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Introduction
Essay on Earlier Explorations
Essay on American Indians
Essay on Preparing for the Journey
Essay on the Journey
Essay on Scientific Encounters
Essay on the Trail Today
List of Sites
Chronological List of Sites
Begin the Tour

Introduction

The National Park Service's National Register of Historic Places, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, and Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail, in conjunction with the National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers (NCSHPO), proudly invite you to discover the historic places of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. This expedition, which took place between 1804 and 1806, has been described as the greatest camping trip of all time, a voyage of high adventure, an exercise in manifest destiny which carried the American flag overland to the Pacific. It was all of this and more. This travel itinerary highlights 41 historic places listed in the National Register of Historic Places and associated with Lewis and Clark. Many of these places are also part of the National Park Service's Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail.

Lewis and Clark traveled more than 8,000 miles in less than two and one-half years, losing only one member of their party, at a total cost to the American taxpayer of $40,000. The significance of the Lewis and Clark Expedition was far reaching. It strengthened the United State's position in the struggle for control of North America, particularly in the Pacific Northwest. Lewis and Clark's trek also inspired explorers, trappers, traders, hunters, adventurers, prospectors, homesteaders, ranchers, soldiers, businessman and missionaries to move westward--spurring a century of rapid settlement which peopled the West with European-Americans and disrupted the cultures and lifestyles of countless American Indians. Lewis and Clark contributed to geographical knowledge by determining the true course of the Upper Missouri River and its major tributaries while William Clark produced maps of tremendous value to later explorers. They forever destroyed the dream of a Northwest Passage (a water route across the continent), but proved the success of overland travel to the Pacific. They made the first attempt at a systematic record of the meteorology of the West, and less successfully attempted to determine the latitude and longitude of significant geographical points. Through the Expedition's peaceful cooperation with the American Indian tribes they met, they compiled the first general survey of life and material culture of the tribes of the Missouri, Rocky Mountains and the Northwest coast. Lewis and Clark also made significant additions to the zoological and botanical knowledge of the continent, describing at least 120 mammals, birds, reptiles and fish, as well as almost 200 plant specimens. By any measure of scientific exploration, the Lewis and Clark Expedition was phenomenally successful in terms of accomplishing its stated goals, expanding human knowledge and spurring further curiosity and wonder about the vast American West.

The expedition began on May 21, 1804, when the Corps of Discovery departed from St. Charles, Missouri, an event now commemorated by the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial. The party crossed the Mississippi River, and headed up the Missouri. The Corps tried to maintain a pace of 14 to 20 miles a day, resting at places such as Fort Atkinson and Spirit Mound. They reached what is now North Dakota by October of 1804, and set up a winter camp, Fort Mandan, amidst the Knife River Indian Villages. It was here that a young Shoshone woman named Sacagawea, who proved to be an invaluable interpreter for the explorers, joined the Expedition with her husband and infant son. In the spring, the Corps of Discovery pushed westward through Montana country until they encountered the Great Falls of the Missouri, where they had to carry their boats over land for almost 20 miles. By mid-September, they were climbing the arduous Lolo Trail through the Bitterroot Mountains to Weippe Prairie, where they arrived exhausted, starving and much in need of the assistance offered by the friendly Nez Perce Indians. The Corps continued onward down the Clearwater, Snake and Columbia rivers and finally reached the Pacific Ocean in mid-November 1805. At the mouth of the Columbia, they built Fort Clatsop, and settled into winter quarters. They began the return trip March 23, 1806, and stayed again with the Nez Perce waiting for the winter snows to melt on the Lolo Trail. After stopping at Traveler's Rest, Lewis and Clark split the men into two groups in order to explore more of the territory. Lewis and three of the men headed north to explore the Marias River, during which the expedition suffered its only hostile encounter with American Indians at Two Medicine Fight Site. Clark's group generally retraced the outbound route to the Three Forks of the Missouri and then overland to the Yellowstone River, which they followed to its juncture with the Missouri River, where both groups reunited on August 12th. The explorers finally returned to St. Charles on September 23, 1806, and were greeted with much fanfare.

