysville, California, he earned $400 in three weeks drawing portraits of whiskered gold miners at an ounce of gold dust per head. After reaching San Francisco, Delano became a correspondent for the "San Francisco Daily Courier" and the "Pacific News." Along with Prentice Mulford, Delano was one of the first to use “California Humor,” a style of writing that uses satirical social commentary that exaggerates situations. Some of his articles were written by his long-nosed proto-Will Rogers figure "Old Block," taken from his whimsical sketches of miners and gamblers. These articles were later collected and published in book form in "Pen-Knife Sketches" and "Old Block's Sketch Book."

Charles Nahl was his illustrator. Delano's book, "On the Trail to the California Gold Rush," was a chronicle of his 1849 travels to California, and included an Introduction by American historian J. S. Holliday. His letters, a journal, and some writings were published in "Life on the Plains and among the Diggings." His comical play, "A Live Woman in the Mines," features the hero Pike County Jess and heroine High Betty Martin.

In 1850, Timothy Ellsworth and Delano purchased a claim on Massachusetts Hill located near Gold Hill in Nevada County, California, and organized the Sierra Quartz Mining Company. At one point, Delano owned one-sixth of the Massachusetts Hill Quartz Mine; Delano & Co. was very involved in its development. In 1851, Delano sold out his interest to Dr. J. C. Delavan, an agent of Rocky Bar, a New York company. Delano was a storekeeper in several communities, including Grass Valley. He was elected the first treasurer of the city of Grass Valley, California. He started working for Wells, Fargo & Company in Sacramento in 1854 and was Grass Valley's first Wells Fargo agent.

During a visit to his hometown of Aurora in 1830, Delano met and married Mary Burt. They had two children: Fred (1833–1857) and Harriet (born 1843). After Mary died in 1871, Delano married Maria Harmon in 1872. Delano died in Grass Valley in 1874 and is buried at Greenwood Cemetery. ... See MoreSee Less

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Oregon-California Trails Association

4 days ago

Today in history, June 29, 1854, Sarah Thomas is buried at age 22 along the Seminoe Cutoff in Wyoming. Click through the link to read the full article about the Cutoff and Sarah Thomas, written by OCTA's Randy Brown. The link provides excellent maps and photos as well. Following are some excerpts from his excellent article:

"Among the many branches and variants of the Oregon Trail was the 35-mile Seminoe Cutoff, which allowed travelers to avoid the last four crossings of the Sweetwater River as well as the difficult climb over Rocky Ridge.

"The cutoff was opened to wagons in the spring of 1853, after heavy snowmelt and heavy spring rains made the fords across the Sweetwater impassable well into the traveling season. The cutoff, combined with the use of the so-called Deep Sand Road that bypassed Three Crossings, enabled emigrants to stay south of the Sweetwater and avoid all the river’s fords except the first one—near Independence Rock. There, French-speaking traders with Shoshone families built a bridge across the river that lasted only until late June 1853, when it washed away.

"In subsequent years, the cutoff was used at times of exceptionally high water or early in the season when the river was too high to be safely forded.

"The cutoff was probably named for Charles Lajeunesse, one of owners of the post at Devil’s Gate and likely one of the builders of the Independence Rock bridge of 1853. His nickname was “Semino.”

"Diary and newspaper accounts show that there were emigrant deaths on the Seminoe Cutoff just as there were on the “old road,” as the main route was sometimes called, but existing identified graves on both routes are now rare. The only one that can be identified on the Seminoe is the grave of Sarah A. Thomas at Immigrant Springs.

"Nothing is known of Sarah Thomas other than the date of her death and age at the time, and these facts only because someone inscribed the information on her headstone. The epitaph reads: “SARAH A. THOMAS D. JUN 29 /54 AG. 22.”

