Timesuck with Dan Cummins - 266 - The Oregon Trail

Episode Date: October 18, 2021

The Oregon Trail was 2,100 plus mile journey from Independence, Missouri all the way to Oregon City, Oregon. And along this trail and its offshoots, between 1841 and 1869, somewhere between 250,000 and 500,000 travelers headed West, motivated by the philosophy of Manifest Destiny and the hope for economic prosperity. The Homestead Act and the Monroe Doctrine also fueled  US westward expansion. The journey to get oneself a 160 acre homestead was not for the faint of heart. Somewhere between 1 in 10 and 1 in 20 settlers died along the trail, some from accidents and violent clashes with other settlers or local tribes, and many died from diseases like cholera. Those who made it truly connected the United States from sea to shining sea, and solidified the nation as a new global power. Lot of yip, yip, yaw in today's Suck! Hope you enjoy the journey. Thanks to Bad Magic Patreon supporters, we'll be donating somewhere around $15,600 this month to RAINN - the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network - America's largest anti-sexual violence organization. Call 1-800 656-HOPE if you've been sexually assaulted or to report a sexual assault. The call is confidential. To learn more: https://www.rainn.org/Watch the Suck on YouTube:  https://youtu.be/zeT7n7k0p5IMerch - https://badmagicmerch.com/  Discord! https://discord.gg/tqzH89vWant to join the Cult of the Curious private Facebook Group? Go directly to Facebook and search for "Cult of the Curious" in order to locate whatever current page hasn't been put in FB Jail :)For all merch related questions/problems: [e-mail] (copy and paste)Please rate and subscribe on iTunes and elsewhere and follow the suck on social media!! @timesuckpodcast on IG and http://www.facebook.com/timesuckpodcastWanna become a Space Lizard? We're over 10,000 strong! Click here: https://www.patreon.com/timesuckpodcastSign up through Patreon and for $5 a month you get to listen to the Secret Suck, which will drop Thursdays at Noon, PST. You'll also get 20% off of all regular Timesuck merch PLUS access to exclusive Space Lizard merch. You get to vote on two Monday topics each month via the app. And you get the download link for my new comedy album, Feel the Heat. Check the Patreon posts to find out how to download the new album and take advantage of other benefits.

The Oregon Trail, a 2100 plus mile journey for some from Independence, Missouri, all the way to Oregon City, Oregon, a rough and rugged odyssey. The American Wild West traveled mainly by American immigrant families, looking to own land for the first time and build wealth in a new place. The claim they're 160 acres, they faced grueling months long journey full of all kinds of hardships. Many of us can't imagine today. Extreme weather without the proper gear by today's standards. River Rapids without the nice flotation device.

Starvation, disease, accidents, conflicts with other immigrants and local tribes and the most shelter they had in the journey was nothing but a covered wagon. For decades, Oregon Trail was America's symbol of manifest destiny. The idea that the United States was destined by God to expand across the continent and civilize the lands out west. Activity on the trail would peak in the 1840s and 50s bringing hundreds of thousands of

men, women and children to the western territories of Oregon, Idaho, Utah, Wyoming and California. The gold rush brought thousands more, primarily single men, looking to strike it rich beyond their wildest dreams. Trail was the path to the American dream for many settlers, property ownership, the potential for wealth and exploration and uncharted territory. Of course, every story involving territorial expansion has a dark side.

Many of the settlers who started out in Missouri with big dreams of making new lives for themselves and Oregon never made it and their lives ended in tragic fashion. Also, there were already thousands of people living in this quote unquote free land, the plains and western Native American fashion. Also, there were already thousands of people living in this quote unquote free land, the planes in Western Native American tribes. Initially, they were curious and accepting of the white settlers.

They traded with them, offered them food and shelter. But they soon realized that the whites were gonna keep coming and coming, continued depleting their resources, continued spreading their new diseases, and continued killing men, women and children to get what they wanted. So they started to fight back. And that soon led to conflicts with the US Army,

displacement from their ancestral lands and seemingly endless deaths and violence. The Oregon Trail was a fresh beginning full of possibilities for some in the end of a way of life that had existed for centuries for others. This week we'll discuss the history and ideologies of the United States expansion from Lewis and Clark to the Homestead Act.

The Oregon Trail itself, life on the trail, the effects of Westward expansion on native tribes and so much more on another. Yeah, wild west edition of Time Suck. This is Michael McDonald and you're listening to Time Suck. You're listening to meet Saks. Get in here. We have to hit the trail and you're late. We've got to get moving soon. We'll be dead by winter. Wait, it's October. Never mind. I'm calling off the wagon train. I've started much too late. Let's just podcast. Dan

Cummins is Suckmaster, Trailmaster master McGill's pop loophole reconstruction surgeon. And you are listening to the time suck. Hail Nimrod, praise Lucifina. Make sure the trail looks good ahead, both jangles and throw on a 10 gallon hat and hop up on that wagon, triple M. Thanks to those of you who came out to the shows and spoke in this past weekend. So much fun. I'm guessing five full rooms.

Hope I had fun with those. Recording this on the 15th. The day of the first shows, but before I got there, I'm guessing I had a pretty good time overall. The symphony of insanity, stand-up tour continues in Kansas City this week. Added another show on Sunday. If you want to go since Nadi Denver, Tampa, leveling Colorado and more coming up, announcing 2022 dates soon. Feeling like a fun new hour is It's really starting to shape up. I'm enjoying myself.

It's been fun fun shows. Fun new collection shirts in the store at badmagicmarch.com our in-house art warlock is whipped up what he's called his cartoon collection. A crows cafe mostly beef shirt. Cheeky teelo's little wiener shirt. Albert peanut butter shirt all done in the late 70s, early 80s animated kid show design.

They're dark. If you know, funny, cute, if you don't, super funny to me. Last reminder, the de-october bad magic charity of the month is rain two ends. Thanks to Patreon support. We have donated $15,600 to the rape abuse and incest national network. America's largest anti-sexual violence organization. You can go to rain.org to learn more.

And that's R-A-I-N-N. One last thing, a little sense of humor reminder. If you're a new sucker and you're confused by some character or absurd reference, it's a running gag. They began in some previous episode. There's so many of them. Some misdirects, some weird shit dad watch, Whipple, Albert Fish, David Childress, a lot of fake ads, et cetera. Got some emails from some long time stockers recently about how it can become annoying to hear constant

reminders that something's a joke right after telling the joke that it kind of like pulls away from the joke. And I like that feedback. I agree. I also like including everyone I can in the inside joke. So now, you know, just a heads up here. Once we're in, you know, we're just going to keep it weird and not do so much exposition after the weirdness. So now let's put the fucking YIP in the YAH. Grease up those axles. Hop onto the wagon. Time to further explore territory. We visited back in the Donner party suck. And they started off in the Oregon trail. And, well, I didn't end well for them, if you recall. Today, we're not deep diving that cannibalistic tragedy.

Again, we're asking the question, how did the US go from a small collection of overcrowded states to a vast unexplored country overnight? The Louisiana purchase marked the beginning of Westward expansion in a series of government, social military events ultimately led to the first immigrants setting out on the Oregon trail. What are we going to break down today's story?

First off, first off, like before first off. I do want to explain that I'm saying immigrant with an E, the littler used word that sounds a lot like immigrant, sounds a lot like identical. So you're like, I say that a little bit funny. It's intentional. I want people migrating inside their country. Now, how are we breaking down today's story?

Well, first we'll start back in the 18th century established why America wanted to settle the West in the first place, cover some early exploratory expeditions, cover how the Monroe Doctrine and philosophy of manifest destiny fueled Westward expansion. Then I'll go over the Homestead Act, explain how that gave a lot of people, 160 relatively free acres worth of incentive to hit the trail.

Next we'll cover the trail itself. What did you need to purchase to prepare for your journey? What was the journey like? What were some stops along the way? Dangers, what was daily life like for a migrating settler? I'll share a few journal entries, some settlers that may put your next road trip complaints into better perspective.

Then finally before the recap, we'll jump into a little timeline. I'll go over how Europeans found the Oregon Territory, began settlement, then accelerated settlement great with the Oregon Trail that lasted all the way until some new railroad tracks made it obsolete. So let's get to learning. After the French and Indian War ended in 1763, France surrendered part of Louisiana, to Spain, and almost all of the remaining territory north of the Caribbean in the Americas to Britain. They took a bite to all of New France, to include a huge portion of Canada and much of the American West, except this is so odd and

fun to me. They refused to relinquish to the islands of the southern coast of Newfoundland, or a small community of French fishermen lived. St. Pierre and Michelin, 12 miles from Pointe-Mais on the Burent Peninsula of Newfoundland, Canada, six miles east of the tiny Canadian island of Green Island, about 6,000 people live on these two little French, largely barren islands. And they still belong to France.

It's an official overseas territory. Anyone born there, a French citizen. Almost everyone on the island can trace their ancestry back to France. They elect two representatives for French parliament. I love it. I want to visit these islands. I got sucked into some travel videos on them

and they're fucking adorable. Little slice of Europe. Just tucked into Canada. And not like part of Canada. It's not like we're back or something where it feels very European and you know in some ways more so than a lot of North America. This like they're connected directly. I love that France gets its ass kicked and then King Louis the 15th is like, fine. You could take out a thing we're having Canada and the American colonies.

You ever sing in North America? Over 3 million square miles. But there are 93 square miles that I must keep You cannot have sampler and michael on they are my favorites. I Loves those little items was all my heart. They're the best codfish. I cannot live without their codfish We'll fight to the last man for precious sampler and michael on I Know idea where that fucking person lived. I was French. I was French-ish. He comes from a weird part of France You've never heard of, okay?

You know what? He fucking comes from St. Pierre. Great Britain, actually invades a little islands, 15 years later in 1778, kick all the French people living there back to France, just fucking deported them. And then in 1796, King Louis XVI of France, King Louis XVI's grandson was like, fuck that! Give us our tiny islands back!

Papal類 loves these islands. We just eat the sweet cod together. And then a treaty in 1804, return the islands to France. They've been fucking French ever since. Why did France really care? Apparently fishing rights. A lot of cod, a lot of crab, other commercial fish caught off these islands. For a couple centuries, best cod fishing on the planet until they were depleted a few decades ago. That's the official story of fishing. Feels more like ego to me though. Friends can now technically say, well, we just not give them everything. We still have our colonies over there too.

Well, an important colonial power. I just can't believe I never heard of those islands. So fucking random finding that out. It's like finding that in the middle of Lake Michigan, the UK, your Spain or Portugal still has a colony or the Japan has a colony in the Puget Sound, just a couple miles off from Seattle. I love strange anomalies like that. Okay, back to 1763, and it's effect on the formation

of America, the suck won't be full of huge deviations from the narrative like that one. It just happened to pop up at the beginning, and it was too good to ignore it for me. Spain's acquisition of Louisiana, 1763, did not have much effect on the US after the new nation was formed in 1776 because they allowed Americans to travel

to Mississippi River and use New Orleans as a trade port, which at the time was all Americans wanted to do with that part of North America. Overall, early Americans had their hands pretty full, protecting their brand new nation from the British, various native tribes, making sure they could defend themselves, you know, if the Spanish or French started making trouble, they were still plenty of land for early farmers and pioneers to settle east to Louisiana territory.

Then when Napoleon took over France in 1799, he wanted to take back France's territory in the States, and he made a deal with Spain. He basically traded some territories in Tuscany, aka Northern Italy for the colony of Louisiana. Fine, H-02, King Charles IV of Spain, or returned Louisiana territory to France, whatever. But then Napoleon revoked America's port access, not fine. Why? Well, Napoleon was kind of a dick.

Also, he wanted to build up an army in North America and try and take over that part of the world just like he wanted to take over Europe and the rest of the world but luckily for america he ran into some money problems world domination can be very expensive to raise a bunch of hell in europe to make sure he could pay in clothes and

arm and feed a huge standing army he needed cash lots and lots of cash so he sold the vast territory to the US except was all too little islands. No one gets a too little islands. I'm sure Napoleon's mind it was a move of sure. I'll sell to you American idiots. And then once all of your up his mind, I will take it back. We did a whole sucking of pulling episode 134. Dude loved war and conquest. Happy to quickly greatly increase the size of their new nation, 1803, President Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, negotiated a deal with France to purchase Louisiana territory.

The United States purchased 827,000 square miles of land for $15 million, doubling the size of the country overnight. Funny how much the value of money, that change, isn't it? There are several homes on just a few acres of land on Lake Cortalane. They cost a lot more than $15 million now. Back then you could buy 530 million acres. Over three times the size of the entire nation of France, and that includes those little islands by Newfoundland. Before the negotiations were even finished Jefferson asked Congress to finance next petition out west

to get a feel for how easy to settle this new land would be. Find out who was already living there, what the geography was. Jefferson asked his personal secretary, Maryweather Lewis, to lead an expedition west to the Mississippi. Lewis chose William Clark to be his co-captain. Clark at the time was working as a fluffer

on a set of some local dawn of the 19th century porno shoot. Pornback then was live theater. He was helping with a production called King George, he poor, he put in pie hold. Not going to waste time going over the plot details. I think he gets the gist of the talk of Virginia. No, of course not. No Clark was an experienced military man who'd handled himself well and numerous skirmishes prior to the expedition and understood how to navigate a map

managed supplies keep a fellow traveler hard like a proper flutter. No, uh, you know other other things pertaining to the expedition. Uh Lewis and Clark's journey across the con. It would open the door to westward expansion via the Oregon Trail a few decades later. I made 14 to 1804 the expedition called the core of volunteers from northwest discovery set out into the unknown from St. Charles Missouri. Today St. Charles basically a suburb of St. Louis back in 1804, a little town of less than a thousand people at a time originally settled by French speaking colonists from Canada. It was considered the last civilized stop on Lewis and Clark's journey west. Lewis and Clark party consisted of obviously captains, 29 year old Lewis and 33 year old

Clark, 27 unmarried soldiers, a French indigenous interpreter, contracted boat crew and York, a man enslaved to Clark. A lot of historical speculation as to what happened to York. Some think that after the expedition was over, Clark refused to give him the freedom he supposedly promised and beat him and forced him to continue being his personal servant. Another narrative is that he was given freedom and horses and a wagon set up to basically work as a deliveryman, but it didn't work out too well. And he soon died of cholera.

McGill's pop. And the most popular narrative is that he left the expedition in present day Wyoming on the way back became a chief in a band of Crow and ended up with four wives. Sadly, not much other than speculation is what happened to Old York. The big expedition would last over two years. Man, that's a hell of a long time for essentially a fucking camp at trip. I love camping, but over two years, that feels a bit excessive. I'm more of a one weekend and then fuck this.

Sack of bug spray, sunscreen sunscreen and sleeping bag kind of guy. Over two years, that's a long time to go without a hot shower and without sleeping on one's own bed. Not that they had showers or nice mattresses back then. But still, not that adventurous. If given the choice, I would have 100% for sure taken a hard pass on the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Now I'm good guys.

Life sucks bad enough in 1804 in general. I already hate living in this time and place. I don't need to make it worse. I'll meet you guys for some warm whiskey, served out of a dirty glass when you get back, and you can tell me all about it, I probably won't care. Moose and Clark and the Corps Discovery were some of the first European Americans

to confront the lands out west. Random pioneers and fur trappers adventure out west before them, but this was the largest expedition to truly see how one coast of America could connect with the other coast. I guess I would like their stories. That's pretty amazing. The expedition wasn't easy as you can imagine. They faced starvation, disease, injuries, tense relations with native tribes, many of whom

had never seen white men before. They presented Jefferson peace medals, tribe members informing the tribes that their land was now part of the United States, subject to U.S. laws and regulations. I'm sure a lot of those tribes were like, yeah, yeah, Jefferson, United States, blah, blah, blah, cool story, bro. Take care. They promised peace and friendship. That, of course, would not quite be how shit would work out. In 1804, while North Dakota, the group met Sakajwia,

actually, Shoney woman, who'd been taken captive by the Mandan and Minotary tribes. Sakajwia, her husband, Tusson, Chabonol, French Canadian furtrapper and explorer, and their baby would travel on the rest of the journey with the corps. They were hired as translators. Sacaja Wea served as an important symbol of peace and acted as a guide for parts of the journey,

she was invaluable. Tusson? Yeah, okay. There were the first group of Americans across the continental divide via the Lemhigh pass Often pronounced lemmy by fellow Idaho mishmails like myself About a six-hour drive from the suck dungeon. You're in cordal lane right in the Idaho Montana border Two-hour drive from buteman tana our drive from salmon Idaho

One-time very important pass very seldomly used now just a little Idaho 13 heading over the border there. One lane in each direction and winding is shit. The expedition traveled through the Bitterroot Mountains where the past lies on through present day Idaho and finally reached the Pacific Ocean on December 10th, 1806. After waiting a few months for winter snow to melt in the mountains, they headed back east and turned home on August 11th or I'm sorry August 12th, 1806, bringing with them invaluable geographical knowledge. They created maps, 1806, bringing with him invaluable geographical knowledge. They created maps, geographical notes, identified 120 previously unknown to Americans' animal species,

200 new botanical species, established somewhat peaceful relations with dozens of tribes. Their journey strengthened American claims in the West and opened the gateways for Americans to flood the land beyond the Mississippi. And maybe most importantly for today's story, they proved it could be done. You could make it to Oregon via an inland route from the new former, or from the, you know, the new former colonies.

They inspired countless explorers and immigrants, most of whom would later travel along the Oregon Trail. The only real aspect of the core discovery's expedition that was considered a failure or a disappointment was their failure to find the fabled Northwest passage Northwest passage was thought to be a famed sea route from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean through a group of sparsely populated Canadian islands known as the Arctic archipelago. Explores look for it for centuries Europeans first started searching for it in the 1400s. The sellers look for it for centuries. Europeans first started searching for it in the 1400s. Countries wanted to claim the Northwest Passage

because it would give a direct route from Europe to Asia, controlling the passage, making control in a major trade route, and thus having economic power over rivals, but they never found it. Because it doesn't really exist. I mean, it's not entirely true. It does exist, but not in the form they were hoping for.