The Lewis and Clark Expedition offers several ways to discover the places that tell the story of the Corps of Discovery. Each highlighted site features a brief description of the place's historic significance, color photographs, and public accessibility information. At the bottom of each page the visitor will find a navigation bar containing links to six essays that explain more about Earlier Explorations, Preparing for the Journey, The Journey, American Indians, Scientific Encounters and The Trail Today. These essays provide historic background, or "contexts," for the places included in the itinerary. In the Learn More section, the itinerary links to regional and local web sites that provide visitors with information regarding special activities and cultural events taking place during the bicentennial celebration of the Expedition, as well as lodging and dining possibilities. The itinerary can be viewed online, or printed out if you plan to visit any of the places in this Lewis and Clark travel itinerary in person.

Created through a partnership between the National Park Service's National Register of Historic Places, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail and NCSHPO, the Lewis and Clark Expedition is the latest example of a new and exciting cooperative project. As part of the Department of the Interior's strategy to promote public awareness of history and encourage tourists to visit historic places throughout the nation, the National Register of Historic Places is cooperating with communities, regions, and Heritage Areas throughout the United States to create online travel itineraries. Using places nominated by State, Federal and Tribal Historic Preservation Offices and listed in the National Register of Historic Places, the itineraries help potential visitors plan their next trip by highlighting the amazing diversity of this country's historic places and supplying accessibility information for each featured site. The Lewis and Clark Expedition is the 26th National Register travel itinerary successfully created through such partnerships. Additional itineraries will debut online in the future. The National Register of Historic Places hopes you enjoy this virtual travel itinerary of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. If you have any comments or questions, please just click on the provided e-mail address, "comments or questions" located at the bottom of each page.

A Special Note about the Journal Citations:
Excerpts from the original journals of Lewis and Clark are included throughout the text of this itinerary. Sources for these journal excerpts are noted in parantheses directly after the citations. The full citation for these sources are found in the Bibliography on our Learn More page. Visitors may be interested in Historic Hotels of America, a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, located near the places featured in this itinerary.

Earlier Explorations

Lewis and Clark followed in the spirit, if not the footsteps, of earlier European explorers. The expeditions of Coronado, La Salle, Lewis and Clark, and John C. Frémont brought back invaluable knowledge of North America's geographic features, flora and fauna, and inhabitants--the American Indians who were the continent's first discoverers and explorers. The Coronado and De Soto expeditions of the Spanish and the French explorations under La Salle, as well as the voyages and expeditions of other European explorers across North America, set the precedent for Lewis and Clark.

First Discoverers: The American Indians were the first discoverers and explorers of the North American continent. Although the most recent evidence points to an American Indian presence more than 13,000 years ago, the date of their initial exploration of North America remains unknown. Crossing a land bridge, which linked Alaska to Siberia during the Ice Age, they spread out from northern Alaska, settled across the North American landmass, and eventually made their way to the furthermost tip of South America. The original inhabitants of North America were familiar with the great rivers and trade routes later used by the European colonists. Often acting as guides to the European explorers, the American Indians taught the newcomers how to cultivate native crops, find hunting grounds and water sources, and explore lands beyond the European colonial horizon. Spain, following Columbus's 1492 discoveries in the Caribbean, was the first European nation to establish permanent colonies in North America. The journeys of Juan Ponce de Leon, the first Spaniard to reach the shores of Florida in 1513 and again in 1521, and the disastrous 1528 Florida expedition of Pánfilo de Narváez, were important in expanding Spanish knowledge of the North American continent above Mexico. It was the discoveries of the Coronado and De Soto expeditions, however, which first mapped most of the present southwestern and southeastern United States.

