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The members of the Lewis
and Clark Expedition came from a variety of backgrounds. Many
were born in the original Thirteen States on the East Coast,
and then migrated to the interior states of Kentucky and Tennessee.
The life they knew on the East Coast and in the Ohio River Valley
was very different from what they would encounter while on the
expedition. Covered bridges like this one were common during
the era. The cover kept snow and ice off the bridge during the
winter months. |
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Building types known by
the explorers would have included stone warehouse buildings
like this one. |
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Cabins and homes made of
horizontal logs were common in the East and on the frontier
of Kentucky and Tennessee. Well to do people were able to add
frame portions to their houses as their prosperity increased. |
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For the most part, family
life centered around the kitchen of the home. Some houses were
so small that there were only one or two rooms, each used for
a variety of purposes. Nearly all houses had at least one wide
fireplace used for heating and cooking. Pots were hung on an
iron or wooden crane over the fire, while baking could be done
in a flat-bottomed, covered iron "Dutch oven" using coals from
the hearth. Big fires were rarely built; small fires and hot
coals were the secret to early American cooking. The smells
of the kitchen - burning wood, drying herbs and fruit, and the
aroma of cooking food like hominy, "hasty pudding," and sometimes
dried, salted or even fresh meat were memories taken by the
men of the expedition into the wilderness. |
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Most communities had a
thriving religious life in the early 1800s. It was a period
of religious revivalism, tent meetings and evangelical crusades.
Most Americans from the East Coast were members of a Protestant
Christian sect, although there were large numbers of Jews (particularly
in New York and Rhode Island) and Roman Catholics (particularly
in Maryland). Some villages had large churches made of framed
wood or stone like this one. Protestant church services typically
were all-day affairs, having morning and afternoon sessions
every Sunday. |
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Settlers in the frontier
areas of America like Kentucky and Tennessee built crude log
cabins to live in, like this one, with log outbuildings. Abraham
Lincoln was born in a log cabin in Kentucky in 1809, just three
years after the Lewis and Clark Expedition ended. Many of the
men of the expedition were poor, and knew what life was like
in log cabins like this. |
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With just 5.3 million people,
the United States was sparsely settled and very rural in 1803.
Pastoral scenes like this one were common. Many people never
traveled more than 25 miles from their homes from the time they
were born until they died. |
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Mills like this one performed
the tasks too heavy for men to carry out ably on their own.
These included grinding grain into flour and cutting lumber.
They were powered by water via a water wheel and a system of
gears. |
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Winters were often harsh,
much worse than 21st century people are used to. |
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The small log house, with
just one or two rooms and a loft, was the most common type of
home seen along the roadsides of Kentucky and Tennessee, as
well as other portions of the country. Large families were sometimes
raised in such small dwellings, which were gradually enlarged
as their owner's ranks increased. |
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Most bridges in the east
were simple affairs like this one. Many rivers and streams did
not have bridges and had to be forded by wading through them
or by walking on stepping stones. |
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Many houses of the "middling
sort," farmers who had property but were not among the nation's
rich, looked like this in the Northeast. |
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The houses of the wealthy
were larger, like the Deane House in Weathersfield, Connecticut,
shown here. Although proportionately few people in the United
States lived this well in 1804, these houses have survived in
greater numbers than the houses of the poor and middling sort.
The Deane House is one of several open for tours in Weathersfield.
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As a farm family became
more prosperous, they built nicer homes and used older dwellings
for livestock and storage. |
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Most water was obtained
from a well. Fresh water was an important aspect of choosing
the site for a farm. |
The
Lewis and Clark Timeline