Only in a very extremely impractical form, not in a way that would have helped any of the colonial powers at all. The north was passage is 900 miles from the North Atlantic, North of Canada's Baffin Island in the east to the Beaufort Sea, North of Alaska and the West. It's entirely within the Arctic Circle. And Norwegian explorer, rolled Amanson, was the first to successfully navigate the passage in 1906. And it took him three terrible, brutally cold. or rolled Amundsen was the first to successfully navigate the passage 1906.

And it took him three terrible, brutally cold. How is this fun on any level years to do it? He and his crew of six men were iced in numerous times for several months at a time. Had to leave the ship more than once, do shit like ski hundreds of miles to go get and then bring back some supplies. It was a fucking shit show where he did it. Now, this passage is now used for commercial shipping in a very limited fashion. In 2014, a Norwegian commercial ship was the first to make it through without an icebreaker, ice breaker leading the way, hauled a bunch of nickel from Quebec to China, made it in 26

days, a lot faster than the 41 days it would have taken to go to the Panama Canal. Even now though, it's only used by a handful of ships every year and only during a few months in the summer. Back in Lewis and Clarks Day, it would have been a death wish to try and cross that. After Lewis and Clark returned with their tales of what kind of lands lay west, the citizens of the US and the government became very expansion-minded. Although the term manifest destiny wasn't coined until 1845, the idea was present in the minds of thousands of people well before them. Manifest destiny defined as the idea

that the United States is destined by God to expand its dominion and spread democracy across the entire North American continent. Human history, man, shape so significantly by so many notions of what no one has ever conclusively proved, right? That A, God exists in some form known by religion, and B, that God wants you to do this or do that. I think I'll be forever fascinated by that. A notion of what some God that may exist and may have said, this or that has truly been such a defining force for so many lives, cultures, empires, et cetera.

We live in lands today carved out largely by these ideas I sure do. You know, in 19th century America, a lot of early Americans truly believed that God wanted them to head west and take new lands for themselves. Forgot, raise Christian families there. For me personally, I got to say, thank you early Christian settlers. Wasn't for your godly efforts. My white non-religious ass certainly would not be living in such a beautiful place. This philosophy drove westward expansion in the 19th century and was used to justify removal

of local tribes from their ancestral lands. Manifest Destiny also created problems with slavery as new states for being added as America pushed West. Some white settlers, mainly from Southern states, obviously, wanted to work their new lands, plantation slavery style, other settlers did not. In this way, Westward expansion driven by manifest destiny would lead directly to the Civil War. Economic misfortune combined with possible new economic opportunities also fueled Westward

expansion. I would say this economic component was the main driver of expansion. It's always been the main driver of expansion, money. Even if you think God wants you to head west, if you are fucking killing it back east, make a money hand over fist, and head west could likely spell financial ruin for you and your kin. Are you really still gonna hop in that wagon and hit the long and dusty road? I doubt it. Someone still do it, the most faithful. You know, maybe some zealots, some clergymen, but I think most of the world's gonna be like, you know what? When I really think about it, I think I heard God wrong.

I think God does want me to stay here and keep my job, keep my job right here. Believe it, God wants you to head west and that you will financially prosper out west unlike your current situation. Well, that was the winning. Let's go settle some shit ticket. God money, that combo has truly, as the saying goes, made the world go round. From 1815 to the US population exploded from roughly 5 million to roughly 23 million, mostly due to high birth rates and immigration.

In this relative overcrowding, also pushed people west. Many Eastern states had become overcrowded for their day. Back when people needed a lot of land to farm. Back when people weren't living in high-rise apartment and condo buildings, working in tech or farmer suitables or customer service or whatever, it was a different kind of crowded. And because of this relative crowding, lower-class families had limited opportunities for land ownership. Adding to financial problems, for many were two depressions, 119-19, 119-39. The panic of 1819 was the first substantial and prolonged financial crisis. The young nation, you know, or the US of fucking A had ever experienced.

It lasted until 1821 was partially brought on by global market adjustments in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars, Napoleon. Caused a lot of carnage over there. Also partially brought on by the US government, not regulated inflation and managing currency and leaving that up to private banks who thought they could just basically print monopoly money to pay any debts they had and not suffer consequences. And then that monopoly money became about as valuable as actual monopoly money and there was a wave of foreclosures and overall financial panic. Simplifying that tremendously for the sake of staying on track with today's subject. In 1839, a period of four years of depression

and deflation began. More folk foreclosures, more economic turmoil, more incentive to head out west and search of land and economic opportunities. You know, head out west and start over. Also, there was the Monroe doctrine. This is important. Need to go over this. 1823, fifth US president James Monroe, invoked manifest destiny when he addressed Congress.

He warned European nations not to interfere with West for expansion. Any attempt by Europeans to colonize American continents would be considered a declaration of war in this led to the official naming of the Monroe doctrine, which established an American sphere of influence and promoted non intervention in European affairs and rose spoke of an old world and a new world. And that each had their own sphere of influence. non-intervention in European affairs and rose book of an old world and a new world and that each had their own sphere of influence and that just like the US had no business meddling in the affairs of Europe Europe needed to stay the hell out of the Americas.

It was very much a you worry about your neighborhood and you stay the fuck out of ours. What you think we don't fuck with you? You don't fuck with us. Cool. The Monroe Doctrine became a cornerstone of US diplomacy for many years and settling the West was part of it. It wasn't an official piece of legislation or anything, it was a philosophy of mentality. It wouldn't actually be officially called to Monroe doctrine until the 1850s, but the

mentality began in the 1820s. In the early 1820s, many Latin American countries won independence from colonial powers like Spain and Portugal. The US government recognized the new republics of Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia, and Mexico in 1822. Britain and the US worried that their continental European powers would make attempts to restore their authority in those regions. Monroe initially supported joining with the British against further colonization in Latin America until Secretary of State, John Quincy Adams argued that allying with the British could limit

US opportunities for expansion. He wanted Monroe to make a unilateral statement of US policy that would set an independent course for the nation and claim a new role as protector of the Western hemisphere. I mean, Ro did just that on December 2, 1823 during his customary message to Congress. His address asserted that, as I just mentioned, the old world and new world are fundamentally different and should have two separate spheres of influence. The US should not interfere with Europe, and Europe should not interfere with the colonies and the North and South America.

The American continents by the free and independent condition, which they have assumed and maintained, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for colonization by any European powers. He said, When the road gave the address, the US was not even a century old, still considered a minor player in world affairs. When a road didn't have the military or naval power to back up such a bold claim of the time, and Europe, largely was like,

ah, I said the fuck up. Then as America grew more powerful, you know, they're like, okay, all right, okay, well, respect your wishes. The US didn't actually invoke them in road doctrine until 1867. When they supplied military and diplomatic support to Benito Juarez in Mexico, which allowed him and his forces to overthrow Emperor Maximeleon, placed on the throne by the French. From 1870 onwards, the US became a world power,

and the Monroe Doctrine was used to justify further interventions in Latin America. In 1904, theodore Roosevelt added the Roosevelt corollary or big stick policy that the US would exercise international police power and responds to any wrongdoing. And we have definitely been police in the world ever since Teddy Mothafuck and Roosevelt. Lay that down. How does all this related to Oregon Trail? Well, the United States badly wanted to settle the Wild West before some European power tried to interfere, interfere or interfere with our sphere of influence and settle at first.

The US government wanted to make sure we didn't directly border some foreign extension of European military power directly to the West, easier to stay independent if you control all the ports to both the east and the west having a war with Spain or France or Britain when they're across the Atlantic. It was one thing fighting them when they're sending in troops from present-day Minnesota, Nebraska, Iowa, California, Texas, etc. Well, they'll be quite another. Speaking of Texas, Tejas. Let's now shift focus to Texas, a key state in early Westward expansion.

In 1820, Moses Austin, a U.S. citizen, asked the Spanish government in Mexico shortly before the Mexican War of Independence for permission to settle Texas. He was granted some land and then died soon after in June of 1821, his son, Stephen F. Austin, took over that land, advertised in New Orleans for other Americans to join him, form a new American colony. Few months later, Mexico gains independence from Spain in the fall of 1821. Austin then negotiated a contract with the new government for the land he had. He's permitted to take 300 families to settle some land along the Brazos River. And then more than 300 families come.

Additional Americans continue arriving. Eventually they outnumber the Mexicans living in Texas. And then the Mexicans, you know, do a little gringo headcount and they're like, hey, wait a minute. 1830, the Mexican government takes measures to stop American immigration. Mexico after winning independence from Spain passed the law suspending US immigration into Texas.

At the time, there were more, you know, because there was more American settlers in Texas and Mexicans, Mexicans, US citizens protested for the re-enixation of Texas then. They want to pull it into America. 1833 Austin seeks statehood for Texas in the Mexican Federation. Actually, he was in using prison effort calling on sellers to declare stated without getting consent from mexican congress you would not be released until eighteen thirty five uh... while he was in jail in eighteen thirty four santa anna a soldier in politician

becomes dictator of mexico seeks to end the texas rebellion there's a lot of chaos going on mexico for like a couple decades in this time in october eighteen thirty five english residence of González, Texas respond to Santa Ana's orders to return a cannon by firing at Mexican soldiers sent to retrieve it. At Barrow, the cannon for defense against some local tribes. This was considered the first shot fired in the battle of the Texas Revolution. American settlers quickly set up a provisional state government.

A Texas army led by Sam Houston would go on to win a series of small battles in the fall of 1835. We went over some of this and a lot more detail in the 41st episode of Time Suck, the Texas Rangers episode. In December of 1835, Texas volunteers under Ben Millum drive out Mexican soldiers from San Antonio, settle around the Alamo, a former mission compound converted into a military base. January of 1836, Santa Ana concentrates a force of a few thousand soldiers south of the Rio Grande, Sam Houston orders that the Texans abandoned the Alamo, Colonel James Buie, or Buie knife, Buie, who arrived at the Alamo on January 19th realized that they couldn't move the cannons in time. So he stays behind with his men, realizes if he can delay the Mexican soldiers, Houston

will have time to raise a larger army on February 2nd, 1836, Boeing 30 men, they join a small cavalry under Colonel William Travis, a week later, David Crockett and 14 Tennessee mounted volunteers Iraq's on February 23rd, 1836, Santa Ann and 3000 Mexican soldiers siege the Alamo for 12 days on March 1st, 1836, the last Texas reinforcements broke through enemy lines and into the Alamo, bringing their total soldiers up to around 185. On our 200 men fighting against several thousand, the Alamo really is a legendary just kind of spata. You know, type battle.

On March 6th, Santa Ana orders his soldiers to storm the Alamo just over an hour, all the remaining Texan and American volunteers are killed in hand-to-hand combat. Just a few women and children survive. They men that died basically sacrifice themselves so that Texas could become part of the U.S. and in that sense it worked. Six weeks later, large Texan army, given time to form during the siege of the Alamo, commanded by Houston, surprised Santa Ana, San, uh, uh, yeah, Sinto. And actually, I should say correction. There's so much historical stuff happening right now. Santa Ana Santa, uh, uh, uh, yeah, uh, uh, yeah, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, Santa Ana Santa, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, CZ animal, yet commanded by Houston, surprised the Santa Ana, San Isento, shouting, remember the

Alamo, yeah, yeah, right? They defeat the Mexican army. They capture Santa Ana who was then forced to recognize Texan independence and withdrew his forces south of Rio Grande. Then on March 2nd, 1936, the Convention of American Texans meets at Washington the Brasow's little community that is still a little community, a little unincorporated community in Washington County, Texas. And they declared Texan independence from Mexico. They chose David Burnett as a provisional president. Sam Houston is commander in chief of all Texan forces, adopted Constitution, protecting slavery, which was prohibited under Mexican law. And Texas sought annexation into the US while for nearly a decade existed existing as an independent republic.

So I guess you could argue they fought either for joining the US or for Texas independence. They had to be independent for a while and then would join the US later. The fact that they were their own kind of country, I guess that really helps me understand the independent spirit of Texas. It has that really helps me understand the independent spirit of Texas. It has the most independent spirit I think of any state in the country by far. Now, from 1836 to 1846, yeah, they did exist as a sovereign state. Brank tank don't die ain't but I ain't think. Well, little aerobangial deep in the heart of Texas, initially presidents Jackson and Van Buren resisted Texas annexation. They feared

would start a war with Mexico, anger Americans who thought annexing Texas was a move to expand slavery. In April of 1844, Texas became eligible for admission to the States as a U.S. territory. Congress actually opposed the agreement. President John Tyler, literally completely fucking forgot that it was ever president. I did, I did double check the research before including him. I'm like, who the hell is President Tyler? He pushed the bill through and did sign it before he left office. And why again would Congress oppose Texas? Well, for a while there it was, you know,

didn't want to start another war with Mexico, but there were other reasons. And one of one of those reasons was Dixie. The survey was taken and it was found that Texas Dix are 30 to 40% smaller than Dix from the rest of the US. It was true then and it's still true today. And Congress didn't wanna appear weaker, to Europe in the Intercontinental Old World

versus New World annual big dick contest due to Texas dragging down EUS National average dick size, JK of course. No, Congress opposed Texas due to Texas being pro slavery. Like I said, Congress was already full of pro and anti-slavery factions bringing tons of discord to legislative sessions. If the America feels divisive now, anything it does compared to recent decades, we are not nearly as divided as we were the couple decades leading up to the Civil War.

Eleventh US President James Pogue pro annexation candidate. He personally was pro slavery in the south and the west supported his presidential campaign uh... he took off as an eighteen forty four and he allowed texas to be admitted as a state in eighteen forty five now with the acquisition of texas the idea that u.s. expansion was inevitable it fully captured the minds of captivated the minds of u.s. citizens in all regions economic classes

and political innings go west young man was on a lot of young men's. And you know, quite a few young women's minds. Turn manifest destiny then appeared in an editorial published in the July, August, 1845 issue of the Democratic review. It's not an official term yet, but it's at least being printed now. The writer encouraged national unity on behalf of the fulfillment of our manifest destiny to overspread the continent, allotted by by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions. In July of 1845, the phrase appeared in the New York Morning News possibly written by

John O'Sullivan, editor of the Democratic Review in the Morning News in December of 1845. Another Morning News article mentioned manifest destiny in reference to the new organ territory. The organ territory was first established in 1842. A year after the first true organ trail, wagon train headed out west, or wagons. Seven years after the first migrant wagon train was organized in Independence, Missouri. 1836, a wagon trail had been cleared

all the way to Fort Hall, Idaho, most of the way, Oregon City. Always wondered if that hall was related to me through my maternal grandpa grandpa Ward, mother, fucking hall pop-a-word since the halls go way back in Idaho. If the relation is there, it's distant. Fort Hall was not named after a guy in Idaho.

I might have mentioned that in the pop-a-word. So it was named after a major investor from back east to help fund the 1834 expedition that founded the Fort Henry Hall. I'm not sure Henry even ever saw his namesake fort. Anyways, prior to 1836, fur traders, trappers, you know, true mountain men, they've been ahead in West for a few decades.

Back to 1842, that year, a treaty between the US and Britain, the Webster Oshburden treaty, resolved the question of where to draw the Canadian border. It's where he left the Oregon territory open to US settlement. This massive piece of land stretched from the Pacific coast to the Rocky Mountains, covering the modern day boundaries of Oregon, Idaho, Washington, and most of British Columbia originally. Pope campaign with a slogan 5440 or fight, referencing the potential northern boundary of Oregon's latitude. He called the US's claims to Oregon clear and unquestionable in his inaugural

address. Pope wanted to acquire Oregon to the US could then focus on taking California for Mexico. Mexico would retain possession of portions, you know, of or all of present day Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming for two more years. In mid 1846, Polk's administration agreed to split Oregon along the 49th parallel, narrowly avoiding a major conflict with Britain, Britain, which still directly controlled Canada, did 1846, Pope's administration agreed to split Oregon along the 49th parallel, narrowly avoiding a major conflict with Britain. Britain, which still directly controlled Canada, did not love that slogan of 54-40 or fight.

They were like, um, you know, we already claimed that area, right? We're actually planning on calling it British Columbia. So I guess we'll have to fucking fight then. And then Pope was like, what the? God. Ah, you wait, didn't you hear the slide whistle after what I said? I was Joshin, 49th parallel. That's what I wanted for realsies.

By the time early settlers were put down permanent roots in Oregon, the US had worked things out with Britain. The US didn't have time to fight Britain because they were now at war with Mexico. Manifest destiny. Woo! Hey, yeah! God wants us to beat you back down South. And by South, we actually ideally mean way east,

all the way back to Spain. Fuck out of here, Jesus loves us more than you. Mexican-American war really was part of the country's manifest destiny narrative. And it's him to assert American supremacy crossing entire continent and an ideal scenario for the US. From sea to shining sea and from the Arctic Circle, somewhere South, the Panama Canal. If Americans, some of them ideally had their way.

Papers like the American Review discussed changing Mexico's customs and outliving, out trading, exterminating her weaker blood, he eek, weaker blood, Jesus. Easy, American Review, easy. Many people, such as future president Abraham Lincoln, abolitionists, ministers, and Henry David Thoreau oppose this war. War last from 1846, 1848 was the first armed U.S. conflict fought mainly on foreign territory. That is Mexico. On February 2, 1848, the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe, Hidalgo ended the Mexican-American War, added 525,000 square miles to the U.S.

Mexico gave up that land I mentioned earlier, parts are all of the future states of California, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, and Wyoming. The treaty recognized that the real ground, the real grande as the new US Mexico border. Mexico also officially recognized the annexation of Texas and agreed to sell their land for 15 million. So deep in the heart of Texas, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. An interesting fact about the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, gold was first discovered in California

just a few days before Mexico ceded their land. Ain't that a bit. Thanks for the land, Mexico, good fight. So much gold, by the way, holy shit. Like the most, we just found it. We're talking more gold than Cortez took from the Aztecs. We'll send you some earrings and a cool bracelet or something. Most important historical event that took place during the final stage of the trail

was the American Civil War, from April 12th, 1861 to April 9th, 1865. We did a Civil War suck, episode 1880, if you want to check it out. The Civil War obviously led to something long overdue and wonderful. The emancipation of African American slaves also led to a lot of death and turmoil. Recent historical estimates, uh, place of death toll at roughly 750,000. A lot of family breadwinners are lost, a lot of farms and plantations lost during and after the war. A lot of people with new incentive to try and rebuild new lives out west.