The Coronado Expedition: Francisco Vásquez de Coronado (1510-1554) remains the most famous Spanish explorer of the American Southwest. Born in Salamanca, Spain, the second son of an aristocrat, Coronado arrived in Mexico in 1535 seeking his fortune. By 1538 he was appointed governor of the frontier province of Nuevo Galicia. On orders from the Spanish Viceroy in Mexico City, Coronado outfitted an elaborate expedition. Coronado's force consisted of 225 mounted cavaliers, 62 foot soldiers, 800 American Indian allies and 1,000 African and American Indian slaves. Their goal was to find the rumored riches of the "Seven Cities of Cíbola". Fray Marcos, a Spanish friar, had visited just south of the pueblo region in 1539 and declared that Cíbola was "a land rich in gold, silver and other wealth." On February 23, 1540, the Coronado party left Compostela in western Mexico and moved north, roughly following the Pacific Coast before exploring the modern day Mexican regions of Sinaloa and Sonora. Part of Coronado's expedition, under Hernando de Alarcón, ascended the Gulf of California in three ships and explored the regions of the lower Colorado River, reaching the modern-day border of southern California and Arizona.

Twenty-one miles south of Sierra Vista, in the San Pedro Valley, historians believe Coronado entered the present United States, where the Coronado National Memorial, administered by the National Park Service, stands today. Entering the Zuni territory of western Arizona and eastern New Mexico, Coronado's party entered the fabled country of Cíbola on July 7, 1540. The pueblos, while impressive, were not the golden cities of Friar Marcos's account.

Coronado occupied the pueblo of Háwiku, making it his headquarters until November 1540, from which he sent out smaller exploring parties. He sent Don Pedro de Tovar to northeastern Arizona, to explore the Hopi villages. In August 1540, García López de Cárdenes, Coronado's right hand man, was sent to investigate reports of a river in the West. Cárdenes and 25 Spanish horsemen arrived after 80 days at the Grand Canyon in northern Arizona, becoming the first Europeans to view one of the most spectacular scenes of natural beauty in the American West. Cárdenes and his company were also the first Europeans to attempt to descend the Grand Canyon to the Colorado River, but they were unsuccessful.

American Indian visitors from the pueblo of Cicuye (Pecos Pueblo in Eastern New Mexico) presented Coronado with hides of a strange "humpbacked cow," which were buffalo hides from the plains. Coronado in turn sent Hernando de Alvarado with 20 men to explore the new region about Cicuye and the upper Río Grande. Near the modern town of Pecos, Texas, at the American Indian settlement of Cicúique, Alvarado's party was presented with two captive American Indians. One, whom the Spanish named "the Turk," convinced the explorers to turn northeast towards a region named Quivira, which he claimed was rich in gold and silver. On April 23, 1541, Coronado left Tiguex on the Río Grande with a force totaling 1,500, including Indian allies and servants. Reaching the plains, they encountered great herds of buffalo and made peaceful contact with the Apache nation. Crossing the Canadian River west of the modern New Mexico-Texas line, the party traversed the Texas Panhandle.

On June 29, 1541, they found the Quivira country, occupied by a native people--probably Wichita Indians. The Quivira villages were composed of scattered round grass lodges, and were not the golden cities the Spanish came searching for. The explorers became exasperated, and in a Quivira village in the vicinity of modern day Lyons, Kansas, the Turk was ordered hung. Although Kansas, abundant in wildlife, reminded the men of Spain, the disappointed Spanish turned back, returning by a new route through the Oklahoma and Texas Panhandles.

The majority of his men desired to return to Mexico and in 1542 the Coronado expedition headed home. Coronado returned to Mexico City with about a hundred men of his mostly disbanded expedition. Coronado and his party were the first Europeans and Africans to observe the Zuni and Hopi pueblos, Colorado River, Grand Canyon, and the Gila River. This expedition was also the first to establish a winter camp on the banks of the Río Grande, hunt buffalo on the plains, and explore the North American interior as far as modern day Kansas.

