Explorers Before Lewis & Clark

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Explorers Before Lewis and Clark

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EXPLORERS BEFORE LEWIS AND CLARK

1492	Seeking a western ocean route to Asia, Christopher Columbus encountered the Caribbean Islands, and claimed them for Spain
1497	John and Sebastian Cabot reached the east coast of North America, and claimed it for England.
1504	Columbus encountered the coast of Panama
1509	Central America was occupied by Spain
1513	Juan Ponce de Leon claimed Florida for Spain. He landed near modern Jacksonville and sailed around the peninsula, perhaps as far north as Tampa.
1519	Alonso Alvarez de Pineda explored the Gulf Coast of Mexico and encountered the mouth of the Mississippi River. He nameed it the "Rio del Espiritu Santo."
1524	Giovanni da Verrazano encountered New York Harbor and the Hudson River, laying claim for France to the "New World."
1527-1536	The Panfilo de Narvaez expedition set out to explore the Gulf coastline from Florida to Texas. The group was attacked by Indians and its boats were swamped. All the expedition members died except for four survivors, who wandered across Texas and the Southwest, eventually contacting the Spanish in Mexico City nearly 10 years later (1536). Lavar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca and a black slave named Esteban were two of the three survivors, who described cultures and the geography of the regions they traversed. They gave the world the first description of the American buffalo (bison).
1539	Esteban returned to the southwest with Fray Marcos de Niza. In search of the fabled 7 Cities of Gold, Esteban was killed by the Zuni. Marcos returned to Mexico City with tales of cities full of gold and turquoise, which fired the imagination and greed of Spanish leaders.

As a direct result of de Niza's stories, the attention of Spain was focused on the northern part of the empire. Three expeditions were sent out to explore the area between 1539 and 1543:

1) Hernando de Soto: Explored from Florida to the Mississippi River, traveling north and west to Oklahoma and Arkansas, 1539-1542. His primary goal was to search for a short, water route to the Pacific.

2) Francisco Vasquez de Coronado: 30-year old explorer, 1540-1542. Explored from the west coast of Mexico to central Kansas with 336 Spanish soldiers, 4 priests (including Fray Marcos), several hundred Mexican-Indian allies, and 1500 stock animals. Scout groups were sent out from the main expedition which encountered the Hopi mesas, the Grand Canyon [Garcia Lopez de Cardenas and Don Pedro de Tovar], Taos Pueblo and explored the Rio Grande River into southern New Mexico [Hernando de Alvarado]. The main body encountered Hawikuh, Acoma, Tiguex, and Cicuye (Pecos) pueblos. At Pecos, an Indian called "the Turk" convinced Coronado that an unbelievably rich land existed to the east, called Quivera. In the spring, Coronado's party started out for Quivera. After 40 days of travel, Coronado sent most of his men back to Tiguex and continued on with just 30 soldiers. After finding only grass huts at Quevira [thought to have been near modern Lyons, Kansas], the Turk confessed that he had lied as part of a pueblo plot to lure the army out onto the plains, where they might die of starvation. The Turk was executed, and Coronado led his army back to Mexico City in disappointment. Coronado was called to account for the failure of his mission in Spain, and it took four years for him to clear his name. He died at the age of 42 in obscurity. Coronado's expedition had a profound influence on the West. It encountered major rivers, the Grand Canyon, the pueblo and plains Indian cultures and the American buffalo, bringing back descriptions of the land and the people in logbooks. Coronado was amazed by the Great Plains, and had the feeling that they might go on forever. The horses which escaped from his army were the beginning of the herds of plains horses used by American Indians, and started a new facet of Indian culture.

3). Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo: Sailed up the Pacific coast from Mexico to Oregon, 1542-43. Encountered San Diego Bay.