Also the homestead act of 1862 made settling in the west more appealing than ever. Signed by President Lincoln, May 20, 1862, the homestead act allowed citizens to register for 160 acres of public land if they paid a fee and lived on the land for five years. 270 million acres roughly 10% of the country was settled under this act. Before the homes that act historians described land distribution policies in America as arbitrary and chaotic. Fun properties overlapped. Awesome. Border disputes were common. Lot of Hock Fowke folk. Hatfield McCoy type fused. Lot of shootouts kicked off over. It's my land. The thing or Jenkins. Out of my papers. The hell you say, Rutherford McKinley, I have papers to say different than you. I think neither one of us can read.

As far as let's fight. Uh, land ordinance of 1785 had been the first standardized system of federal land surveys leading up to the Homestead Act. Territory been divided into six square mile or six mile squares, whatever, same difference, called townships. Each township divided into 36 sections, one square mile or 640 acres. An individual is required to purchase a full section, this was a huge investment, and the labor needed to clear the land and establish a settlement was too much for the average American. By 1800, the minimum lot was reduced to 320 acres. And a four installment payment plan was implemented.

The price was fixed at $125 an acre until 1854, but it was still too much. A lot of American. 1854 federal legislation established a graduating scale that adjusted the price per acre based on a lot of desirability. Some undesirable lots were reduced to just 12.5 cents an acre. For those interested in a whole bunch of dust, rock, and rag wheat, those desiring some of that sand and sage brush land. Fuck yeah, bro. Look at all this land that I own, free and clear.

And just cue some panoramic view of cow skulls, ant hills, vulture, sandy soil, dry creek bed, few manger coyotes. To get further incentive to settle the U.S. government extended bonuses to veterans, anyone interested in settling the organ territory. This made homestead that act of viable, you know, option for more people. I'm sorry, not act. This made homesteading a viable option for more people. But previous to the home said act, it was still widely unattainable for most Americans. Let me

explain why. Before and after the Mexican-American War, there was pressure for the federal government to change land policies. In 1830s and 40s, the price of corn, of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state. The state and time again, the government shot that concept down. Eastern legislators opposed it because they worried that their factory labor would just flee West. But then by the time the Civil War kicked off, a number of developments supported the growth of homesteaders, and unprecedented number of immigrants brought economic prosperity to the country.

New canals reduced dependence on the New Orleans harbor. England's repeal of corn laws opened up new markets for American farmers. Preemption became a hotly debated matter of potential national policy in 1852, 1854, and 1859. But the Senate defeated those measures each time. Then in 1860, a homestead bill providing federal land grants was passed by Congress. And then vetoed by 15th president James Buchanan, Jr. Jimmy Jr. A man, many presidential historians think with the worst president of all time. Fucking, Jr. And after Jr. was out of the office during the Civil War, the Northern states were temporarily

their own country, no longer had to worry about Southern labor concerns, which is why James Buchanan shot it down. So in 1862 Lincoln moved to sign the home, said, act into law. And when he signed it, he allegedly muttered, fuck you, Jimmy Jr. They take and suck my honest, dick. Maybe he muttered that. I wasn't there. Now under this act, acquiring land was made even more financially possible than any kind of preemption law.

Under this act, you wouldn't have to pay for anything directly for your land, not at first. You could buy the land if you wanted for $1.25 per acre after six months, or you can just pay a filing fee for 160 acres for as little as $10. You pay a $2 commission when you show up to your land agent. Then after five years of work in that land, a $6 final filing payment. You can purchase 160 acres of farmable land for as little as $18. It wasn't quite free, but it was pretty damn close. After the war was over,

the Southern States would just have to retroactively accept this. There were three steps, the homestead acquisition process, file an application and prove the land file for deed of title. Right after five years, you know, a homesteader could file for deed of title by submitting proof of residency and required improvements to a local land office.

Work the land until the land is yours. No purchase necessary, outside of sweat labor and $18 in filing fees. Always gotta be some fees. Almost nothing's totally free. You know some homesteaders bitched about that 18 bucks, right? Or at least maybe about like the $6 filing fee at the end. Maybe they forgot about it after five years of farming. And they're like, wow? Six bucks. You want six bucks. That looked like I made a money. How about how about open a vein and you just take my blood to while you're at greedy ass uncle Sam need my six bucks.

The country's going to fall back to the British or some shit I get the January 1st, 1863, Daniel Freeman makes the first claim under this new act. At a New Year's Eve party. He convinces a land office clerk to open the office just a tick after midnight so we can file that claim first. I love his enthusiasm. And soon he was heading out west of present day Southeast Nebraska.

Nebraska. This is a few miles outside of the present day town of Beatrice, Nebraska. And he jumped into a whole heap of hardship and hard work in addition to a lot of land. Getting those 160 acres that sure as shit didn't put you on easy street life was hard for Daniel in other homesteaders. Although the land was cheap or free many homesteaders did not last five years because of blizzards drought disease. You know, plague's a locus loneliness on the open prairies occasional psychotic neighbor. You know, after they made itust, loneliness on the open prairies, occasional psychotic neighbor. You know, after they made it to the west, they faced winds, blizzards, plagues of insects, yeah, limited natural resources, fuel, water.

160 acres not enough to sustain a large farm, difficult to raise livestock actually. I don't know, shit about farming personally. So, sounds like a lot to me, but, you know, I guess compared to likes to gigantic farms, 160 acres wasn't quite enough. They faced extreme loneliness in many cases. They just lived so far from any town or mail route or railroads in so many cases for so long. No roads in a lot of cases.

They had land, but for many, they didn't have much of anything else. Sounds like hell on earth for me. I feel like that situation would lead to me thinking, something like, you know what? I think I do want to be a stage coach robber. Better than dying of boredomom out in some dusty field. Those who could last at least five years were often rewarded,

quickly developing railroads made it easier to get supplies and travel and soon increase the value of their land and the ability to make money off that land substantially. Unfortunately, while the homes that act technically open lands up to any U.S. citizens of any race, because free blacks were denied U.S. citizenship until 1868 they missed out on a lot of the best land. And because natives were not considered U.S. citizens, a lot of the tribes whose lands had just been taken and given to home standards could not become home standards themselves and try and get that shit back. So mostly, not surprising here, if you know much about the history of the Western world,

the home-stead act was for White folk. Please allow this white guy to, I don't know, slide whistle my way out of this awkwardness in transition. Moon long with all that history now established. Take a look at life on the trail for settlers, followed of course by our timeline of the trail from beginning to end with the mentions of some notable people and events and some of the acts that led up to the beginning of the trail. Took the pioneers roughly four to six months, approximately 2,170 miles of travel to reach Oregon, city, Oregon from Independence, Missouri. That was the full length of the trail. Somewhere between 250 and 500,000 people traveled on that trail between 1841 and 1869. Pretty rough estimate since they didn't have some, you know, like ticket booth at the beginning of the trail. Somebody doing a head count, like you're walking into

Disneyland or something. Also, the trail was used after 1869, just not nearly as often because the railroads connected the east and the west beginning in May of 1869. And while the Bartleson Bidwell party was the first immigrant group credited with using the Oregon Trail to immigrate West in 1841 Smaller groups of people people who forwards the beginning of the trail did head out and make it to Oregon earlier than that The Oregon Trail from the very beginning wasn't the only way out West

Immigrants could also sail all the way down around the tip of South America Cape Horn and then back up to say San Francisco Now take anywhere from three and a half months to a fucking year. Jesus Christ, quite a bit of variance there. Apparently some boats provided a little faster ride than others. And generally, I guess it was closer to a year. That's a long time to be seasick if you struggle with that like I do. Again, I am out. Hard out.

I wanted to stay where I was. I wanted to try to hike my away down to Florida or something. They want to beach. Eat lots of fish and oranges until I die of malaria or something. It was around a 15,000 mile journey to travel that way. So many miles at sea. The journey from a London port to a port in New York City, that's less than 4,000 miles.

To sail around the horn from East to West Coast, USA, almost four times that many, right? Four times that many miles in a shitty ass early 19th century boat. Fuck that. January of 1855, a railway was completed across the isthmus of Panama. Then you can take a boat from the east coast of the U.S. down to Panama. Then you can take a 47 mile rail journey. Then get on another boat and sail up the west coast.

But that was super risky because traveling to the jungle of Panama, you could come down with, you know, Colorado, malaria, yellow fever, and then check this out. This is ridiculous. And Panama City on the west side of Panama, you might be stuck for several months waiting for a ship to take you up to San Francisco. A lot of sailors who crewed boats from Panama to San Francisco refused to come back and they were just abandon their boats and San Francisco Bay. For a few years, San Francisco Bay had so many abandoned boats.

They started using them for temporary housing. Dude, we just get there and then just like fuck that, they take off and go look for some gold or go home, set themselves or whatever. And I'm like, we're not going on a fucking shitty ass boat back to Panama. It reminds me of getting like an email notification today. Notifying me that my flight has been you know, canceled and I've been put on a different flight, you know, no, my two hour layover is a six hour layover. And I'm like, God damn it.

Oh, thanks for ruining my whole day, Delta. Except back then, if you're supposed to sail on, say, October 20th, you would get a notification that your ship had me canceled and that you'd been rescheduled for like February 15th. Except you wouldn't be rescheduled. It was like, fuck you you by a new ticket. That sucks so bad. For several decades, your organ trail was far and away. Your best option.

I'm making it from Missouri to anywhere east Missouri. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm making it from any from Missouri or anywhere east Missouri to basically anywhere west of Missouri. So you chose to take the trail. When did you get going? For overlanders, timing was everything on this journey. Emigrants had to be in St. Joseph or Independence, Missouri, or near one of those places as a more stops got going later on in early April to start their journey, you know, by the middle of the month. If they tried to head out earlier, the weather wouldn't be right for travel. And then if they got out later, they'd be snowed in, have to win or in the western mountains, which often meant death, you know, you don't

want to be like the ill-fated Donner party. Also, if you left too late, the grass could die early, and there wouldn't be any food for your livestock. If you left too early, the grass wouldn't have grown in enough yet. Wouldn't be enough food for your livestock is tricky. And St. Josephine Independence, that's where you'd buy everything you needed for the journey. Food, tools, wagons, animals, where you'd hire trail guides. Reminds me of the old Oregon Trail

computer game. I used to play in school. A lot of us did. Early PC game, first release, 1978, with the Apple IIE, the 1985 version. That was the one that was just like widely released in schools all over America. I'm sure many other countries, that's the one I played. Well, I guess it wouldn't be in other countries. Why would they fucking care?

A lot of these things. No, America. That's the one I played. Well, I guess it wouldn't be in other countries. Why would they fucking care? Bar-day is good in that. No, America. And, yeah, I was released and, uh, it was, you know, continued to be distributed until 1993, that version. And I found a sweet, free emulator online at visitorrigan.com. And I've been playing the last couple of days. And I haven't been doing well.

So how about I play along while I tell the story? We'll find out if my party can make it or not Before I begin let me consult consult historical experts regarding what me and Lindsey and Joe and Logan and Zach will need for a wagon train journey All the then the you know all the in office staff will come along for this ride. We'll see who lives Who's dumb enough to drown or dive color or get a fucking snake bite or something? Joe has been doing well in the practice rounds. He's been getting a lot of snake bites. I will see how well I can hunt for this party. It would cost between $81200 roughly equivalent to $28,000 to $42,000 in today's money to properly

outfit a wagon. Get all of the stuff you needed to survive a whole year without being able to harvest any crops. The Immigrant Guide published in St. Louis, 1849 gave a list of supplies for three people. Historians often reference this as a standard supply list for immigrants. You need, you know, food, obviously, flour. This is crazy. A thousand 80 pounds of flour. 600 pounds of bacon, 100 pounds of coffee, five pounds of tea, 150 pounds of sugar. I feel like if it's only today, it'd be like a thousand pounds of sugar, 5 pounds of tea, 150 pounds of sugar. I feel like if it's only today to be like 1000 pounds of sugar, 10 pounds of flour.

75 pounds of rice, 50 pounds of dried fruit, 50 pounds of salt and pepper, 10 pounds of baking soda, 50 pounds of lard. Travelers also recommended to buy cornmeal, hard tack, dried beef, molasses, vinegar, eggs, and beans. Oh, hard tack. Hard tack is a cracker-ish biscuit thing made out of flour, water, and salt if you're fancy. It was cheap to make and the shit lasts forever.

They still have recipes for hard tack on pepper sites. And they claim if you keep a dry, these calorie rocks will last anywhere from 30 years to literally over a hundred years. Not kidding. They're super hard, super dry, and best case, they have virtually no flavor. Worst case, it sounds like they taste like they're made out of fucking dried buttholes and vomit.

Now, you need cooking supplies on your journey oven, skillet, kettle, coffee grinder, teapot, knife, ladle, tin, tableware, water cake, matches, tools, you know, plow, shovel, rake, hoe, carpeted tools, saw, mallet, axe, spade, wetstone, plain, axles, king bolt, ox or mule shoes. Obviously, depending if you got an ox or a mule, uh, oxen, you have multiple spokes, ropes, chains. So far, the supplies have not included anything fun. I double checked, and I didn't see an intendo switch or iPad or porn mags or even a Frisbee. Next you need some seeds, corn, wheat, other seeds. I would suck to make it all the way to Oregon. Realize you forgot your fucking seeds. Back in Missouri. All right family, we lost Lucy and Graham and Neddy, but

Dressress made it. Manifest destiny. All the sacrifice was worth it. Now we're gonna grow to most crops anyone's ever grown. We grabbed a seeds here and we're I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening.

I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening.

I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. pistol knife, hatchet, powder-led bullet mold. All right, gotta make it on bullets. Off in cases, or you need to help, be helpful to do so, powder horn, bullet pouch, holster. Now, when you're rifle, you're shot

in your pistol, I'll jam up, you lose them, run out of ammo. Better be good with the hatchet. Now, to go, old school, real old school, carve yourself a spear. There's clothes, wool coats, rubber coats, cotton dresses, buckskin pants, duck trousers, cotton shirts, woolen undershirts, cotton drawers, flannel shirts, cotton socks, boots, shoes, ponchos,

felt hats, and sun bonnets. Sun bonnet might seem like an inconsequential thing to bring, but remember there was no sunscreen, and there was people walking beside the wagon. Most people were walk next to the wagon along the trail, walk in all day every day for months across the Midwest summer. You know, burn your fucking scalp off. If you forget that bonnet and then it looked like Freddie Krueger by time you make it Oregon, if you're

not careful. Also need proper bedding. Walk in all day tends to wear a meat sack out. You're going to want to sleep on something other than rocks and sticks and bugs. If you want to get enough rest to complete your journey, You're gonna need blankets, ground cloths, pillows, tents, poles, stakes, ropes, jerk off racks, dittle racks, JK maybe. Probably be best off shooting your seat out in the dirt. Maybe I'm on the side of a tree, not on the trail though. You don't wanna make it more slippery. You don't wanna accidentally kill another pioneer

when they slip on your seat and break a leg or something. Now, you gotta do some good old fashioned tree jerking. Maybe wipe those dittle DJ fingers off on some prairie grass. Most settlers did bring some kind of luxury items. Still no switches though. More like canned goods, plant cuttings, books, instruments, toys, family albums, jewelry, China silverware, linens, iron stoves, furniture, rock and chair be pretty sweet.

A little bit of sunset rocking in after a long day of walking. Other items might include surgical instruments, linaments, bandages, stool, chamber pot, wash bowl, lanterns, candle molds, tallow, spy glasses, scissors, needles, pins, threads, toothbrushes, soap, comb brush, and towels. Not even kidding on the spy glasses. Not quite as cool as they sound though. Basically a small telescope, so you can see up ahead. If you're approaching a grizzly bear or something, you know

That's maybe some other meat sacks. They don't look too welcoming Well, you might want to get your rifle ready a little bit Prev a little bit before you run into them All right, now it's about time to fire up that old Oregon Trail game Right after today's sponsor break Thanks for listening meat sacks now let's return to the Oregon Trail I feel ready to play the game and bring the suck dungeon crew from Missouri to 160 glorious acres in Oregon's Willamette Valley. All right, so, okay, I gotta get my team going here. First, let's start off on the Oregon Trail game. It says, you know, you mean travel in the trail, learn about the trail. See

the Oregon top 10. Ah, fuck this. Let's go. Let's go travel the trail. That's what we're here for. All right, you want to be a banker from Boston, Carpenter from Ohio, Farmer from Illinois. You know what? Joe's yelling, I wanna be a Carpenter. Okay, Carpenter from Ohio, because you know, Joe's got family in Ohio, Lindsey's from Ohio, it's be a Carpenter from Ohio.

What is the first name of the wagon leader? Okay, so I'm the wagon leader and I'm gonna be Whipple. So I'm gonna be Whipple the wagon master and then other members of the wagon leader. Okay, so I'm the wagon leader and I'm going to be Whipple. So I'm going to be Whipple the wagon master. And then other members of the party, let's have Lucifina. That will be Lindsay. Let's have let's have burgers. That'll be Zach, because for many years, he lived off of only burgers. For Logan, let's have showbiz. He's gonna be showbiz guy. And then, uh, for, for Joe, we're gonna have Lil J. Uh, and I love, I love the little Joe stuff because he's actually, uh, he's actually on the bigger size of a guy. And somehow it became like, he became a little guy in the suck for suck world, but he's not at all.

Okay. So look at our team here. Are these names correct? Yes, they are. It's 1848, you're jumping off. It's Independence, Missouri. You know, decide which month to leave. March, April, May, June, July.

Well, they just told us April, right? We just came across in the research April. I think March is too early, made us too late. Now it says, before leaving Independence, you should buy equipment and supplies. You have 800 bucks. I've been practicing this a little bit, so it would be too tedious. But I says, before leaving independence, you should buy equipment and supplies. You have 800 bucks. I've been practicing this a little bit so it would be too tedious. But I have, but I've all been dying. So this might not work out very well. Don't have to spend

it all now. Okay. Space Party continue. You can buy whatever you need. It matches. Generals to it. All right, Matt. What do you sell on the day, Matt? He says, hello, I'm Matt. So you're going to Oregon. Aren't you perceptive? I can fix you up with what you need. A team of oxen to pull your wagon, clothing for both summer and winter. Okay Matt, plenty of food, ammo, we got it Matt. Now we're gonna buy some shit, oxen. Okay, I gotta get, he says he recommends at least three yoke oxen, there's two oxen in a yoke. He's charging forty bucks a yoke, fuck it. Alright, there we go, three. You know what, I don't get four, I don't get four yokes because last time I played some son of a bitch stole six of my oxen in the middle of the night.