The De Soto Expedition: Hernando De Soto (1500-1542) was a captain under Francisco Pizarro, and made a fortune during the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire. De Soto's expedition into the Southeastern United States began from Cuba. The site of De Soto's landing in Florida in May 1539 is disputed between Tampa Bay, Charlotte Harbor and San Carlos Bay. De Soto, leading 600 men, marched north up the Florida peninsula, finding winter quarters at the American Indian town of Apalache, near the modern city of Tallahassee, Florida. In March 1540 De Soto headed north across Georgia, before going up the Savannah River. Here De Soto encountered the Cherokees, visiting their town Xualla in the region of the North Carolina-South Carolina border before crossing the mountains into eastern Tennessee. Turning south into Alabama, by October 1540, De Soto reached Mavila (today Mobile, Alabama), where the ancestors of the Creek Nation resisted the Spanish. In the encounter De Soto's force took the town of Mavila, but the Spanish lost 18 men and 12 horses, while 150 of the Spanish force received wounds, among them De Soto himself. Hearing of riches, on November 17 he turned north, and set up winter quarters at a Chickasaw settlement in northern Mississippi. By March, the Chickasaw were at war with De Soto's party, and destroyed most of the expedition's supplies.

In April 1541, on the move again, De Soto and his company stood on the east bank of the Mississippi, becoming the first Europeans to encounter the great river. It was in June when he and his men crossed the Mississippi and passed through central and south Arkansas, searching for gold. They reached as far north as the village of Coluca, in northeastern Arkansas, before traveling to the mouth of the Arkansas River. From there, the Spanish followed the Arkansas River upstream until they reached near modern-day Little Rock. De Soto and his party next journeyed west to Tula, near Caddo Gap, before finding winter quarters on the Ouachita River in southern Arkansas. The next spring, resolving to go to the Gulf of Mexico and send for reinforcements, De Soto's party headed south, now with about 300 efficient fighting men. Near the mouth of the Red River in Louisiana, on May 21, 1542, De Soto died from a fever and was buried in the Mississippi River. The remainder of the expedition returned to Mexico.

Today the National Park Service maintains the De Soto National Memorial in Bradenton, Florida, which commemorates the 1539 De Soto expedition. The legacy of the Coronado and De Soto expeditions, according to the historian Herbert Bolton in Coronado, Knight of Pueblos and Plain, "made known to the world in broad outline nearly a third of the area now contained in the United States, and in several important respects had changed current ideas regarding the entire land mass of North America and its geographical relation to the rest of the globe."

French Explorations: The French entered the race for the Americas in 1534 when King Francis I sent Jacques Cartier on a voyage of discovery across the Atlantic Ocean. Cartier first explored Newfoundland before sailing up the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The following year he continued exploring the St. Lawrence as far as present-day Montreal. For the next half-century French fishermen arrived in such numbers around the waters of Newfoundland that they secured French claims to modern-day eastern Canada. It was the fur trade and the wealth it generated that caused King Henry IV, who reigned from 1589 to 1610, to secure the area for France. Samuel de Champlain traversed much of the new territory, establishing Quebec in 1608 and exploring the waterways and paths around Lake Champlain, Lake Huron and the eastern end of Lake Ontario from 1609-15. In 1663 The French King Louis XIV created a royal province out of New France and sent as its administrator Jean Talon, a man of great ability. Talon sent Father Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet (1645-1700), a native-born Canadian fur trader, to explore the Mississippi River, which they entered on June 17, 1673. Marquette and Jolliet reached as far as the mouth of the Arkansas River before turning back.

When they returned to Quebec in 1674 René Robert Cavelier, also known as Sieur de La Salle, listened to the tales of their adventures with great attention. La Salle envisioned creating a series of trading forts down the Mississippi that would prevent the Atlantic English colonies from expanding westward. In February 1682, La Salle and his party entered the Mississippi from the Illinois River, and by April they entered the Gulf of Mexico, having successfully navigated the great river. Returning to France, he received permission to establish a colony at the mouth of the Mississippi, and with four ships he embarked across the Atlantic, but landed instead at Matagorda Bay, in Texas. It was in eastern Texas where mutinous followers murdered him in 1687. La Salle's vision became a reality when New Orleans was established in 1718, and the French forts along the Mississippi River basin were created to secure the alliances of the local inhabitants.