"One account survives of her burial, but it does not even include her name. Jacob Hays of Missouri was heading for California when his company reached the springs on June 29, 1854. He wrote: “Clear but very windy, traveled over some pretty rough roads some 13 miles, encamped for the night on Rock Creek [the runoff from Immigrant Springs]. Witnessed the burial of a lady, herded cattle some miles from the wagons to the left of the road where there is a noble spring. Spring near the road called Rock Spring.” That’s it, and it’s the only contemporary account of the life and death of Sarah A. Thomas thus far discovered." ... See MoreSee Less

The Seminoe Cutoff and Sarah Thomas Grave | WyoHistory.org

www.wyohistory.org

Among the many branches and variants of the Oregon Trail was the 35-mile Seminoe Cutoff, which allowed travelers to avoid the last four crossings of the Sweetwater River as well as the difficult climb...

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Oregon-California Trails Association

5 days ago

On this date in history, June 28, 1852, John Clark wrote in his diary:

"Everything was covered with frost....some 20 old wagons, several graves & dead stock....saw 2 skeletons on the ground close to their graves. The Kiotes had drawn them out; the flesh was gone, but the bone & sinews held together. We are now going through what is termd the South Pass to Pacific Spring....We are now 52 days out from St Jo, 956 miles. Dead stock by the wayside 327, broken down & burnt waggons 111, graves 287."

After a rather quiet year for trail deaths in 1851, cholera surged back with a vengeance in 1852. Ezra Meeker wrote in his diary that the trail along the South Platte looked like a battlefield with the dead lined up "in rows of 50 or more." Another diarist, Abraham Sortore, wrote that along the Platte he was "scarcely out of sight of grave diggers." Historian Merrill Mattes pegged the mortality rate at about 6 percent. Sarah Wisner calculated that approximately 30,000 people died on the trail between 1842 and 1859, with a grave every 200 feet, on average. Most died from disease and illness, with Asiatic cholera being the main culprit.

For more on the trails and cholera, see “Dead of the Bloody Flux: Cholera Stalks the Emigrant Trail” by Herbert C. Milikien in Overland Journal 14-3 (Fall 1996), which is available as a free download for OCTA members at www.octa-journals.org or for $5 at the link here. ... See MoreSee Less

Overland Journal 14-3, Fall 1996 - OCTA

octa-trails.org

"Dead of the Bloody Flux: Cholera Stalks the Emigrant Trail" by Herbert C. Milikien; "Jedediah Strong Smith: Trails West" by Richard L. Dyer; "The Oregon Trail: Revisited" by Louis Kirkaldie

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Oregon-California Trails Association

6 days ago

Today in history, June 27, 1848, three members of the Mormon Battalion were attacked, butchered, and buried in a shallow grave in the Sierra Nevada on the Carson Route near Silver Lake, a location now known as Tragedy Spring.

Killed were Sergeant Daniel Browett, 38, Private Henderson Cox, 19, and Musician Ezra Hela Allen, 34. All three had enlisted in the Battalion in the summer of 1846 at Council Bluffs, Iowa, part of the army organized under General Stephen Watts Kearny. The Battalion followed the Santa Fe Trail to Santa Fe. From New Mexico they blazed a rough wagon road, later known as Cooke’s Wagon Road, to California. When they were mustered out in July of 1847, many members of the Battalion were asked to work at Sutter’s Mill in Northern California to earn money. Browett, Cox, and Allen were nearby when gold was discovered on January 24, 1848 and spent a few months mining for gold.

Browett, a native of England, had emigrated to the United States with his wife, Elizabeth, and eventually joined the LDS church and moved to Winter Quarters. When he enlisted, he left behind his wife and an infant son, Moroni, who had been born in November 1845.The son died a year later while his father was on somewhere in the west with the Battalion; it isn’t known if he ever learned that his son had died. Elizabeth joined a wagon train that arrived in Salt Lake Valley in September 1847, where she expected to await her husband’s return.