Food, we're gonna need a lot of food because I'm very bad at hunting because you only have the left right, up down arrows in this particular keyboard which doesn't allow for angles. So the fucking bears and deer have to be coming straight at me from the left to right or straight above or below for me to shoot them You recommend these 200 pounds of food for each person in your family. Okay, we have five people So I should get you know as you get a thousand pounds. How many pounds do you want? Yeah, Matt? I do want I want a thousand pounds Now we have we have 440 bucks left Clothing we need some clothing

Matt saying you need warm for the mountains, you need two sets, you know, because it can be cool clothes for the summer. Recommend two sets per person, each sets 10 bucks. I've got, you know, five people, so I gotta get 10 sets of clothing. Now I've got three hundred forty bucks left. Ammo, I'm fucking shit with the rifle on this game.

Sells ammo in boxes, 20 bullets, $2 each. I don't think there's any way in hell. I'm gonna shoot more than and boxes of 20 bullets, two dollars each. I don't think that there's any way in hell. I'm going to shoot more than 10 boxes of bullets. So now spare parts, I got 400 or 320 bucks left. Now this is this is the screwed me the last game. Wagon wheel, $10 each. Wagon axle, he says, good idea. Have a few spare parts.

How many wagon wheels? Uh, I'm gonna get six wagon wheels. It's got a lot of wagon wheels. Let me get six. I'm gonna get no, I'm gonna get six wagon wheels. Let's get a lot of wagon wheels. I'm gonna get six, I'm gonna get, no, I'm gonna get three, four axles. Oh, you can only carry three wagon wheels. Well, fuck, all right, Matt, I'll max out, max wagon wheels. How many axles? Three, how many tongues? Three. Okay. Now we got $570 bill. We have $230 left. Let's go. Let's leave the store. We're ready. He says good luck on your journey He says it's gonna be long and difficult ahead of the fuck shut the fuck up, Matt

Why are you being a Debbie Downer telling me my journey my journey is gonna be hard Independence April 1st 1848 press space bar to continue Gonna continue on the trail because we haven't even got started Here we go. The weather's cool and the health is good. Got my food, thousand pounds. Right? I'm just fucking moving along. Oh, God damn, Ox wanders off. I just lost three days. I'm not good. I got a dumb ox. Start my journey like out the gate. He wanders. Okay. Can I make it into some kind of river

And I have to make some choices the rivers. That's where you can lose a lot of people. I'm at the Kansas River Would you like to look around? Yeah, I would once you Okay, staple 10th I'm not seeing shit. There's no other people there. So I'm gonna continue on the trail. See how deep it is Ooh four and a half feet deep 626 feet across. I feel like I might have some smaller party members and they're gonna drown. So I'm not gonna be able to just drag them across.

Now I'm gonna have to, I'm gonna have to cock the wagon and float that shit. I'm not gonna take a ferry, I don't think it's that crazy. Okay, best of luck. Here we're going, we're moving. Please don't capsize. At the start, please don't capsize. I'll just quit. Oh, all right, we made it. You had no trouble. here we're going or moving please don't capsize at the start please don't capsize all this quit

oh all right we made it you had no trouble victory from the Kansas River 82 miles to the big blue river crossing let's get to moving all right I'd like to make it to Fort Carney if I could on this initial initial part of the journey I highly recommend playing this too if you get a chance it's pretty fun oh god Lucifer has a chance, it's pretty fun. Oh God, Lou Stafina has a broken leg. Lindsay's legs broken, how have you even made the second river? Ah, okay, I got a size of a situation.

I'm gonna give her a few days to, I'm gonna stop and rest. But only this once, so you can't get her fucking shit together. We're just gonna have to keep pushing on here soon. I'll rest, okay, I'll rest for five days. We started early, Lou to Fina, Lindsay. Now it's April 20th, slowing us down.

Now I'm gonna make it to the river. Big blue river crossing, would you like to look around? Nah, I don't, I don't wanna look around. I just wanna get moving. You must cross the river in order to continue. The river at this point is currently 228 feet across. Oh, it's only 2.1 feet deep, fuck this river. I want to forward this river. Option one, moving along. Not a problem. We got one dumb ox. Hopefully it doesn't lead me into some rapids. Okay, it was a muddy

crossing but I did not get stuck. This is the best I've done thus far. Now, okay, this next little segment of the show, we're just gonna go 118 more miles and we're gonna make it to Fort Carney, hopefully. I got 670 pounds of food left. Haven't had to hunt. Haven't had to size up the situation outside of, you know, one little broken lake. Almost made it to Fort Carney. You are Fort Carney, would you like to look around?

Yes, I would. Hey, Fort Carney's! Bunch of other wagons, there's a dude on a horse, and a nice little brick building. And then we'll get back to that in a little bit. Now that we've made it, where we can resupply, let's talk about supplies. Forks and trading posts with the primary resupply stations.

Early on, there were real few and far in between. For quite some time, there were just seven forts long, over 2100 miles worth of wagon trail. That average is out to just one every 300 miles. Moving 15 to 20 miles a day in a wagon train, that could mean you're three weeks out for another fort. And what if that fort is not a good one you get there? It wasn't like you could just go across the street

and buy something from a competitor, and you might not be able to do a fort supplies. The traders at forts did have. That shit was expensive. You get a load up at the start of your journey because supply and demand, baby. Demand tended to be real, real high for a trader supplies so they would jack the prices up. If some other seller was willing to pay more for you than what you needed to buy what you needed to finish your journey well and tough shit for you and yours.

There are other little trading posts that would pop up and go away here and there, but there weren't many. Okay, in addition to supplies, hopefully, forts also provided protection along the journey. The one place immigrants could fully relax knowing that they were protected by the US military. Let's travel through this game a bit more. Let's check on our supplies. I'm going to buy some supplies. I'm going to talk to people first. Let's see what this some shithead has to say. A four-carny scout tells you the game is still plentiful along here, but getting harder to find with so many overlanders. I don't expect it to last more than a few years. Folks shoot the game for sport. Take a small piece and let the rest rot in the sun. Well, that's a shame. I don't know. Okay, how that affects my journey.

Now, let's attempt, let's buy some supplies. Not gonna trade yet, need more food. Everything's nothing's broken yet, so let's just get some food. Oh, it's only 25 cents a pound. That's a good deal, actually. Let's get some food, which number, I have 230 bucks, how many pounds?

Let's get 200 pounds. Let's get 250 pounds. I think. Okay, good. 250 pounds. We got 167 bucks left. Let's get the hell on out here. Let's leave the store and get the fucking trailing. Fort Carney is 250 miles to chimney rock.

Off we go. To chimney rock. Let's see how the little guy makes it. Okay. Weather's warm. Health is good. Get 800 pounds of food, you know, we've traveled roughly 400 miles now. It's early May, nothing, nothing dramatic. Now the, now the

soils, it's gonna hot. Ground's a little, a little browner than it was. Now I'm getting moving to the food, but we are cruising. We are cruising along. Nothing dramatic. Making it into that next landmark and less than 15 miles. Here we are, chimney rock, would you like to look around? Yeah, let's hear some music. All right, there's a rock. Super cool, super cool rock. Let's get the fucking moving.

There's nobody hanging around the rock. I wanna try and make it to Fort Laramie. That's coming up in 86 miles. Oh, I found some wild fruit. Well, that can awesome. Let's keep while in 86 miles. I found some wild fruit. Well, that can awesome. Let's keep while I'm moving. In add a quick grass. Found more wild fruit though.

So the oxygen are doing great. This is like a miracle that's going this well. No one's died. This is insane. You passed a gravesite. Would you like to expect closer? Yes, I would. Here lies Voland.

Hey, hey, hey, come out and play Okay, computer programmers better programming than writing tomestowns That was the best thing you come up with for this game. It's the first like little joky thing you see Hey, hey, come out and play. What does that even mean? Now we've made it to Fort Laramie. Would you like to look around? Yes, I would Oh, there's people to talk to. There's a crazy looking Mountman guy. There's a local tribe member and also a weird like solo white horse

We'll come back to that Many immigrants worrying about not bringing enough overload of their wagons. They were worried about paying You know expensive prices down the down the. And then they had to end up dumping excess items. Soon after, they leave Missouri. It was common to see luxuries and family heirlooms dumped along the trail, but you'd never see tools, guns, you know, food left behind. I've lensed and I were traveling together on a wagon train for real. We would for sure get in some fights about want versus need.

You know, be stuff like, yeah, I understand your piss to me. You know, for throwing away 65 pounds of fucking skin care products off the wagon. But you don't need that shit, no matter how piss to me, you know, for throwing away 65 pounds of fucking skin care products off the wagon. But you don't need that shit, no matter how many times you say you do. And then she'd be like, well, you didn't need, you know, 50 pounds worth of graphic novels. So that goes as well.

And then, you know, cute, screaming, okay. Band of the items were called lever rights, short for lever right here. Later on, some thrifty Mormon settlers made a nice profit out of salvaging the lever rights, reselling them to immigrants passing through Salt Lake Valley. I love that. Doing some early thrifting.

For the Wagon Trail left, the men usually elected a captain to lead the way. Wagon Trail left the men usually elected a captain to lead the way. Wagon Trail joined up into parties, their large companies for help and protection. A single family traveling alone was very rare. Outside of these forts, there was no law enforcement of any kind. So Wagon Trains came up with and enforced their own laws. I found that interesting. Most successful groups had written constitutions,

codes, resolutions, bylaws. They could refer to when there was a conflict. There were rules for camping, traveling, restrictions on gambling and drinking. There were penalties for breaking the rules, agreed upon by the members of the party. There's also sometimes a form of social security for sick people, widows and orphans, and provisions established for disputes over the possessions of deceased party members. Noise, conflict resolutions.

Many people say goodbye to their family for the last time. They made this journey. They were going to come back and visit for the holidays, head west to start a new life, and it would take them anywhere from four to six months to get to where they were going. From independence, the wagon trail followed the little blue, flat, sweet water snake and clumpy rivers to Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming, Idaho and Oregon. And again, they travel around 15 miles a day. Oh man, so much work to do that too.

So easy now. If you map the trail by cities or towns rather small towns, the trail went from Independence, never much more than 3,000 people during his years as a jump on off point. The Oregon city near Portland and the Lamont River Valley, never much more than 1000 people during the trail years. For most of it closer to just a few hundred, Oregon Trail was one of two main routes west, the other being the Santa Fe Trail from independence to Santa Fe in New Mexico. Additional branches from the trail provided routes to California, the Salt Lake region

you know soon enough. Independence was the original starting point, but immigrants could also leave from St. Joseph, 20 miles north. And within a few years, the trail get and go and there were several jumping off spots in the area. California branch, the trail trace the same route until the split Fort Bridger, Wyoming, uh, Soda Springs or raft river in Idaho. I'd never heard of raft river before. Name sounded like it was made up to me. I looked a little further into it. Tributary the snake river down in Southeast Idaho. Seems to originate not too far from the great metropolis of Malta. 200 people living around a raft river junior and senior high school and not a whole hell of a lot else. Hasn't grown much since its organ trail days. What they do have, black pine,

steakhouse. I love getting to weird wormholes in the web and finding random trivia like this I was making fun of Malta and I found this one restaurant checked out the yelp and Google reviews and this place looks legit Apparently Holly works there. Hi Holly Never been there, but Holly may be the owner based on the reviews and apparently she's very nice So many five star reviews Nicole Christopherson one of many who love it said the food was amazing and portions were huge. My steak was cooked exactly how I was asked and mashed potatoes and shrimp were great. There was something on the menu for everyone. Even my pickiest eaters, top-notch service, I will definitely be back. Amazing steak and shrimp and multi-idea hoe along the raft river. What a time to be alive. Good job, Holly. Back in the Oregon Trail days, guests in the best food,

you could find was some fish you cut yourself local game, maybe some previous settlers hard tack, a throughout of the wagon after breaking a fucking tooth on under something. Immigrants went through the Utah Nevada deserts till they crossed the Sierra Nevada Mountains descended into Sacramento and beyond that route popular in the 50s during the gold rush. Major Forch along the trail Fort Carney, Fort Laramie, Fort Bridger, Fort Hall, Fort Walla, Walla, Fort Van Coover. I'm going to use you marked monuments along the way to leave helpful notes for other pioneers. Over time, wagon trails left clear past the fall. I love how the trail

was built with the Oregon Trail. It wasn't like a county or state or federal work crew, you know, was building a road or wasn't like a forest service was knocking out a really nice trail with park benches and bathrooms here and there. No, first early pioneers, mountain men, shit, you know, they walk through road along the, you know, through pure wilderness on horseback. And then after many years of that, some early wagon, you know, immigrants in the mid 1830s went along clear to the path of bigger rocks and brush that would stop a wagon. Then more groups would clear it further later on, you know, and so on. It was more like a human game trail than a road like a like a human version of a deer trail

carved out by nothing more than a bunch of deer walking across it. Cool. How something that rough, you know, provided the means for so many to make it to the west. Major landmarks were blue mountain courthouse rock, jail rock, chimney rocks, scots, bluff, layering peak, devil's gate, twin buttes, flagstaff hill, mountain hood, and many others. Platte River was considered the first gentle leg of the journey, allowing immigrants to settle into life on the trail. The Oto tribe called the Platte region, Nebraska, meaning, meaning flat water.

French word, plat means the same, the Platte River Valley terrain was ideal for wagon parties because it was, you know, flat and provided plenty of water and grass. Travers considered it the easiest, most enjoyable part of the journey. There was flowers, animal sand hills, rock formations, not too many struggles. Most immigrant journals complained about the dirty water, swarms of insects, and you know, what they would call quick stand, just, you know, really like kind of heavy mud. Some people saw buffalo for the first time. We clicked buffalo chips to burn his firewood. That's dried pieces of buffalo shit. Tastes a lot like heart attack. What I understand.

I'm a grins got used to hitching and unhitching the oxen, wagon maintenance, foraging for firewood and clean water, cooking over an open flame and learning to break and set up camp each day on the first leg of the journey. And better clean that water good. Don't drink that river water unless you want to catch some cholera

and McGill's pop your loophole off. cholera killed more organ trail settlers than anything else. A very sources say between one and 20 and one and 10 settlers died trying to make it out west. When the wagon train reached chimney rocks got spluffed they were a third of the way there. The real challenges now began. Firewood and supply depots were scarce buffalo herds thinned out. Wagon parties had to cross fast rivers and the continental divide. They faced a summer heat. There was no trees meaning no shade dust constantly kicking up and we're going to also

lived in fear of being attacked by local tribe members, which is we'll go over here soon. Wasn't actually a huge concern. Let's see if I can get my wagon party or to the continental divide alive now. All right, let's move moving along. Come on, I gotta buy some more supplies though first. That's this fort. Let's see, I'm gonna get probably some more food. Ah, it's 30 cents a pound. I should about more with last place. That's okay. Okay, let's get 300 pounds. Can I get that many? I think so.

Try to do some quick math here. 300 pounds of food. Oh, fuck yeah, I got 77 bucks. Let's get out of here, let's leave the store. I'm real lucky, haven't broken anything. I don't even wanna talk to anybody. We gotta get moving. Daylights wasting.

Fort Lairmeat's 190 miles to independent rock. Let's get moving. Shug can along. No oxen's even gotten lost since their Luciferin has been fined. Alright, keep going, keep going. I'm down to 800 pounds of food again, but I've made it 736 miles. This is great! I'm a pro now. I can do this in real life. Easily. If I can do it, you know, one out of three times and make it on the game, I gotta be able to do it in real life easily. You know, if I can do it, you know, one out of three times and make it on the game, I got to be able to do it in real life.

Now I've made it to Independence Rock. We like to look around. Yes, even though it's stupid, I saw it before. Okay, yep rock. Let's get out of here. Weather's cool. Health is good, so I'm gonna continue along on the trail. It's 102 miles to South pass now, let's get moving. Come on, burger, show me this. Come on, Lil J. Let's get to walking, keep moving those feet. All right, we're only 40 miles to the next landmark now.

18 miles, I don't know how the hell we're doing this. I was kinda hoping for some more tragedy. Would you like to look around the South Pass? Yeah, let's hear some more music. Hey, there there's another person let's see what he wants to talk about I'm gonna press this spacebar talk to people yeah what's going on buddy a Mormon traveler tells me my family and I travel with 40 other families to the Valley of the Great Salt Lake to seek religious freedom back east Mormons are persecuted and Utah will join together to build a new community changing desert into farmland

All right Okay, that's cool. Good luck Attempt to trade. Nope. I don't need to do shit. This has been the craziest. Oh the trail divides here. Oh, no Oh god dang it Green River crossing or head for Fort Bridger. I don't know. I can't remember. I'm gonna go for Fort Bridger It's 125 miles come on. Yeah, yeah, yeah, get going. Come on burger Crossing her head for four Bridger. I don't know. I can't remember. I'm gonna go for four Bridger 125 miles come on. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, get going come on burger This fucking move it whip whip those oxen little J This is ridiculous. What I have it said on the the nothing ever happens setting

I was hoping somebody would break their leg. I found wild fruit. I don't fucking care I want some drama I'm uh Now I have 380 pounds of food. Okay, four Bridger would you like to look around? Yeah, sure Okay, some other people I'm gonna buy I'm gonna buy some more supplies. I'm gonna spend well I probably shouldn't I've only have 77 bucks now food is 35 cents a pound. I'm gonna buy a hundred pounds of beef and Then I'm gonna have to hunt eventually. How many pounds 100? Oh god, I have 40 bucks. Let's get out of here Something's gonna break down and I'm not gonna have anything I'm gonna be screwed. I normally talk to people, but we gotta get moving

I feel like this is my is boring because nothing's happened. It's 162 miles to soda springs. Okay, let's get going Whether it's warm health is good. This is the easiest this game has ever been for me is nothing's happened. It's 162 miles to Soda Springs. Okay, let's get going. Whether it's warm, health is good. This is the easiest this game has ever been for me. Traveled over 1100 miles now. All right, we're 90 miles to wherever the hell it was. Soda Springs. Oh God, severe thunderstorm.