Other Explorations: Vitus Bering, a Danish navigator sailing in the service of Russia, set out on a great expedition in 1741, and with Aleksei Chirikov, successfully mapped the western coast of Alaska, claiming the land for the Czars. Later the Russians would reach as far as northern California, when, in 1812, Russian fur traders established Fort Ross on Bodega Bay, to the north of San Francisco. England's exploration of North America began when Genovese navigator John Cabot explored the seas around Newfoundland in 1497. The successful English colonization of North America started with the founding of Jamestown in 1607. The Dutch and the Swedes competed with England for control of the Hudson and Delaware River valleys, with the Dutch exploring much of modern New York State from the 1620s until the English conquered their North American holdings in 1664. The Dutch had earlier seized the Swedish possessions.

The English exploration of the North American interior was slow and cautious. Captain Abraham Wood, in 1650, explored the forks of the Roanoke River in Virginia. James Neeham and Gabriel Arthur reached the Yadkin River and found a pass through the Carolina Blue Ridge in 1673. It was the English fur traders who pushed west into the Shenandoah Valley in the 1680s. By the following decade they were on the banks of the Ohio River, in disputed territory claimed by France. After the American Revolution, British and British Canadian explorers continued to map the North American continent. Captain George Vancouver was an English explorer whose ships reached the Strait of Juan de Fuca in May 1792. He explored the region about modern-day Seattle, naming Puget Sound, Mt. Rainier, Whidbey Island, and the Hood Canal. David Thompson explored western North America from 1797 to 1812, including much of the western United States (including the Columbia River) and Canada, and mapped the region.

Bibliography

Ambrose, Stephen E. Undaunted Courage Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West. New York: Simon & Shuster, 1996.

Billington, Ray Allen, with James Blaine Hedges. Westward Expansion: A History of the American Frontier. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1949.

Lamar, Howard R. (editor). The New Encyclopedia of the American West. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998. (Especially helpful were the articles by Richard A. Bartlett on Coronado and De Soto, Homer E. Socolofsky's article on Colonial Wars, Odie B. Faulk's article on Texas, John L. Loos' article on the Lewis and Clark Expedition).

Milner II, Clyde A., Carol A. O'Connor, Martha A. Sandweiss (editors). The Oxford History of the American West. New York: Oxford University Press. 1994.

National Park Service. Coronado National Memorial Arizona. (pamphlet) Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1974.

Seibert, Erika K. Martin (compiler and editor). The Earliest Americans Theme Study for the Eastern United States (draft). Washington, D.C.: National Historic Landmarks Survey, NRHE, National Park Service, 2002.

Slaughter, Thomas P. Exploring Lewis and Clark: Reflections on Men and Wilderness. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003.

Preparing for the Journey

Before his inauguration on March 4, 1801, President Thomas Jefferson asked Meriwether Lewis, a 29-year-old career officer in the U.S. Army, to join him in the White House as his personal secretary. Jefferson knew Lewis and Lewis's family, as they were neighbors of his Monticello, Virginia, estate. Lewis, a staunch Jeffersonian Democrat, tested the loyalty of top Army officers to the President and reported back to Jefferson. Lewis was sent with sensitive messages to the ministers of foreign powers, and generally assisted the President. But most of all Lewis listened. Lewis absorbed Jefferson's ideas on geography, science, politics, American Indians, and diplomacy. It seems that Lewis was being groomed to lead Jefferson's expedition into the West.