Cox, a native of Warren, Indiana, was one of the youngest members of the Battalion, enlisting at the age of 17. One of 16 children, his parents, Jeru and Sarah Cox, were on a wagon train west of Grand Island, Nebraska, on the day he was killed. They did not learn of his death until they arrived in Salt Lake Valley.

Allen, born in Madrid, New York, married his wife, Sarah, on Christmas Day, 1834. After converting, they moved to Nauvoo in 1842 and eventually to Council Bluffs. A fifer, he enlisted in the Mormon Battalion as a musician. He left behind his wife, a 6-year-old daughter and infant son (two other children had died in 1842 and 1843). Sarah emigrated to Utah in 1852 and remarried.

In the spring of 1848, Battalion members were planning to leave the gold fields near Placerville to join the new colony in Salt Lake. Near the end of June, Browett, Cox, and Allen were selected to scout snow conditions and a possible route over the Sierra (this would become the Carson Route).

As related in "The Mormon Battalion, U.S. Army of the West, 1846-1848" by Norma Baldwin Ricketts, within 10 days there was great concern because the scouts had not returned. A search party was organized to find the missing men but returned without finding them. However, they found a pass that might get the Battalion over the mountains.

A larger party was organized and on July 18, 1848, while building a road, they found a spring and a dead campfire, along with a newly made mound that looked like a grave. When the grave was opened, they found the naked, butchered remains of the three men. (Ricketts’ book includes a very grisly description of the bodies.) All three were carrying gold, but only a pouch belonging to Allen containing $120 in gold dust was found (it was later delivered to his widow). Animals, supplies, and guns were gone. Because a number of arrows were found near the grave, it was suspected that they had been attacked and killed by Indians.

The party dug a deeper grave for the men and built a wall of rocks around it. They filled the center with dirt and covered it with more rocks. A large rock was placed at the top of the grave for a headstone. One of the party stripped the bark off a fir tree and carved the names of the three men the exposed wood: “To the memory of Daniel Browett, Ezrah H. Allen, Henderson Cox, who was [sic] supposed to have been murdered and buried by Indians on the night of the 27th June 1848.”

A later theory, based on the idea that Indians would not have buried their victims or had tools to dig a grave, held that the killings were the result of an attack by pro-slavery zealots who wanted to discourage free-state Mormons from settling in California

The original fir tree trunk, about ten feet in diameter was taken to Sutter's Fort in 1931 and the stump is now located in Marshall Gold Discovery Park in Coloma. Today, the U.S. Forest Service maintains a picnic ground at Tragedy Spring in eastern Amador County, adjacent to Highway 88, approximately 48 miles east of Jackson and two miles west of Silver Lake.

In 1967, the International Society of Daughters of Utah Pioneers attached a bronze historical marker listing the names of the fallen scouts. The burial site remains in a rock cairn that is cemented in place with an attached plaque commemorating the loss of the three men, Henderson Cox (1829-1848), Ezra Hela Allen (1814-1848), and Daniel Browett (1809-1848). ... See MoreSee Less

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Oregon-California Trails Association

6 days ago

Recently added to the Historical Marker Database. ... See MoreSee Less

Yreka Trail - Up Butte Creek Historical Marker

www.hmdb.org

'The next day we followed up Butte Creek for six miles and pitched our tents. (A historical marker located near Tennant in Siskiyou County, California.)

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Oregon-California Trails Association

7 days ago

Don't leave home without this!Thanks to everyone who participated in Wednesday's Nebraska History Challenge! We chose Carole Montgomery as the winner this time around.

Here's the history behind this object:

This is a tar bucket that a traveler would fill with grease to lubricate the wheels of a wagon, hung below the moving wagon. This one came to Fillmore County, Nebraska, from Ohio in 1870. It's going to be featured in our new exhibit at Chimney Rock when the visitor center reopens.

Also, another programming note: we're reconsidering fully ending our Nebraska History Challenge series. Check out the comments of this post to help us nail down how we would do it going forward. ... See MoreSee Less

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