Okay, just lost today. It's down to scarier than it was. Whatever, health is still good. Man, my fucking team isn't moving. Suck dungeon, not fucking around on this trail. Now we made it to Soda Springs. You like to look around, I guess so. A bunch of people taking baths or something.

I don't want to talk to them, they seem creepy. I don't need 57 miles to Fort Hall. We are fucking cruising. Yes! Come on! 210 pounds of food. I don't have enough money for anything else. Oh my god, we made it to the Fort Hall.

No, I don't want to look around a Fort Hall. Let's just keep it going. 182 miles to the Snake River crossing. This is where some of us could die. Okay. 150 pounds left of food. Get a little low in food. All right. Okay, 100 pounds left of food. Get a little low in food. All right.

Okay, 100 pounds left of food. This, we're gonna start starving soon. This, okay, this is how I'm gonna die. Broken wagon tongue, we'd like to try and repair it. Yes I would. You're unable to repair the wagon trunk. You must, okay, I'll replace it then. Now we have 45 pounds of food.

Oh shit. Oh God. Now we have 15 pounds of food. Now we have 45 pounds of food. Oh shit. Oh God. Now we have 15 pounds of food. Now we have zero pounds of food. We have, okay, all right, all right. But health is, health is fair. Health is decreasing quickly.

Because I've had zero pounds of food for a while. Now I'm gonna have to hunt a little bit here. Let's see what we get. Okay, I'm out here with my little dude in the corner. Oh, shoot that squirrel! Come on! I shot a squirrel. Now he's gonna block my fucking goddamnit squirrel.

Now you blocked all my other food options. Fuck you. Come on, bear. No! All my get is a squirrel. This is okay. Oh God, I can't, I can't move. And the game is limited.

1985, I got a little pee shitter, and there's a squirrels in the way. No dear dear. Come on. No Oh god, this is terrible. This is the worst honey I've ever done. I got I got two pounds worth of meat Okay, all right Let's let's up. We got a hunt again. I'm in a better position now Come on a bear coming. There's a bear coming back at a bear All right, and I'm in a better position now. Come on, a bear coming. There's a bear coming. Buh, I got a bear. All right. And I'm in a good position for more animals.

There's a couple of plants around me, not blocking anything though. All right, I'm gonna get a hundred pound of food out of that bear. You bet your ass, there's a deer. Fuck you, deer. Got that deer. There's another deer. I don't even need you, other deer.

I'll shoot you anyway. Nothing else, nothing else. Come on. Let's wrap it up. Probably shouldn't be wasting ammo like this. But it's like the way the bullet sounds. Look at that! 100 pounds! Yeah hell yeah. Now we can continue on the trail. You pass a grave site. Would you like to inspect it closer? Here lies Jiffr. That's literally all it says. Who fucking wrote this game? There's not even a joke there. Now we're making it to the river.

Would you like to look around? Nope. You must cross the river in order to continue. The river at this point is currently a thousand feet across, six point two feet deep in the middle. Okay. That means we're gonna try and cock the wagon. Let's fucking go!

Cock in the wagon, floating, floating, floating, floating. Come on, please don't cap size. Or, I don't know, I guess if you do, it'll be exciting. You had no trouble. I'm the best wagon master ever. Now it's only 130 miles to Fort Boise. Let's fucking move it. But we only got 25 pounds.

Oh no, Luciferina has exhaustion and no food. Okay, all right. I'm gonna size up the situation. You know what, we're gonna stop there. We're gonna stop there. We're gonna check on Luciferina in a bit. I'm gonna do some hunting. Let's talk about the last leg of the real journey.

Extremely difficult. The immigrants face the blue mountains in Eastern Oregon. The cast gade range, we're not too far from that in the game. They try to move as fast as possible, worrying about winter approaching, because how much with that suck to be in the wrong side of the last pass, bunch of snow starts to fall. Say your prayers, little Jimmy, we gave it our all, but we're probably going to die now. Apparently our manifest destiny was to become human popsicles. When immigrants reach the Dallas, a one time mission settlement on the Columbia River,

now in Oregon state, and a cool last town, where I once got Bob Seeger, his night moves album for two bucks at a thrift store, fuck yeah bro, they had to decide if they wanted to take the Columbia River or in 1846 a new option, safer but longer, Barlow Road, named for Sam Barlow, early settler, maybe in among the first US citizens to summit Mount Hood, his road became the preferred route for immigrants. Until 1846, when Barlow Road was created, everyone had to float from the dials to Fort Van Cooper. Now, floating a wagon down a river, floating across one, 14 AKA pulling one across the river, all dangerous options.

Good way to drown or lose your shit. Even if wagons are properly prepped and loaded, 14 rivers was at best a risky endeavor. Wheels could drop into holes, cause wagons to overturn, quick sand could bog wagons down, making it very difficult to pull out and perhaps cause a capsize, 14 required ingenuity to get the wagon down the bank into the water up the bank on the other side. Pinears would use picks and shovels to cut down stream banks to get their wagons down the incline into the water. Other times men would gently ease a wagon down the steep slope by tying a long rope to the axle of the wagons.

Settlers learned to angle their wagons as they crossed rivers to prevent the current from hitting it broadside, knocking it over. When sufficient timber was available to pioneers, crossed rivers by building ferry boats, that would take some time. Sometimes they float two wagons across the river that have been tied together with ropes and poles. Strong current could still roll them over though. Most of the time they go one wagon at a time,

but they put the wagon on a makeshift raft called a scall. But that was excruciatingly slow. And then the oxen, you know, would swim across. Between 1848, 1853, most overlanders took the main stem of the Oregon Trail. They joined the Columbia, west of the Dishoote River, climbed out of the canyon, descended again at the Dallas,

took Barlow Road, south side to Mount Hood, and then they took the Columbia route to avoid the winter weather in the cascades. And we're going to finally end their journey in the Willemite Valley. Well, they've staked out a plot of land, settled in for long, and brutal winter. Yay, welcome. It's winter. When everyone's finally reached the west, they cleared rocks, cut trees, to build new homes, and they better do that shit quick, because again, winter, the first winter was the ultimate test of survival in spring arrived. They could utilize the forest, rich soil, wild game in Oregon. If they went to California, there was a better climate for agriculture.

Western settlements slowly, but surely turned into towns as more people arrived, gold being found out, you know, West early into the trails existence helped a lot of towns get moving. What would a typical day like be on the trail? Well, it would start around 4 a.m., real early. Not gonna waste any time of the day to be moving. You wanna get moving as fast as possible. They would play a bugle or the leader of the wagon train

which fire as rifle to wake everybody up. Sounds like a terrible start to a terrible day. 5 a.m. by that time, the women have prepared breakfast. The men have rounded up the animals from the grazing fields. They tended to grab breakfast first so they could do some work by 6 a.m. By that time the women have prepared breakfast the men have rounded up the animals from the grazing fields They tended to grab breakfast first so they could do some work by six a.m. The men and boys have moved on from breakfast to hitching the wagons all the women and children eat breakfast Breakfast might consist of coffee, bacon, bread That sounds good actually better than heart attack seven a.m. The bugle sounds of the wagon master's shouts wagons roll and everyone's headed out for the day by seven a.m

By seven a.m. These pioneers have accomplished a lot more in a typical day than a lot of my fellow stand-up comic friends. I work with them accomplished by noon. At some point of the day most wagon trains took a hour lunch called nooning was not always a noon lunch was most often coffee beans bacon or some buffalo meat. Mmm, lean and delicious. Or hard tack if you're a terrible hunter and or too poor to probably supply it before you start your journey. 6 p.m. in a large wagon train, the wagons often circled up to provide a corral for livestock and protect them from cattle thieves, wild animals, and weather. After the wagon circled up,

immigrants started fires, cooked dinner, ate venison, buffaloed beef, wild birds, if they had it, or leftovers, you know, if they had a, from the previous day they didn't have stew. fat drippings mixed with flour to make gravy. It's immigrants were really desperate for food. They ate snakes or prairie dogs or hard tack. What's a, that's a tough meal. That's how you know you got some poor folks.

If you like snake and hard tack again, if a family had a milk cow, they'd turn butter all day using the swane motion of the wagon. If there was no wood immigrants made fires using those buffalo chips Oh, and then we're gonna have a moment of free time like to play music card games checkers chess And I imagine probably bitch a lot about how their feet and back hurt Women would men clothes men would fix the wagons men women wrote journals wrote letters back home Not well for the most part, but they did write them Roughly one in every 200 immigrants kept diaries of their journey according to one source diary time very limited though immigrants only

had about an hour each day max to write and they were tired. Some people on the road on laundry day when they stopped at forts. That was also the most common way to post letters back home take forever to get there, but you can, you know, send them. Let's read a few entries right after I hop back on the Oregon Trail game and try and make it a little further on down the line. Gonna continue, I better hunt, I think we're out of food. I hunt for some food while Lucifina gets, oh, man, oh, bear.

God, kill the bear right off the bat. Oh, dear, oh, son of a bitch. He's crafty bastard. And he ran away from me. He's kind of snuck in there. Be better if I had more kind of arrow keys. You could do more. But just be a weird guy who only goes forward, backward, left or right, just directly. Oh, come on, dear. Got another dear. That's good. I'm gonna call it a day. I'm not gonna waste any more ammo

because no matter how many animals you shoot in the old Oregon Trail game, you only get to pack out a hundred pounds of meat, which I think is very unfair. Yep. I got a hundred ninety eight pounds But it can only bring a hundred pounds back now. We got to rest. We got to let Lucifina like I cannot die Five days. Okay. Now we're into August We're we're cooking along though. We're doing pretty good. We're gonna continue on the trail got. Oh, not much food shit God damn it you guys are eating too much food. I got no food. Fuck. Now people are gonna start dying. I got to hunt again real quick. And after this, we're probably just gonna, probably is gonna die.

I got, I'm gonna just use all of my money to buy more food. And then it's gonna be trading for food. Because hunting is just, you don't get enough. Come on, bear. You son of a bitch. He's hiding behind some brush. Oh dear, oh, I didn't get him. This is a very unsuccessful trip. I'm gonna, I'm gonna pour a spot. Dang it.

Oh, I just got squirrel, sweet. That's gonna be two pounds. That's not gonna do anything. Damn it. No. Oh god, I got one pound of meat. I got fucking skate squirrel is all I got That sucks. Okay I'm gonna I'm gonna try one more time you guys now. This is I know this is probably painful to listen to but please let Or please let our wagon train have a chance and they got me behind they got me in between two fucking bushes There's this is death wish. This is how we all die

I got cocky early on I thought I could make it with you know Without doing much of anything and then I ran out of our food. I realized I got low on money and now we're dead Now we're all gonna be dead here soon. Damn it. There's no fucking animals coming around Probably low on bullets Just an idiot with no food. coming around. Probably low on bullets. Just an idiot with no food. You're unable to shoot any food. I know, I know I was.

Can I try to, can I trade? Can I trade with anybody? Now you meet another immigrant who wants a wagon tongue. He'll give you 60 bullets. Fuck that guy, can't hunt. I'll trade with another person. No one wants to trade with you. Okay, just wasting time, sweet. He wants a wagon axle. Nope, I need food with another person. Um, no one wants to trade with you. Okay, just wasting time, sweet.

You want some wagon axle? Nope, I need food, you idiots. You guys know I need food. No one wants to trade with you. This is, oh, we're getting hungry or an hungrier. Fuck, we're definitely gonna die. Okay, the hell's this poor? Oh, what?

The native guy just helped me find food. I don't know where. He had some dude just came by and gave us 30 pounds of food. I didn't know that could happen in the game That's awesome now we're in heavy fog though. Oh Man, but we got food. It's another guy another tribe guy. Just fucking gave us food another 30 pounds of food I made it to Fort Boisey. Would you like to look around? We're gonna take a quick break here, but yes, yes, I would Okay I made it to Fort Boycee. Would you like to look around? We're gonna take a quick break here, but yes, yes I would. Heh. BEEP. Okay.

You're gonna have to buy some food here. We'll get back after reading these letters. Let's read these journal entries. I tried to find again exciting entries, but for the most part, they're light on details, sad and heavy on complaints. But we'll have fun with a few of them. August 1st, 1847.

Williams Family Broken Axel, two days from Fort Bridger, lost a full day waiting for him. Weather's hot. Martin Baby died a fever. August 23rd, 1847. Williams Family lost an ox. Down to one now. Feet hurt. Sores on back, smell funny.

Martin Family lost another baby, crossing river. I'll never eat a hard tack again once I make it to Oregon. It's 10th, 1847. Williams family is completely dead. Feeder swollen, bleeding. Back gangregus. Martin family down to the last baby. Would happily kill that baby for one pound of heart attack.

So hungry. Fuck Oregon. Okay, maybe that wasn't real one. I wish I could have found journal entries that I found that interesting. I made those ones up. Here's a pair of real entries. And this, they do show how fucking distarable it was. This is from Claire Ryes, September 1846.

Five months have passed since we left. There's been a lot of sickness, loss, and death. We are in Devil's Flat. Ten days ago, we filled our barrels, and now they're almost empty. Livestock is thin and sick. James Wright lost a child and saved one. I feel sad for them, and it's steaming hot. I feel like a desert. I

Expect to get sick going through devil's flat I expect to encounter some more Indians. It's been between 9 to 5 and a hundred degrees in the day making it almost impossible to pass Sooner or later my mules might die. I hope not. This is a long danger is in hot trip. Down if I have some rough road trips. What else do I like, Claire's? She did make it to Oregon, but it sounds like barely. Okay, just one more. Anna Ives also from 1846. September 2nd, we arrived at Devil's Flat.

It's been five months since we left Fort Independence. We had some bad stuff like my other ox died. I have no livestock left. One of the good things is that we crossed the river. Also Pearl's daughter died. She says that is terrible. I think so too. When I looked at the dry, deserted devils flat,

it did look like a devil. Wicked and mean. Trying to take our lives. I felt like something bad was gonna happen to my children, to my friends on the wagon train. We might fall into the tracks of the evil devil. I hope we don't, Anna. Anna sounds fucking crazy.

I think so too, regarding someone's daughter dying. Yeah, Anna, yeah it, that goes that same, that's fucking terrible. It's weird that you felt the need to be like, I also think that's terrible that her daughter died. We might fall into the cracks or the evil devil. I think you should be more worried about your oxen all being dead. You know, if you were playing the Oregon Trail game,

no oxen, you'd be stuck. Less some assholes wanted to make a trade with you. Anna made a West as well. This all sounds yeah, terrible though. And in clear, both took trips worse than any road trip I've ever taken for sure. I feel like a modern day, like a bed trip journal entry from my travels would be more like this.

So there are four, 2004. For open spoke, canned washing, to beat Montana today looking for a bar gig. Snow was heavy, coming over, look out past, slippery in the Honda. Let it brought some extra CDs. FM signals were nonexistent. New modest mouse and mic chemical romance albums are legit. Got a little hungry after I stopped at the same region truck stops to

to grab those old-fashioned donuts when I gasped up. Taco John's was a bad call for lunch, fake cheese and tater tots, don't belong in a burrito. Did some damage to a gas station bathroom and deer lunch. Might stop into apologizing my way back to Spokane tomorrow. Show not fun. Seven people in crowd, three paying attention. One, maybe didn't hate me.

Opening act was a juggler. Considering driving off the road on the way back, but Honda won't go fast enough to take me out. Hungry for Taco John's again. Okay. Gonna go over a bit more of what settlers did on the trail again right after I see if I can take my wagon party all the way to the blue mountains. Or further, let's buy some supplies. Let's lose

the last of our money. Okay, we have 42 bucks left. God damn it, food's 45 cents a pound. I don't even know how much that gives me 90 pounds, maybe. I'm gonna try and get 90 pounds of food. I'm gonna see what that does. 90 pounds of, come on. I have $2 left. Nope, I gotta get out of here. I gotta leave the store. Let's go!

Attempt to trade. Yes, I would like to trade. No one wants to trade with you. Jesus Christ, the people hate me. Luckily there's a couple of tribe members that fucking give me stuff. Everyone else is dicks. Let's continue on the trail.

166 miles to the blue mountains. Okay, see if I can make it. Oh, heavy fog lost today. God damn it, the health is poor for the team. It's hot. We got 45 pounds left to food. It's a rough trail now on top of everything. We got 30 pounds left to food.

Inadequate grass. Oh God, heavy fog. We have zero pounds of food already Little water health is poor people are dying. We have a hundred and six miles to the next landmark I got a fucking hunt again. We're all dead Come on, we're the desert. Please don't oh, oh that's interesting. I'm in the desert surrounded by brush It won't let me shoot anywhere this game's trying to kill us now Literally can't shoot more than maybe two feet next to me.

Alright, we're dead. We're dead, we're dead. Little J, burger, Joe Biz. Sorry to this too. Can't hunt, no one wants to trade with us. I'm stuck behind three piles of sagebrush as I watch many deer just go right on the other side. My guy's too fucking dumb.

Did all of it just walk, maybe two feet to the left. Just try and take one shot. It's some of these, I gotta, I gotta attempt a trade now or we're all, our whole team's gonna die. No one wants to trade with us. That's great. We have so much stuff too. We have cool, yes!

Oh! He, oh, he wants 58 pounds of my food. Damn, I got excited, fuck you. I have no food, you want 58 pounds? Why are you trying to trade with me? Oh, he wants my ox, he'll trade me 52 pounds of food. Yes, I'm willing to trade. Take my, that sounds like you stole from me, but whatever.

Now we have, wait a minute. I gotta size up my rations, I gotta change my food rations. Gotta hit number five. We're down to bare bones. Sorry team, some of you are gonna die. And now we gotta, now we gotta hit number five. We're down to bare bones. Sorry team. Some of you are gonna die. And now we gotta, now we gotta hit the trail. I know we took the wrong fucking trail. We lost four days. The health is poor. We're long ways from anywhere cool. We got 12 pounds in mega rations. Inadequate grass. Oh, man, we've made it 1700 miles. We're about to die in the home stretch.