1549	A silver "rush" near Zacatecas, Mexico, opened the Spanish northern frontier.
1565	In reaction to the establishment of a French colony in Florida, Captain Pedro Menendez de Aviles attacked and destroyed the French Fort Caroline, and set up the city of St. Augustine to the south. During the 1570s, Spanish missionaries traveled northward up the Atlantic coast, establishing sites as far north as North Carolina and perhaps Virginia. Missionaries also moved into northern Mexico (Chihuahua).
1579	Sir Francis Drake circumnavigated the world, stopping along the California coast and claiming it for Great Britain.
1581	Francisco Sanchez Chamucado explored the Great Plains.
1585	The first British colony was established in North Carolina ("the lost colony").
1592	Juan de Fuca reached the coast of Washington State, establishing a Spanish claim to the Pacific Northwest.
1598	Don Juan de Onate, one of the wealthiest men in Mexico, led an expedition from Zacatecas into what is now New Mexico, following the Indian trail along the Rio Grande with 129 soldier-colonists and 10 Franciscans. Vincente de Zaldivar of the expedition spent 54 days hunting buffalo, for the first time using the old-world term "buffalo" to describe them. Zaldivar said that the Indians' tents made of buffalo hides were better than those of the Europeans.

COLONIAL COMPETITION

1607	The first permanent, successful English colony was established at Jamestown, Virginia.
1608	Samuel de Champlain established a French fur-trading post at Quebec, Canada.
1610	Santa Fe was founded by the Spanish, extending the Camino Real (royal road) north into Pueblo country. The Great Plains become a natural barrier, protecting Spanish territory from incursions by other European powers. Without a need for more interior territory, and with no promise of riches or commodities, Spanish administrators and explorers settled into a complacent lifestyle; little exploration was accomplished during the 17th century.
1659	Zuniga founded a mission at El Paso, Texas.
1673	French explorers Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet, with 7 men, reached the headwaters of the Mississippi River, and descended it to the mouth of the Arkansas River.
1675	Fernando del Bosque and Fr. Juan Larios set out from Monclova, Coahuila, crossed the Rio Grande and explored the area between Eagle Pass and Del Rio, Texas.
1680	The pueblo revolt forced all Spaniards out of New Mexico.
1682	Robert de la Salle sailed down the Mississippi River to its mouth, claiming the Mississippi Valley and "Louisiana" for France.
1684	La Salle established a short-lived French colony at Matagorda Bay on the Texas Gulf coast, called Fort St. Louis. Spain shifted its focus from New Mexico to eastern Texas as a result. Juan Dominguez de Mendoza led an expedition into west Texas from El Paso in search of the French colony. La Salle's people mutinied against him.
1685	Henri Tonti established Poste des Arkansas on the Mississippi River for France.
1686	Alonso de Leon, governor of Coahuila, led the first of five land expeditions north of the Rio Grande into east Texas, in search of La Salle's French colony. He found it in 1689; very few survivors were left, due to Indian attack and disease.
1687	Francisco Eusebio Kino, a Jesuit, arrived in northern Sonora, Mexico to begin his missionary work. He set up a chain of missions in southern Arizona, northern Mexico, and Baja California.
1690	The first Spanish missions in east Texas were founded.
1691	Domingo Teran de los Rios, the first governor of Texas, led an expedition to east Texas via the San Antonio valley. He noted the potential for a large, permanent settlement there. The Jesuits explored southern Arizona, and founded Tumacacori mission.
1692 - 1694	Don Diego de Vargas began the military reconquest of New Mexico following the Pueblo Revolt of 1680.
1699	A mission was founded by French priests at Cahokia, Illinois.
1706	A Spanish settlement was established at Albuquerque, New Mexico.
1714	St. Denis founded Natchitoches, Louisiana.
1718	A large Spanish expedition marched into Texas to set up missions. The French established New Orleans.
1719	The French attacked the Spanish in east Texas; in 1721, the Spanish drove the French out.
1738	Frenchman Verendryes reached the Mandan villages in what is today North Dakota.
1741	Vitus Bering, a Danish sailor exploring for the Russians, sighted the mainland of Alaska. The trapping of sea otter furs began in 1745. As they depleted the supply in an area, the Russians moved further to the east and south, down the Pacific Coast.
1748	The Ohio Company was founded by the English Americans for land speculation over the Appalachians.
1754	Ordered into the Ohio country to observe and prevent French construction of a fort there, George Washington caused an incident which touched off the French and Indian War. The French constructed Fort Duquesne on the site of modern-day Pittsburgh.
1762	As a result of the impending loss of the Seven Years War to Britain, France ceded the Louisiana Territory to Spain.
1763	A British treaty line forbade English settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains. The Treaty of Paris ended all French claims to land on the North American continent.