On January 18, 1803, President Jefferson sent a special message to Congress about the proposed expedition. He noted with concern the fact that the British were carrying on a lucrative fur trade with American Indians along the northern border of the United States and into the West. He approached Congress with the idea that "an intelligent officer with 10 or 12 chosen men, fit for the enterprise and willing to undertake it, taken from our posts, where they may be spared without inconvenience, might explore the whole line, even to the Western ocean ..." (Jackson 10-13). In this message, Jefferson portrayed the major goal of the projected expedition as a diplomatic one, in which the explorers "could have conferences with the natives" about commerce, and gain admission for American traders among the various Indian tribes. The other major goal of the expedition, barely stated by Jefferson on January 18, was a scientific one--to not only explore but map and chronicle everything of interest, as he put it, along "the only line of easy communication across the continent." Jefferson took great care to describe the project as a cheap one which would not cost the taxpayers much money. "Their arms & accouterments, some instruments of observation, & light & cheap presents for the Indians would be all the apparatus they could carry, and with an expectation of a soldier's portion of land on their return would constitute the whole expense." Jefferson knew that diplomacy, especially with the goal of increased commerce, could be sold to Congress; scientific discovery and description could not. One seemed practical, the other less so. Thus Jefferson asked for $2,500 to fund the expedition (based on Lewis's initial estimates). (Jackson 8-9 and 13)

On about March 15, 1803, Lewis arrived in Harpers Ferry, Virginia (today's West Virginia), to obtain rifles and other equipment for the expedition, including an iron boat frame. The construction of the boat detained him longer than he had expected, and he stayed in Harpers Ferry for about a month. The boat was made in two sections, each weighing 22 pounds, which could be fitted together to form the skeleton of a boat of 40 feet in length, and would be covered with animal hides and sealed together with pitch. This special boat could be used high in the mountains if they were unable to make dugout canoes.

Besides procuring equipment, Lewis was also expected to take crash courses in several disciplines to round out his training as leader of the expedition. With only the precedent of the voyages of James Cook, Lewis was instructed to compile scientific data on every aspect of the terrain through which he would pass. He was prepared for this by Jefferson during the period he served as the President's personal secretary, and during the Spring of 1803 by astronomer Andrew Ellicott, botanist Dr. Benjamin Smith Barton, surveyor and mathematician Robert Patterson, physician Dr. Benjamin Rush, and anatomist Dr. Caspar Wistar (Rush and Wistar were both members of the American Philosophical Society). Lewis also spent his time in Philadelphia procuring supplies, such items as "portable soup," medicine, special uniforms made of drab cloth, tents, tools, kettles, tobacco, corn mills, wine, gunpowder in lead canisters, medical and surgical supplies, and presents. In addition to all of these activities, Lewis most certainly visited the famous museum of Charles Willson Peale, then located on the second floor of Independence Hall.

Lewis left Philadelphia on June 1 and traveled to Washington, D.C. to meet with President Jefferson and make final arrangements for his journey to the Pacific. These included writing a long letter on June 19 to an old friend, William Clark, asking him to be a co-leader of the expedition and to recruit men in his area. Lewis told Clark the real destination of their mission (the Pacific Coast), but told him to use a cover story that the mission was to go up the Mississippi River to its source for his recruitment. Lewis also hinted at secret news just received by President Jefferson: the French had offered the entire territory of Louisiana to the United States for $15 million. On July 3, 1803, official news arrived in the nation's capital--Robert Livingston and James Monroe had purchased the Louisiana Territory from Napoleon's France.

Lewis left Washington on July 5 for Harpers Ferry, where he picked up the more than 3,500 pounds of supplies and equipment he had amassed to take overland to the Pittsburgh area. The Harpers Ferry-made items probably included 15 rifles, 24 pipe tomahawks, 36 tomahawks for American Indian presents, 24 large knives, 15 powder horns and pouches, 15 pairs of bullet molds, 15 wipers or gun worms, 15 ball screws, 15 gun slings, extra parts of locks and tools for replacing arms, 40 fish giggs such as the Indians use with a single barb point, 1 small grindstone and the collapsible iron frame for a canoe. Lewis left Harpers Ferry for the West on July 8. He hired a man named William Linnard with a Conestoga Wagon to haul the supplies to Pittsburgh. The items were so heavy that Linnard had to obtain another wagon. At Elizabeth, Pennsylvania (south of Pittsburgh on the Monongehela River), Lewis was held up for more than a month waiting for his 55-foot keelboat to be built. During this time, Lewis received word from William Clark that he would join the expedition.