God, we're at the blue mountains. We like to look around, yes I would. Beep, beep, beep. September 19th, 1848, looking around the Blue Mountains. Beep, beep, beep. And so close to death. Beep, beep, beep. Press space bar to continue.

Uh, get an attempt at the trade. Before we move on, nope. Can't do it, just need food people. Come on, food or nothing. I'm gonna, I'm gonna try and hunt one more time I know this is painful, but we're gonna do one more hunting. Oh, it doesn't even let me hunt. What's your choice? Why can't I hunt? Yeah, oh, I gotta make a choice head for Fort Walla Walla. Fuck yeah, not the Dallas. We don't have we have to get I have no money

I've killed us No, oh Health is poor. It's hot out, there's bad water. I can't believe none of us have starved to death. We've been for about a week now with literally no food. Would you like to look around? Yes. Hi. Some friendly looking people this fort. Now, I have to try and trade because we have, we're begging. I wish there was a beg option. Somebody wants to trade me for the book, 40 bullets No, please trade. Give me some food. He wants, oh he'll trade me 25 pounds

of food for a wagon axles. That seems like he's ripped me off but I'll take it. We're desperate. All right, and we're gonna stay there for a little bit and then we're gonna come back and our whole team's gonna die. Let's see what children on the trail were up to. When they had time and the wagon wasn't moving, children played games like button button button Who's got the button or dropped a handkerchief? Both these games don't sound real fun Well drop their handkerchief I guess this game where one player runs behind other players as they stand to circle Drops a handkerchief behind one of them must then pick it up and then run after run the circle after the first player try to try to tag catch or kiss them Oh boy must've been playing that with mom, Pa. We're looking.

Button, button, who's got the button? They all form a circle. And you know, one kid called a leader, or it, takes an object like a button, goes around the circle, everybody else has their eyes closed, hands out. Or no, I'm sorry, doesn't have their eyes closed, hands out, and then has to fake where the button's going. You know, they kind of like trying to sneak

and act like they have the button. And then you have to guess who's the button. Now, all the leader of the kids is going to say, button, button, who's got the button? Each kid guesses. And then the guests who replies, you know, Bill has got the button or I don't know. That's not like a very fun game. Children, some of them, they would study when they could, they would usually complete school lessons in the evenings. Some party stopped on Sundays, they have church service, someone stopped for a little bit of laundry, women in the trails. They would do a lot of stuff. They have church service. Someone stopped for a little bit of laundry, women in the trails. They would do a lot of stuff.

They challenged traditional gender roles. He'll lose to Fina. They often travel with their husbands and children. Played a key role in the success of the wagon trains. Normally they did all the domestic work, cooking, cleaning, racing children. Also, physical labor gathered fuel, drove oxen, made bullets, acted as nurses and doctors, gave birth, kept traveling, working occasionally infant orphans, shared amongst nursing mothers so they could survive

the journey. Damn. And then some women did everything because they would travel without men. The homestead act was revolutionary for women because they were allowed to claim property for themselves. It stated any person who's ahead of the family or who has arrived at the age of 21 years eligible. Women who are single, widowed or divorced could be considered the head of the family.

Historians estimate that women accounted for one third of homestead claims in the first 50 years of the act. Women out there driving those mule, an oxen. Mule teams preferred motor travel, oxen, more common, both animals, so we're some of the only livestock strong enough to pull heavy wagons. Wagons constructed a season of hardwood that could carry up to 2500 pounds. Typical wagon 10 feet, 4x4 feet. They had to be extra tough to survive the rough terrain, mostly made out of osage, orange

wood or white oak. Wagons typically cost 85 bucks, about 3,000 today. Covered about 100 bucks, about 3,500 today. Covered wagon was the main mode of transport the minivan of immigrant trails There was a few different types. There was the Murphy wagon named for Joseph Murphy Murphy produced wagons for traders headed west from Missouri to Santa Fe and later for overland immigrants his wagons were the best Nine feet tall 12 foot long straight box bed could haul up to 22 hundred pounds But if you went too far above that, you might,

you know, damage the wagon beyond repair and it required two yolks to oxen. Spare oxen, you know, often traveled behind so the families could rotate and give their livestock a break. Next is stutubaker wagon, named for the stutubaker brothers. Started their business in South Bend, Indiana, founded in 1852. The company would eventually make cars as well as up until 1966. Stutubakers also provided hardware for many of the earliest wagon manufacturers, almost every 52, the company would eventually make cars as well up until 1966. Studebakers also provided hardware for many of the earliest wagon manufacturers, almost every wagon of every brand had studebaker components. Finally there was the conno, conno, conno, stoga, there we go.

I wanted to add a syllable there. The conno, stoga wagon. That's the one usually seen in western films. Covered wagon named for its origins in conno, kind of stoga river valley and landcaster county, Pennsylvania, 17 feet long, 11 feet high. Bigger for freighters, moving supplies west, you could haul up to 6,000 pounds, but needed 16 oxen to pull it. Wagon covers often made of canvas cloth, sail cloth, homespawn hemp, have a sturdy cover essential to success on the trail. And then the final method to transport the Mormon handcart. It was for poor people making the journey west, you had to push or pull that shit,

the entire fucking way. Gosh dang, now flipping chat behind me. Sounds terrible, like you're being tortured, pulling, pushing your shit for up to 2100 miles and change. Hard pass. I'll just die back these things. A modeled after carts used by street sweepers, luggage trolleys, rail road, uh, porters, three feet wide, four feet long, nine inch deep box, carry a few hundred pounds, just walking down the trail. They, uh, they broke a lot too. Uh, and even if you did have a wagon, the people to ride on, you usually walk, there's a lot of walking.

And we're going to really took time off to celebrate. People did have weddings, birthdays, a lot of women gave birth while traveling. Fourth of July, commonly celebrated, makes sense. Not gonna be Christmas. If you're still in the trail at the end of December, you're, you know, about to die. Independence Day, men fired salutes with their guns, wave flags. Wagon Party stopped to have a feast occasionally. Immigrant, almost bachelor, dirt, rode in 1849.

Soon after we started this morning, we passed a large company in camp. They saluted us with several volumes of musketry. They were returned in a scattering fashion from our train, which extended nearly a mile. They had the stars and stripes moving in the breeze and were stopping to celebrate that day. Another reason to celebrate on July 4 was reaching Independence Rock, Wyoming. If the settlers reached Independence Rock by July 4th, it meant they were on schedule. Settlers like to carve their names in Jalandmark to mark mark their journey west became known as the great register of the desert. Also been called the birthplace of American graffiti. To this day, you can visit the rock and see Settlers

names written on it. Very cool. Big rock, 130 feet high, 1900 feet long, 850 feet wide, a U.S. national landmark. And to my knowledge, not even one example of was here being scratched out and changed to Sucks Dick, which is impressive. Wedding's fairly common on jumping off spots like the Platte River or Fort Laramie. That's like getting hitched on a long and dusty trail. I'm sure those wedding night festivities smelled fantastic. This vine just threw up her mouth. Romances often were sparked up between people and different families on the wagon parties. Oftentimes if a couple got married on the trail or to Ford, older married couples conspired

against the newlyweds with a shivery. Never heard of this. People circled around the couple, fired guns, banged pots and made as much noise as possible so they wouldn't get a winker privacy on their wedding night. It's a fun way to haze a new couple, a source of entertainment for everyone but the couple. I actually stopped for a second that the lead researcher on this succ Hayes a new couple, a source of entertainment for everyone but the couple. I actually stopped for a second that the lead researcher on this suck Olivia Lee had Cummins locked me with that bullshit, but a trivia, but it's true.

Shivery, those settlers came up with some interesting ways to keep themselves entertained. Immigrants faced many dangers on the trail from accidents, disease, extreme weather conditions and attacks from local tribes, not that common as a lot of Western movies and TV shows tried to make it out to be majority tribes were peaceful Miss and rumors about tribes did lead to more violence with tribes You know because the people would attack them being worried about them to shoot first ask questions later After sellers have been selling for a few decades And after they'd killed most of the buffalo in some places trip the land of a lot of other resources

Then some tribes did get pretty hostile attack, which makes sense. Somebody comes into your neighborhood, fucks everything up. You know, it's gonna be hard to be neighborly after that. Conflicts with other immigrants was also a danger, disease the biggest dangers I said, especially cholera, puking and shitting yourself to death, blowing up that, you know, poophole cap,

blowing right off with McGill's pop. Cholera outbreaks, struck each spring at jumping off towns along the Missouri River. Thousands of families preparing to set out gathered in towns get supplies for the trip. Many people died from Collar up before they even set out on the trail. How terrible for them and their families starting off morning. Many more died along the trail corridor to Fort Larry, my only Collar as I've explained before, it does not actually blow up your butthole, but you do shit yourself to death.

Severe diarrhea kills people through dehydration. The bacteria spreads to water and food contaminated by human waste treated today, by rehydrating the patient. At the time, though, proper treatments unknown. Typical treatments were camphor and lardinum. Camphor, a power of the originally came from the bark and wood of the camphor tree.

Didn't do anything to treat cholera. Neither did Lodnam, an opiate related to morphine and heroin, taking too much Lodnam, whiskey, Lodnam, saw. Uh, did somewhat frequently lead to fatal overdoses though. You could choke down a bunch of liquid morphine to treat your horrific diarrhea and then you'd OD, which I guess was less painful than shit in yourself to death. Most people would die of cholera within a few hours. If you didn't die within 12 to 24 hours,

well, then you had decent chances of vibing. The unsanitary conditions along the trail, perfect breeding ground for cholera, which spreads quickly in dirty, unsanitary places, you know? Places with outhand sanitizers everywhere, like we have now, or any kind of soap. Now, or any kind of sinks to wash your hands off

after using the bathroom, just shitting the woods, no toilet paper, no soap, lots of cholera. Yay, living in the 1800s. Immigrants also unknowingly cared the bacteria with them and deposit it in campgrounds and water holes. Once travelers made it to Fort Lairemy, though, usually safe in cholera.

One immigrant George Trouble wrote about the cholera epidemic in 1852 saying for 400 miles, the road was almost a solid graveyard. At one campground, I counted 71 graves. Damn, five out of 10 triple family members died on the way to Oregon. Most collar graves unmarked family members being buried along the trail, just where they died. Bison and other danger on the trail, herds of thousands at one time covering the plains

they could block wagon trains for miles, occasionally charge a wagon train. Dust storms, common problem, immigrant James John, wrote in 1841, there came up a storm in the afternoon. The wind blew very hard and on the opposite side of the river, a tremendous hurricane. We saw trees flying on the air, water blown out of the river is high as apparently it's the clouds. Wow. He seems like he exaggerates, but you know, it's probably bad. Immigrants also had to face thunderstorms and hail stones sometimes big enough to sometimes

kill people and animals, lightning, tornadoes, destructive winds. Also the intense heat of the deserts along the trail made some of the wagon wheels shrink and people have to soak their wheels in the rivers at night to keep them from, you know, breaking, cracking, causing irreparable damage. Emigrants also had to rub axle grease on their lips to prevent blisters. It just keeps sounding more fun. Accidents to another another main cause of death. People died from accidental gunshots, slipping under wagons, unruly oxen, drowning medical complications. Later trail years, bunching occurred when groups of hundreds, even thousands of wagons would get stuck in a big old

wagon traffic jam and then people get frustrated, try to move too fast, fucking run over toddlers and shit. Tough times to be a toddler on the wagon trail. If immigrants ran out of supplies, couldn't hunt or forge, they also face starvation, and we're getting Clark Thompson wrote in 1850, look starvation in the face. I've seen men on passing an animal

that have starved to death on the plane, stop and cut out a steak, roast and eat it and call it delicious. Eating some of that sweet, rancid, rotting meat steaks. Nice, aged meat, not cured, preserved in any way, but definitely aged. I think you're supposed to prepare those steaks well done to burn out the maggots. Some of the people went crazy on the trail. One notable story is Elizabeth Markham.

When her family reached the snake river in present day Idaho, she, quote, went insane, told her husband, Samuel, she wasn't going any farther. Left her behind, took the children on towards Oregon country, short time later sends his oldest son, John, back to get her. And then how fucked up is this? When his wife returns alone, Mr. Markham learned that she had club, John, you know, tried to club him to death with a rock, uh, race to find him. John's barely alive.

Then when Mr. Markham and john make it back to the wagon train he discovers that his wife Elizabeth has set one of their fucking wagons on fire after all that they stayed together makes you wonder how good the sex was i know michael my no i'll recognize lever to shimdamner kill moldest boy john sent or wagon to flames but well

she fucks like a banshee as she can suck new y york straight through a straw. I can't leave her. The markups had two more kids together. They ran a store together for time in Oregon City after all that then divorced in Samuel and to California. She got married again and divorced again. Not real surprise. All right, about to jump into a baby timeline. Little one about making it to the Oregon territory. But first let's finish out our trail journey here. We're definitely about to die here. Okay, we're gonna attempt to trade.

We've got a lot of stuff to trade, but no one wants to fucking trade with us. Oh boy, let's just continue on the trail. Can we make it 120 miles with no food? No, we have 20 pounds of food. All right, police, Luciferina, you have measles. I'm so sorry, but we have to keep moving. We have 15 pounds of food. Good luck starving with measles. I'm so sorry, but we have to keep moving. We have 15 pounds of food.

Good luck starving with measles. We're down to five pounds. Now we're down to zero pounds of food in the very little water. All right, gotta try hunting one last time or trading with somebody. Come on, come on, trade with us. Please, someone give us food.

Nope, food is just scarce now. This is not good. Oh, no, I damn it. I thought he wanted food too. Everybody starving on the trail now. No one wants to trade with us. We're getting hungry and hungry. Oh boy. Nope. Got to try hunting one last time. This is it. This is it. And then I'm just going to die. Okay. And they stuck me behind a fucking tree again. This is fantastic. This is great. And my guy is a moron. And he just, oh, if I can shoot a tree in that direction or a tree in the other direction, this is super fun. Oh, wait, come on, bear, bear. Okay, we got a bear. We got a bear. I'm just going to stop there. Right? There's no way I can get

all that meat out anyway. Sorry for the drink of water there getting thirsty on the trail. I haven't eaten and I don't know seven days or something. Now Lucifina has measles. I'm probably, you know, it's probably frustrating listening to her complain. Now we're gonna try and make it on the trail. We got a hundred pounds of meat. Let's fucking go! Come on! Burgers has measles now too.

Meagals are spread and God damn it. Lucifina and Burgers both have measles and the water's bad. Now Lil J has measles now too, meagles are spread and god damn it Luciferian and burgers Both have measles and the water's bad now Lil J has measles. Oh god And oh, and we just lost oh look eight days. Oh Luciferian has cholera now Shit's getting real fucking rough. Oh, we just lost another eight days. Oh god The trail's real bad. Oh come on come on. No one died yet though. Heavy fog Inadequate grass. You're now at the Dallas. Would you like to look around you bet? Hey, we got the water Okay, and then we got continue on the trail because we're dying

Okay, float down the Columbia River or take the Barlow toll road. You know what? We're gonna float down the river. We're gonna gamble it Use the arrow keys to guy your raft through rushing waters of the Columbia River. Can we all make it after passing a third direction sign? Land your raft at the trail to make it- we might make it after all that! So dramatic! Oh boy. No. Oh god.

This is really hard. Is that working? No, no, no! Oh no! The raft hit a rock. This game just fucked me. The key's on working. Little J, I'm sorry, you're dead. Oh boy.

Showbiz, you're dead. Lucaphina, you're dead. We lost four oxen, seven sets of clothing, seventeen bullets, wagon axles. Okay, we lost pretty much everything, but the... All right, now my wagons headin down How do I always push the wrong way? ha ha whoops I might still make it I think it's me. I think little J think it's me a little J just together just two of us

Just like as we done. Oh, no the button just fuck me again. No burgers is dead now. Oh god Still floating. Oh no! We did another rock. How are we still alive? Okay, alright. Oh God, we hit the bank. I'm a terrible raft guy. Okay, making it a little further. Me and I think I think Lil J is still alive. On the old Apple 2E organ trail game. Oh I see, oh I see. I'm now a better river guide. You have to do a little more work when you play this game. Like it just keeps moving after you hit the button.

I didn't know that before. I'm sure this is amazing audio content. But we're so close. I can't stop. Oh boy. Oh boy. Me and Lil J, I think we're gonna make it. I Don't see any come on. How long is this?

This they didn't make games as well back then. There's no reason for it to slowly go on this long The graphics are shitty Come on or you draw. I do remember playing this game all the time trying to like get out of things in school I have one teacher third grade who let me play it all the time. Miss Williamson. I remember getting out of stuff. I was like, no, come on. I'm almost, I gotta make it down a little farther down the river.

I remember just one kid Thomas Jefferson. He was the best at it. He could win with all three of the things. He could be a banker. He could be carpenter. He could be whatever other dipshit there was. Okay. You know what? I'm just gonna go ahead and hit the timeline button

because this is taking while. We'll find out here in a second if I made it. Shrap on those boots, soldier. We're marching down a time-sub-time line. All right, I'm gonna try multi-task. Uh, the RAF has missed the landing. You have lost two sets of clothing. I didn't even know there was a landing. Alright, I'm gonna try multitask. The RAF has missed the landing. You have lost two sets of clothing.

I didn't even know there was a landing. We made it! We made it! Uh, October 23rd, 1848. Congratulations, you've made it to Oregon. Let's see how many points you received. It was just me. I think Lil J, he died, I guess.

Oh, so sorry. One person in very poor health. Was that me? That's just me, Joe said it's just me for me if you're going as a carpenter your points doubled and I had I made it with my wagon I made it with a person in poor health and literally nothing else. No, I had 29 bullets. Everything else was lost in the river like literally everything else Okay, so I got 500 points and nine bullets, everything else was lost in the river, like literally everything else. Okay. So I got 500 points and I'm a little bit shy of the top score in this game, which is Steven Meek with 76 150 points. All right. Okay.