PROTECTING THE EMPIRES

1767	The Jesuits were expelled from Spanish Territory by King Carlos III. Missions were taken over by the Franciscans.
1769	Fr. Junipero Serra, a Franciscan, founded the mission San Diego de Alcala, the first of 21 missions built in a chain up the California coast. San Francisco Bay was rediscovered by the Spanish.
1770s	Explorers including Daniel Boone and Simon Kenton violated the British Fort Stanwix treaty line, moving into Kentucky and Tennessee and establishing illegal settlements.
1776	Capt. Juan Bautista de Anza led Spanish colonists from the Presidio of Tubac (Arizona) to San Francisco, California. Fray Francisco Antanasio Dominguez and Fr. Silvestre Velez de Escalante explored northern New Mexico, southern Colorado and southern Utah, in an unsuccessful attempt to reach California. They reached the Grand Canyon.
1778-79	George Rogers Clark's campaigns in the Mississippi Valley were supplied and assisted by Spanish authorities at St. Louis.
1779	Governor de Anza of New Mexico defeated the Comanches under Cuerno Verde in southwestern Colorado. In 1786, de Anza signed a peace treaty with the Comanches, and an alliance against the Apaches.
1781	The community of Nuestra Senora de la Reina de Los Angeles was founded, the beginning of modern Los Angeles, California.
1783	As part of the settlement of the Revolutionary War with England, the line of the Mississippi River became the border between the U.S. and Spain.
1786	Pedro Vial blazed a trail from San Antonio to Santa Fe.
1789	Englishman Alexander McKenzie traveled from Upper Canada to the arctic.
1792	Pedro Vial opened a route between Santa Fe and St. Louis. American sailor Robert Grey rediscovered the mouth of the Columbia River. British explorer George Vancouver sailed up the Columbia River, and sent a detachment into the interior as far as they could sail; they reached an area near today's Hat Rock and described the countryside, including Mount Hood, Mount Rainier and Mount St. Helens.
1793	British explorer Alexander McKenzie traveled across the Canadian Rockies to the Pacific Ocean.
1794	At the Nootka Convention, a weakened Spain acknowledged British claims in the Pacific Northwest.
1795	During the 1790s, Spanish authorities sent French and Scottish mercenaries up the Missouri River to make pacts for trade with the Arikara Indians. In 1795, James Mackay and his Welsh assistant, John Evans, reached the Omahas. Evans continued on to the Mandan country.
1800	Louisiana was ceded to France by Spain in the Treaty of San Ildefonso.
1803	The United States purchased Louisiana from France.

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Map used courtesy of the Library of Congress

JEFFERSONIAN EXPLORATION

1804-06	The Lewis and Clark expedition explored the route of the Missouri River and found (with the assistance of Indian tribal groups) a passage over the Rocky Mountains to the Columbia River Basin and the Pacific Ocean.
1804	Baptiste LaLande was sent by William Morrison from St. Louis to open trade with the Spanish in Santa Fe. LaLande found his way there, and liked it so much that he decided to stay. James Purcell and others followed the same pattern. An American trader at Natchtoches named Saunders started up the Red River to trade with the southern Pawnee villages; he made it 500 miles into Spanish territory before being captured and escorted back to the U.S. border by Spanish soldiers. Two Jefferson-sent expeditions to Santa Fe, Dunbar (1804) and Sparks (1806) were also turned back.
1805	Zebulon Pike was sent out to find the source of the Mississippi River by Gen. James Wilkinson.
1805	Antoine Larocque explored the valley of the Yellowstone and wintered with the Mandans. Simon Frazer traveled across the Canadian Rockies to the Pacific.
1806	Zebulon Pike was ordered to the Southwest, and later betrayed by Gen. James Wilkinson. Pike and his party followed the Arkansas River. They explored the Colorado Rockies, and when discovered by Spanish soldiers pretended to be lost. In March 1807 Pike and his men were marched to Santa Fe as the "guests" of Spain, then taken south to Chihuahua, Mexico. By the time Pike returned to the U.S. in July 1807, valuable military information was stored in his head. Pike referred to the great plains as "sandy deserts". When his book was published in 1810, it began the notion of the "Great American Desert." Pike pointed out the trade possibilities with Santa Fe. After the penetration of their territory by Pike and the threat of the Burr conspiracy, an "iron curtain" policy was maintained by the Spanish in the Southwest.

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