Well, that game's over now. So we did some stuff. Now we're in the timeline. 1542. Sorry, everybody. Sorry, team. Everybody's dead. But I lived, that's pretty cool. 1542 Explorer, Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo,

sailed to the coast of California, map in the shoreline in name and landmarks. He died on Catalina Island from complications of a broken limb. It's pretty islands at least to die on. His chief pilot Bartolome Ferrer took control of the ship, sailed north, possibly reaching Oregon's coast.

The French and Spanish were the first to explore Oregon in the 17th and 18th centuries. Four Europeans arrived. Local tribes lived in Oregon for over 10,000 years. Historians estimate they were around 180,000 people, around 125 tribes. At the peak of that, the Chinook lived along the lower Columbia River and the coastal plains between the Cascade Mountains and the Pacific. Also, many others like the Cascade, Clacamas, Multnomah, and the Clatsup, Fort Classup and Historia, Oregon, where Lewis and Clark and their expedition would you know, winter during their expedition before they headed back to East. The banks of the

Columbia River were a main trading and fishing spot for indigenous groups all over the Northwest from US and Southwest from Canada. Areas around major rivers were almost as always important trading centers, especially during salmon runs. Beautiful part of the country. Early 1600s, explorers began searching for what they called the River of the West. Explore a Martin day, regular, first reported it. He thought it was a major river running in the Pacific near the 42nd parallel. Map makers began calling the river the Northwest passage. We now know that it wasn't.

In 1765, British major Robert Rogers, Robert Rogers, Rob Rogers called the river of the West the river Oregon, like our our gone French word for hurricane or windstorm spelled Oregon later by Jonathan Carver in 1778 and the misspelled name stuck that's how Oregon got its name. I think there's a lot of disagreement of how the name Oregon came to be, but that seems to me the best story. It does get real windy in parts of the Columbia. March of 1778, English explorer James Cook cited the coast of Oregon. He established a four-domain Kuver Island spent time trading with local tribes, numerous

explorers now spreading the word about how there's great fur trading potential in the Pacific Northwest. And that reaches all the way to Thomas Jefferson, US minister to France at the time. You remember 1777, 87 American captains Robert Gray and John Kendrick sent to the Pacific coast to trade with tribes in the area, reach Oregon 10 months later and do their trading. Gray returned to Boston in 1790, making them the first American district to navigate the globe. 1792 to the first white men to reach the Columbia River Gorge at the

end of the Oregon Trail, a Robert Gray and George Vancouver sent by American Britain respectively. Both explorers entered the river from the Pacific Ocean. Gray sailed from Boston to the Pacific Northwest on September 28, 1790 on a ship called the Columbia. This party camped north of the Newt Cassandre on Vancouver Island for the winter of 1791, 1792. Gray showed up in April of 1792. His party would name all sorts of shit in the area that stuck to this day. Vancouver Island, Mount Baker, Mount Adams, Puget Sound, Mount Rainier, Widby Island, and much more.

All named after crew members, himself or friends. Gray's party left after trading with the Chinook people near the mouth of the river. On May 11, 1792, the Columbia cross the San Bar at the mouth of the Columbia and the mouth of the Columbia River and explored the waterway. Grey saw natives on the bank following his ship. He wrote, without a doubt, we are the first civilized people that ever visited this port. These poor fellows viewed us in the ship with the greatest astonishment. Their language was different from any we have yet heard.

The men were entirely naked. And the women except a small apron before were also in a state of nature. The crew exchanged gifts with them and probably tried to hide their boners and not zone off staring at boobs or, you know, I get caught trying to see up those aprons and they established fur trade. The Columbia return home and j- uh, excuse me July 25th 1793 before he left, Gray named the river Columbia, you know, after the ship, Gray and Van Coover, often cited as the first to discover the territory. Actually though, just two of 28 trading vessels in the northwest that year, not to mention the, you know, of course, the tribes already living in the heart of Oregon country. On April 27, 1792, Gray and Van Coover meet up, compare maps.

He both notes the locations of Columbia River. And Van Coover dismissed Gray as an amateur, said it was not a major river. Obviously, he'd both note the locations of Columbia River. And Vancouver to Smith Gray as an amateur said it was not a major river. Obviously, he was a bit wrong there. 1805 Lewis and Clark and the Corps Discovery reached the Columbia River Gorge, first US military personnel treats area. 1810 for entrepreneur John Jacob Astor organizes an expedition west to establish a fur trading post for America fur company, and Oregon. They follow the Missouri River upstream from St. Louis to South Dakota, then trick across Wyoming and Idaho.

Meet another group that sailed to west along the river there, 1811 British merchant David Thompson navigated the Columbia from its headwaters and British Columbia to the river's mouth. It's party encountered for it. Historia recently established by John Jacob Astor's, you know, Pacific fur company. Both companies traveled upstream together relying on local tribes for helping resources. From 1811 to 1840, the trails used by trappers, fur traders, missionaries, traveling mostly on foot and horseback. And their journey's probably sucked more than the early journeys of the Oregon Trail

settlers. 1812, John Jacob Astor completes Ford Astoria near the mouth of the Columbia River. That was the first American owned settlements on the Pacific coast. Astor St. Robert Stewart and other party members, back east for supplies and men, they found the South past and Southwestern Wyoming, a 20 mile gap in the Rockies, provides a path across the continental divide. On December 24, 1814, US, Britain, they signed the Treaty of Gint, officially ending the war of 1812. Four British American commissions tasked with resolving boundary questions now, little

influence shape of the West, 1821. The British Hudson's Bay Company purchases Northwest fur company takes ownership of former Fort Astoria. Uh oh, better get out there and settle that shit before the British do. Manifest destiny. 1824, the Hudson's Bay Company establishes Fort Van Coover on the North Bank of Columbia between the Sandy and Millamott Rivers. Stablishes are farmed at the location.

Also in 1824, Jeddai Smith, James Fitzpatrick, become the first US explorers to reach California coming from the east. 1830s, missionaries began arriving along the Columbia River from the Oregon Trail. March 1st, 1833, the Christian Advocate, journal published article with a title, who will respond to go beyond the Rocky Mountains and carry the book of heaven. Wesley University president Wilbur Fisk asked the Methodist mission board to establish a mission among the flathead tribe. As his pupil Reverend Jason Leigh to lead a caravan to Oregon, Leigh accepts.

A young fur trader named Nathaniel Wyeth agrees to lead the group to the annual fur trader rendezvous in Wyoming. April 28th 1834, missionary Jason Daniel Leigh depart for Oregon led by Wyeth and Captain William Sublett, the reach Pocahtello, Idaho. Lee delivers the first Protestant sermon in Oregon country when the reach the snake river, Wyeth established Fort Hall in their Pocahtello. His post later purchased by the Hudson's Bay company and it becomes a major supply outpost for future immigrants. Wyeth Lee party, the first group to travel the entire Oregon trail. Jason Lee set up a Methodist mission in the Willamette Valley, Daniel Lee established a mission at the Dalles. 1836 missionary Marcus Whitman leads an overland party by wagon to the west. He and his

wife Narcissa, along with the Reverend Henry Spalding and his wife Eliza and William Gray, bound a mission in present day wallowalow, Washington, in an effort to convert local tribes to Christianity. The journey proved to American society at the time that women could survive in inland journeys to the northwest. 1840 Robert Newell and Joseph Meek lead in a small party from Fort Hall guided by Thomas Fitzpatrick are often credited as the first non-missionary immigrants, regular-old ass settlers, to reach Lamont Valley by land. 1841, the first proper wagon train crosses the Oregon Trail. Small band of 70 immigrants leaves from Independence, Missouri led by John Barlson and John Bidwell.

Bidwell, eventually thousands of wagons will widen the path into a hundred foot wide highway of sorts. 1842, a group of 100 immigrants crossed the Oregon Trail on the second major journey, led by a missionary Elijah White. Same year, Marcus Whitman, he's back, travels 3, travels 3000 miles back east on horseback alone. Fucking insane. To persuade sponsors to continue missions and plead with President John Tyler to keep the territory out of Great Britain's hands. Apparently Tyler was thinking about exchanging all that land for a cod fishery. But Whitman changes mind. His actions along

with reports from map maker and explore John C. Fremont who explored the west with kit Carson and Thomas Fitzpatrick helped to spell some misfloating around the time. There was nothing but a bunch of desert out there and it wasn't where Settlin 1843 before Oregon becomes a territory. New overlanders arrive and form a provisional government that banned slavery. Yay, but bars entry to black people, not yay. They're law required in slavers to free enslaved people. They brought with them to Oregon and then banished freed black people from the territory. And black people tried to stay were whipped last

39 times. For every six months, they remained in Oregon. What the fuck? John, you and your family are free. We will not tolerate slavery in this new land. It's tomorrow. Now, please enjoy your new freedom and get the fuck out. Go on. Go be free somewhere else. You should them a bitch. Or crazy ass species. Settlers later amended the lash law to forced labor, so you were no longer a slave. That's against the law, but then if you didn't leave, you were basically made to be a slave, so they didn't really abolish slavery.

Despite all this horse shit, some of the original pioneers were black. A few hundred black people traveled to the Oregon territory in the 1840s and 50s and 60s, despite white settlers not welcoming them with open arms. One notable black immigrant was George Bush, free son of a black father and an Irish mother. Travel to Oregon in 1844 with his wife and five children wanted to escape the hostile state of Missouri for a fresh start, joined up with the wagon party of four white families. These whites respected Bush because they were neighbors in Missouri.

George was described as a prosperous farmer and a kind man. They gave supplies to the poor families in the party, bought food for them along the trail. When they reached the dowels, they got word of Oregon's lash law, though. Bush and his family then headed up to the Hudson's Bay Company territory north of the Columbia River out of reach of Oregon's exclusion laws. Winter near Hudson's Bay, Hudson's Bay Bay companies Fort Grand Coover, present day Washington State, and the spring, they moved further north to get away from crazy, lash happy white folk, settled in the Puget Sound area near present day tum water, about 60 miles south of present day Seattle, built a farm, became friends with local in the Squally tribe.

Then when the US and Britain divided the Oregon country in 1846, US took over the Puget Sound region, Bush again subject to racist laws, mother fucker, Congress passed a donation land act of 1850, which allowed white settlers to legally claim land in Oregon. It was at risk of losing his farm. Luckily, Bush's friends and neighbors took legal action to help him protect his land, and then Congress passed an act in 1855 to validate Bush's land claim. And by 1860, the Bushes had a modern mechanized farm known as Bush Prairie. His direct descendants would remain in the area and prosper, and I have to imagine he still has descendants in the Puget Sound area to this day.

The rare success story for Black Americans, who took the trail. May 22nd, 1843, a thousand immigrants all head west together as part of the great migration of 1843. Led by John Gant to Farmy Army Captain and fur trader first large wagon train across the trail they departed from Elm Grove, Missouri. Great migration eventually joined partially guided by old Marcus Whitman again. The entire journey took five months for the massive wagon train except for one guy who apparently, according to one source I found, made the entire journey in around 30 minutes.

Rumor has it, Willie Hitchinbacher, while preparing for his 1843 journey while trying to make moonshine accidentally added a whole heap of nitroglycerin to his still and stumbled upon an early batch of fucking Whipple! Oregon Trail Pioneer Edition, minute of two gallons of nitroglycerin, four gallons of moonshine, full batch of Whipple! Oregon Trail Pioneer Edition allows you to run run roughly four thousand miles an hour for around thirty minutes you can run across water through trees by senior hit or obliterated you can even slower speed down the rotation of the fucking earth depending on which

way you temporarily unbreakable body is simple and long fuck you fuck your family fuck your wagon train and drink with all sadly willy hit and bacher died of a massive heart attack. And internal hemorrhage, you shortly after make it to Oregon city. And maybe Willie's not real. I can't remember 1845. 3000 people participated in that year's great migration. It became an annual event.

But the giant convoy soon turned into smaller bands of wagons 12 to 24 in a party. 1846 group of Mormon immigrants decided to move to the Great Salt Lake region. After Mormon leader, Joseph Smith murdered in 1844. The cross to Iowa set up a winter camp in Nebraska and traveled the rest of the trail before breaking off West heading into Utah. We covered that a bit more in episode 157 on Mormonism. Same year John McLaughlin opens a general store in Oregon city. Now considered the final stop of the trail. Barlow Road identified, eliminating the need to cross the Columbia River. 1847, the Whitman family and 11 other whites,

near Walla Walla are murdered by the Cuyuce tribe after a measles outbreak. In the years before Whitman's focus had shifted to converting as many indigenous people as possible. But as more and more white settlers arrived to his outpost, the Cuyuce had become resentful of him.

When a measles outbreak killed many Cuyuce, they attacked the settlers in retaliation. The incident would help pass a bill establishing the Oregon territory. So settlers could be provided some military protection and cause the Kiyos war between natives and settlers. And that would last until 1855. January 24, 1848, James Wilson Marshall, carpenter from New Jersey, finds gold in the American river at the base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains near Colomac, California,

California. Marshall was working to build a water-powered sawmill for John Sutter, founder of the Colony of New Switzerland, which later became Sacramento. Days after Marshall made his discovery, the US and Mexico signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, if you recall, making California U.S. territory. Marshall and Sutter tried to keep the news a secret, but words spread by mid-March. A newspaper report that discovered it's Sutter's mill by mid-June three fourths. San Francisco's men left town for goldmines.

And there were from four thousand miners in town by August. More soon arrived by boat from Oregon, Hawaii, Mexico, Chile, Peru, and China. Gold, gold, gold, get it, get it. Thousands of prospective miners traveled to San Francisco in this surrounding area by the end of 1849, two years later, the non-native population in California had risen from about 7,000 to around 100,000. December of 1848, gold fever kicked off in the east. When President Polk announced to discover

a golden California, East coasters were skeptical before for now having the president confirm the news, made them set their sights on the Oregon Trail, in 1849 thousands of men sold their homes borrowed money to travel to California. The 49ers made their way overland on the Oregon Trail, the gold rush peaked in 1852 bringing thousands to California. In total, two billion worth of precious metal would be extracted from the area. 1850, the Oregon Donation Land Act, small precursor to the Homestead Act, encouraged further

settlement in Oregon Country. By 1851, the Oregon Territory, non-native population, went from a small group of primarily fur trappers and missionaries to around 12,000 people. December of 1851, gold discovered in Oregon further increases traffic into the territory, and the discovery of gold marks the beginning of the end for the trail. As more and more miners come west, they start to veer off into the traditional path, more and more, paving their own way, looking for some sweet, shiny shit. They could be thought of as just another mineral worth no more than some gravel, since currency is made up social construct, but instead it's a shiny symbol of commerce. Yay, arbitrarily, pick and go. Yay, shiny stuff. In the mid 1850s, there's a decrease in immigration. When the US government removes indigenous groups from their villages along

the river, some tribes remove from their villages along the river. Some tribes removed the treaties others forcefully. 1858 businesses like Portage Roads, Railroads and the Oregon Steam Navigation Company set up along major rivers to make money and help immigrants cross the trail more easily. Fairies and bridges spring up across river crossings, as well as, you know, more trading posts and forts. Shortens trail time by as much as a month. People now make new businesses charge money to get across those rivers.

On February 4th, 1859, Oregon becomes a state. One of their first state actions is to prohibit further black settlement, those sons of bitches. White people being scared of black people, the American way. Still too much of that today. Black people barred from owning property entering into contracts, participating in legal matters. This clause will not be repealed until 1926. 1866 and 1862, we discover your golden Idaho, lures settlers into the Snake River Valley. July 1st, 1862, President Lincoln signs the Pacific Railroad Act.

Pacific Railroad Act charted the Central Pacific and Union Pacific Railroad companies to build a transcontinental railroad, linking the east and west coast. This act guaranteed public land grants and loans to each railroad company construction began in 1862. For seven years, these companies raced towards each other from Sacramento and Omaha. The road had been slowly but surely catching up with the Oregon Trail in 1850. There were 9,000 miles of track east of the Missouri River with the influx of settlers moving west plus the gold rush railroad companies looking to expand as quickly as possible. Go, gold, gold. 1869, the beginning of the end for the trail,

and early 1869, the railroad companies just a few miles away from each other. And March, they agreed to meet each other with the Promontory Summit in Utah. To complete the railroad, and on May 10th, the Transcontinental Railroads completed bringing the wagon era to a close, a central Pacific union Pacific, meat and promontory, final spike driven into the railroad at the Golden Spike ceremony. And it made it way easier, right, to get across the, uh, uh, where the Oregon Trail was heading. You should cost a thousand bucks to cross the country after the road's completion, the

price dropped to 111 bucks and 80, then to 40 bucks. Crazy difference. The railroad opened the West up to much faster development, travel time cut from several months to under a week. So much easier, right? So insane that for a few years, people still did both. Imagine two competing travel companies. I don't know which one to pick. The Oregon wagon express will get us there maybe in four to five months if we don't die of so many things. And we'll have to basically walk the whole fucking way and it costs a thousand dollars. Or I can pay forty bucks.

No one has to die or walk or learn how to steer a wagon. And the railroad express will get me there in less than a week. Hmm. From 1866 to 1888, the trail primarily used for cattle drives, wagon trains occasionally seen cross the trail until the 1880s. By 1890, no need to travel by wagon due to expansive railroad tracks reaching all over the country now. Let's get the fuck out of this timeline. Good job soldier, you've made it back. Barely.

Before a quick home stretch, another final sponsor break a very important one. This episode of TimeSuck is brought to you by Dittel, defend innocent dolphin dick from love making experiments. Did you know that every year fake scientists fuck literally thousands of male dolphins in disturbing sex-spirit experiments in order to try and figure out how to speak telepathically to aliens Well, okay, I mean maybe that's not entirely 100% true But I do know that's happened at least one time and I know that Peter

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A-crying it? A-crying it? Uh, thanks Thanks for listening, guys. That very important message. Never mind me a lot of that ceramic lockling thing with the dogs, but with dolphin dicks. How does expansion affect native tribes? Already lived in Western territory. The Great Migration of 1843 marked the year things change forever for Western native tribes and various recorded skirmishes, while killing about, you know, travelers, tribes lost about 400 to combat. They lost so many more to disease.

Smallpox, cholera, measles, other illnesses for which the tribes had no natural immunity wiped out about 90% of some tribes during the business 20 years that Oregon Trail. Another massive negative impact of the trail for many tribes was in their extinction of the bison. By 1850, huge herds, a thousands of bison are dying out. Bison lived in the plains from the 1300s to the early 1800s, thrived in the wetter and cooler climate, or Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas. From 1825 to 1850 traffic along the Santa Fe trail disrupted their herds, and then bison hunters were killing up to 25,000 bison a year.

In the 1860s, conflicts increased further between the U.S. Army and planes tribes, mostly due to the expansion of railroad lines out west. And then the army provided free ammo to hide hunters who would then hunt the Bison to near extinction. And that was done to hurt the tribes. The government recognized how important the Bison were to indigenous people, so to subdue them, they killed their main food source. By 1994, Yellowstone National Park had the only known wild herb in the US.

And just like we went over the trail of tear suck, treaty after treaty after treaty, removed tribes from ancestors for lands, placed them for the most part on smaller and smaller reservations as more white settlers headed west. So manifest destiny in the Oregon Trail great for the strength of the new emerging world power of the United States terrible for local tribes. Guess you already knew that. Human history littered with tales of the conquering and the conquered and the story of the Oregon Trail, one of these tales.

So what happened to the trail once people stopped using it? Well, rail tracks were sometimes laid directly over trail paths. After the trail stopped being used for travel, it was still used for cattle and sheep tribes and places for a bit. And then the land, you know, the trail was on with sold farms wiped it away, paved roads, placed over at shopping centers,, schools on and on. The day tour is conceived remnants of the trail here and there. Number of forts once along the trail are now national state local historical sites.

1978 Congress authorized the establishment of the Oregon Trail. I'm sorry, the Oregon National Historic Trail to preserve and maintain little parts throughout the day the trail managed by the National Park Service, what's left of it. For decades, there have been laws passed to preserve monuments and. They the trail managed by the National Park Service, what's left of it. For decades, there have been laws passed, preserve monuments and parts of the trail and for historical associations to keep memories of the trail fresh in the American mind, books, films, celebrations.

The National Park Service is insured, we can never forget the importance of the trail. And of course, that sweet Oregon Trail educational video game used by so many kids to learn about life in the trail, the one where I lived and I was fine, and all my fucking weaker associates here died, you know. I couldn't find numbers, but how many people played that game? A couple hundred million?

I wasn't terribly painful to listen to me play today. I had fun. I hope you had fun. I hope you had fun with the whole thing. Let's recap some of the most important parts of what we learned with today's top five takeaways and also, of course, learn one more new thing. Time, Chuck, more new thing. Time, suck, tough, five takeaway. Number one, the Oregon Trail was a, you know, roughly 2000 mile long route from Missouri

to Oregon Country and also California, tracing the banks, several rivers crossed the plains, deserts, western mountains in North America. immigrants faced many hardships along the way, accents, cholera, extreme weather starvation, those who made it rewarded with as much as 640 acres of land, a dream unfathomable for many people living in big cities and east. Number two manifest destiny estimated 250,000 to 500,000 immigrants crossed the Oregon Trail to find land for themselves. First with the Oregon Land Donation Act, then the Homestead Act, just like I'd want it.

Number three, contrary to popular belief, the trail was not full of violence between whites' natives. Whites killed around 400 natives, natives killed around 360 whites, and documented skirmishes along the organ territory settlement days. During the settlement days, most of the conflicts instigated by whites

who were suspicious of local tribes. Number four, the completion of the transcontinental railroad on May 10th, 1869 brought an end to the need for the Oregon Trail. Railroad transport just made it way faster and easier and cheaper to make the journey west. As new modern technologies came about, the trail was largely forgotten in regard to this an old-fashioned thing of the past by most Americans.

And then number five, new info, Lady Pants. One interesting piece of the trail history involves bloomers, Amelia Janks Bloomer. The suffragist, women's magazine editor from New York, she started a dress reform movement in 1851 by wearing pantaloons under a short skirt. Amelia Bloomer's articles were picked up by the New York Weekly Tribune, interested in Amelia Bloomer's and Amelia's bloomers,

quickly spread. Bloomer's first appeared in California in Oregon in 1851. She was initially ridiculed for her dress, slash pants combo, but then a lot of young women were like, I love this practical outfit. And the purchase blimmers for the journey west, it made it easier to walk around, get in the water, and have spiders crawling to their vagina, guessing, and it prevented fire hazards, which were more common than you would think. Women's dresses often caught on fire when they were cooking over open flames.

Unfortunately, this trend did not catch on for most women. They stuck with their long, heavy skirts and criticized the bloomer girls for being immodest. Oh, pants! You can kind of see the shape of your legs. Time suck. Top five takeaways. Oregon Trail has been sucked. Hope you enjoyed the journey.

Thank you to the Time Suck team, the Bad Magic Productions team, for all their help and making time suck every week. Queen of Bad Magic Lindsey Cummins, Reverend Dr. Jill Paisley. Thanks to Zach Flannery, the script keeper for helping us here with a variety of things every week. Olivia Lee, for doing the initial research on this one. Thanks to Bit of Lixer for keeping the Time Suck app on and smooth. Logan the Art Warlock, Keith, our creator, director, Creighton, all the merch at badmagicmerch.com

and more. Thanks to Lizzie and Chantras Hernandez who runs our Cult of the Curious Facebook private page, currently Cult of the Curious 2, along with her. Excuse me, wonderful all-seeing eyes moderators, and she helps look up on socials. And thanks to Beefstake and his mod squad keeping over 10,000 meat stacks happy over on Discord. Next week is the week Halloween. What spooky son of a bitch should be sucked? How about somebody, one of their nicknames or monikers is Dr. Satan.

Dr. Satan aka French World War II serial killer Dr. Marcel Pithio. Next week on Time Suck we find ourselves back in the midst of World War II for some insane true horror. Imagine what it would be like to have your nation invaded, conquered by Nazis, have your neighbors round it up, be put to death for ethnicity, then imagine a brave group of your fellow countrymen decide to smuggle out the people that are being targeted and that's great, that's good, that's noble. And then a fucking serial killer

pretends to be one of these brave noble countrymen, a real wolf and sheep clothing, devil disguised as an angel, uses the same underground salvation pipeline as a way to murder the fuck out of people seeking refuge from other evil men. Next Monday we go full evil on Halloween week, talk about a super dream son of a bitch who did exactly that. Marcel Petrio, a friend serial killer who murdered Jews and Gentiles alike as they tried to

escape to German Gestapo after Nazi's invaded France. And the story won't just be about murders, It was a complicated character. This patio led a crazy life. It was a somehow semi-successful politician despite being a known criminal. Also an alleged inventor, which included secret weapons, it probably don't exist. And he was a doctor with a decent reputation despite not really being qualified to be a doctor. Petyo was thought of as a French resistance hero for a time until his unprecedented crimes were discovered in his weird murder mansion. Dude got away with likely stealing millions and millions of francs from his perhaps 60 or more victims.

Bixims who thought they had finally found someone to help them. Tune in to the suck next Monday to unravel another real piece of shit Marcel Petrio, one of the many villains of the World War II era, but even for those wild times, especially bad. And now before all that bad, let's hear some good on this week's time sucker updates. First up, young sucker, Solacek Cody Sears as a birthday greeting she would like to share. Cody writes, dear suck master. Hi, I hope you're the queen of the suck and the little suck leans are having a great day. My name is Cody Sears. Yeah, we're on a good day. I'm 23 years old from Texas. I love times like you say Texas. Cody

That suck in my head now. I was really introduced to the world of the suck by my boyfriend Peter Keller. I'm so glad he trusted me enough to share his favorite and super fucking crazy awesome. That's a thank you podcast with me. I'm so glad he trusted me enough to share his favorite and super fucking crazy awesome. That's a thank you podcast with me. It has now become one of our main topics in discussion. I'm actually writing this email in the hopes that you will wish him a happy birthday on or near November 2nd. I figured if I start emailing now and continue every week until then maybe just maybe one of my emails will get to you.

Thanks for creating such, thanks for creating such a fun and top provoking work of art. Well, that's very nice. It feels just like madness most times. A meter-night, Peter, meet, meet or not, meet or be a university name. Peter and I both know your podcast will never disappoint. We will leave every episode having our, having scratched our heads,

looked at each other with our no fucking way glances. Laughter asses off, had a heartfelt moment, and let's be honest, probably had to rewind a bit because you mentioned something sexy and we're making out a bit. Hey, I lose the fena. Anyways, love the suck. You and all the time suck champions,

y'all are amazing sacks. Thank you, Best Cody Sears. Well, Cody, first off, love the way your name spelled K-O-D-I-E. Super cool. I didn't see that one. Second, thanks for the kind words. You're too nice. And third, happy birthday to your lover, Peter. And that's, that's a human Peter, right? After last week, I worry about Peter, the dolphins, you know, being taken advantage of sexually by overly adventurous young women. If Peter is a dolphin, Cody, now you have to keep fucking him forever because he'll get so sad if you don't. If he's a human congrats, you two sound like you're having a fun relationship, hail

them rotten, hail Luciferina, and now two sweet sex, or maybe one two at a sec, or maybe one split personality sec, has some silliness to share JK she signed the messages Bethany and Walter but only Bethany writes dear suck master supreme Are we not gonna talk about how dolphins have a spiral shape vaginal cavity and how this freak John Lily Excuse me. I had a dad and how this freak John Lee had a dad named Dick Coil Am I the only one who immediately thought this and laughed my ass off? Anyway, because of your nasty ass podcast. I met the man one who immediately thought this and laughed my ass off? Anyway, because of your nasty ass podcast, I met the man. I'm married in a week.

Let me explain. I found your podcast while being a barely functioning binge drinker. We're going to crappy dead end job. Over the years, I realized that the first space is it. I met in the wild. I would marry. This reasoning was in part because no other meat sack would ever appreciate my dark twisted humor.

And I knew that anyone lived with me would have to have common traits of liking to learn and listening to your bullshit while I work in my creative pursuits. Before I met my student to be husband, I was spiraling down a self-destructive path that had gotten me into two car accidents in the span of a month. 24 hours after getting into the before mentioned second accident, my concussed ass went to a bar to meet one of those idiots of the internet. And I slipped out a hail of Saphina to which he responded, no way. Your time's up or two? And in that moment, I knew it was all over. This is it.

The next few week, COVID-19, got shut down. I moved in with a practical stranger and I wouldn't change a fucking thing. So thank you for being a starting point on building a relationship with the meat sack that cheers me on to learn and create and encourages, both of us to be our best selves.

Lastly, we've been binge listening to your Moshmoth nonsense to distract us from the stress of our pending nuptials or lately. If you could give my now husband a shout out this week with a congratulations you degenerate in certain your own debauchery here. How about fuck-faced, Alphandick, Suck and Collar, Lupol juice drinker? Okay. Haleus Fina. Yours truly and unfortunately, Bethany and Walter.

Walter congrats on marrying someone who sounds like a lot of fun. Hell is Fina. May she join your naughty fun bits often and always. Bethany, thanks for sharing such a cool story. Good for you. Pursue in love and your dreams and you fucking go get it. Use me, man. It's always going crazy. it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, the serial oil spacers, Samantha Wyatt coming at you from Yakima, Washington. It's going to be a long one, so strap on those boot soldier. First, I'll tell you about myself from 30 years old and totally blind since birth. And believe me when I say the blindness is the least it was wrong with me, I was born with septo-optic dysplasia, an optic nerve hypoplasia. This means the septum in the middle of my brain didn't grow properly in one little spot.

In my case, my optic nerves only grew to one tenth of the normal size, so they didn't connect to my brain. The spot where my defect happened is also where the pituitary gland is. If you don't already know, the pituitary, that, the pituitary is the body's hormone center. My pituitary function is hit and miss. So I have to take medications to replace my hormones. Even before COVID was a thing,

my life was on a different path. Because of the blindness, I can't keep a normal sleep schedule. The cell is in my brain, the controls are creating a rhythm, don't get any cues to tell me when it's light or dark outside. Side question.

If my sleep runs on my hormones, and my hormones hormones run on my sleep, how many times have I been fucked over? Anyway, I dealt with sleep issues my whole life and never had a label for it until a few years ago. It's called non-24 sleep wake disorder affects mostly blind people. Such a long story.

It won't all fit in this message, but I've been on an eight year journey of acceptance. It was rough at first. I went through therapy, found new purposes for my life, a late old dreams to rest. Now I just try to focus on my quality of life, sleep when my brain wants to sleep, live my best life when I'm awake, even if it's 3 a.m.

I started fostering dogs from my local pet rescue, so I would have someone to take care of besides myself and love every minute of it. I have perfect pitch and love to sing, so my mom started taking me out to karaoke every weekend. That's great, that's awesome. I got a place of my own so I don't have to tip till around sleep

and people all the time and they don't have to do the same for me. But then the COVID came along and took a big, bowed jangle size shit all over everything. I got sick in May of 2020, and liked the suck master, didn't have any other respiratory systems or even a fever. In fact, I thought I was just allergies for the first few weeks because I got headaches, or I get headaches during the allergy season, tested negative for COVID at the time, tested positive for anybody's a few weeks after that. My doctor drew blood, tested for them because

I was still having symptoms. And what people call a long hauler still have symptoms almost 18 months later. I get headaches and body aches every day, constipation, and brain people call a long hauler, still have symptoms almost 18 months later. I get headaches and body aches every day, constipation, and brain fog, and so much more fog to suck. One day I was laying in bed, feeling like hammered out shit, bored because I'd run out of things and entertained me, turned on episode one of the suck, heard your stand up before I'm pan door, and loved it. I remember hearing your ad for the suck, and thought I'd see what it was all about. Start with episode one, fell in love right away, and binge never since.

I'll thank you. Between time suckers, we've done the secret suck, you've completely ruined my ability to watch regular TV. I've been watching a show on Netflix with my mom, thinking about how I can't wait to listen to the next suck. Sometimes the headaches are so bad, all I can do is lay in bed in the quiet and wish for death or recovery. Sometimes the only thing I can tolerate is something playing softly on my phone. You suck master everybody bad magic, creating your creating something beautiful. You help me get through every day by distracting me for my pain and I get story time and so much needed laughs. You guys are light for me to these dark times. Pun definitely

intended. You made a side not to read this on the time, suck your updates because it's so long now, but I just wanted to reach out and tell you what an impact you're making. Hail, Nimra, praise about jangles and keep on sucking your forever loyal space, it's Samantha Wyatt, PSI fostered a dog to my local rescue who was burned in a wildfire fucking 2016. My family and I spent a year nursing back to health. I adopted him, trained him to be my service dog.

He's a pit bull husky mix. He's a big teddy bear full of love. Every time you mention both jangles now being fierce, all I can picture is my sweet teddy bear, laying on his back, asking for belly rubs. His name is Bernie because he was burned. I'm an asshole, I know. I bring this up because now I find myself affectionately calling him burn jangles.

PPS today is October 15th, coming to your show and spoke can, and I can't fucking wait. It's the man that you wonderful dog fucker you. I mean dog fosterer. Praiseable jangles and praise his sweet cousin, burn jangles as well. I love your sense of humor. I find your story inspiring. You've pushed past blindness hormone regulation problems, asleep disorder and a pandemic aches all so much stuff. Hail Samantha mother fucking Wyatt. I hope you had fun at the Spokane show. I recorded this October 14th, just a few hours before the show. And I hope we can bring you more light in the darkness and also horrific tales of serial killers and dolphin bliss. Not for humor. Humiliated sack, Victoria Morgan has to find a new mechanic. She writes,

I wanna start this off by saying, I always thought 90% of the commons love updates were made up horse shit from people who wanted shout outs until today. I was half right through the new episode about the dolphin point experiment. When I took my car to get a much needed checkup, my Prius has pretty good Bluetooth range.

I never turned the Bluetooth off on my phone. So it just automatically connects every time I get in the car. And the phone automatically begins to play the last thing you were listening to when the Bluetooth connects to the car speakers about 10, 15 minutes into my appointment. I looked down on my phone only to realize that the poor mechanic was getting an ear full of dolphin sex and David Hatcher. Children's God damn it. Of all the episodes it could have played. I've got a great

relationship with the owner of that service station. Unfortunately, I will never be able to show my face there again. You're right Victoria. You have to find a new mechanic. It's gonna be very hard to explain listening to stories about dolphin fucking, you know, to a lot of people. Best of luck. And hope a future episode doesn't ruin a future relationship with another mechanic. Actually, that would be a great story for the rest of us, but kind of sorry, though. And now last message, a dad sucker. Hopefully, not a serial killer like so many dads, Douglass Hare writes, time suck team, I guess I got someone somewhat common's law today. Doesn't really affect me too much because he's my son, he's cool as hell, but let's just say he wasn't ready for what he was hearing.

I was in the shower this morning, blaring two, six, five, the dolphin point experiment. I was laughing hysterically at the monkey orgasms and jerked off dogs and I opened the door while you said he was professional beagle jerker offer to a wide open mouth and look of utter confusion from my 12 year old son, which made it all the more hilarious, Hellosafina. Well, Douglas, I think that boy years is now man. Once you've heard shit like that, I, I think that boy yours is now man. Once you've heard shit like that, I don't think he can be a kid anymore.

Make sure being a pro-beagle jerker offer isn't a noble profession and something to inspire, aspire to, make sure your son realizes that. Make sure he really knows that being an amateur beagle jerker offer is even worse. And keep having fun with your kid. Keep having fun, everybody, listen to this. I hope you still enjoy the ride, hail Nimrod, everyone.

Thanks, time suckers. I need a net. We all did. Thanks for listening to another Bad Magic Productions podcast, Meet Sacks. Maybe don't start a 2100 mile plus long wagon trip this week. Sounds super hard, and dangerous, you know, like you just fucking sucks.

Maybe just, instead of that kind of sucking, you just keep listening to time suck and just keep on sucking that way. Hey, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you killed me. Yeah, Zach. I know Lindsey and Logan. I know on the yorken trail The but the buster I used to use oh you're hoping you're alive. I figured that out after you guys died Oh, typical Dan kill everybody and then figure it out when they're dead Wow I mean, I mean it's still kind of cool that I made it they were holding me back They were holding me back.