On August 31, the keelboat was completed and Lewis began his journey down the Ohio. It is believed that Lewis also purchased what later became known as the "Red Pirogue" at this time, a single-masted boat rowed with seven oars. Lewis investigated ancient Indian mounds on his way down the river at what is now Creek Mounds State Historic Site near Kent, West Virginia. The next day Lewis first mentioned his Newfoundland dog, Seaman, in the journals. The water in the Ohio was low, causing long portages at various points. Lewis reached Cincinnati, Ohio, on September 28, 1803, where he talked with Dr. William Goforth, a local physician who was excavating the fossil remains of a mastodon at the Big Bone Lick in Kentucky. Lewis traveled to Big Bone Lick himself by October 4, and sent a box of specimens back to President Jefferson, along with an extremely detailed letter describing the finds of Goforth--the lengthiest surviving letter written by Lewis.

On October 14, the keelboat arrived at Clarksville, Indiana, where Lewis finally joined William Clark, his slave York, and the "young men from Kentucky" including Joseph and Reubin Field, recruited by Clark on August 1, and Charles Floyd and George Gibson. John Colter officially enlisted on October 15, George Shannon and John Shields on the 19th, Nathaniel Hale Pryor and William Bratton on the 20th. These so-called "nine young men from Kentucky" formed the backbone of the expedition's crew. Whatever inexperience they may have suffered from in October 1803 was rectified quickly at Camp Wood and along the trail in 1804-06. We don't know if these men met Lewis's initial criteria, but they certainly grew into the role as time went on, and hindsight shows that Clark could not have chosen better.

The expedition got under way once more on October 27, moving down the Ohio to Fort Massac, Illinois, by November 11. Today a replica of the American fort as it looked when Lewis and Clark visited in 1803 stands on the site. Lewis hired interpreter George Drouillard and gained volunteers from the U.S. military at Fort Massac: John Newman and Joseph Whitehouse of Daniel Bissell's 1st Infantry Regiment. These were the first active-duty military personnel added to the Corps of Discovery. The most important addition at Massac was Drouillard, or "Drewyer" as his name is most often spelled in the journals. Born north of present-day Detroit, Michigan, Drouillard was half French and half Shawnee Indian. Drouillard possessed skils that members of the expedition lacked to this point--he was a real frontiersman in the mold of Daniel Boone or Simon Kenton, by far the best hunter and woodsman of the entire expedition.

On November 13 the Corps left Fort Massac, arriving in the vicinity of modern Cairo, Illinois, on the 14th. Here Lewis and Clark worked jointly on their first scientific research and description; to study the geography at the junction of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers. On November 16, they began the diplomatic phase of their journey when they visited the Wilson City area of Mississippi County, Missouri, and met with Delaware and Shawnee Indian chiefs. They ended their surveys at Cairo on November 19, and proceeded up the Mississippi River, now working against the current.

Lewis and Clark stopped to describe and climb Tower Rock on November 25, and arrived at Fort Kaskaskia, Illinois, on the 29th. In 1803, Kaskaskia was the U.S. Army post furthest north and furthest west. Kaskaskia was a town of 467 people when Lewis and Clark visited in 1803. Six soldiers enlisted at Kaskaskia from Russell Bissell's Company, 1st U.S. Infantry Regiment: Sgt. John Ordway and privates Peter M. Weiser, Richard Windsor, Patrick Gass, John Boley, and John Collins. In addition, John Dame, John Robertson, Ebeneezer Tuttle, Issac White, and Alexander Hamilton Willard of Capt. Amos Stoddard's company, U.S. Corps of Artillery, also enlisted for the journey. This was a very important crop of men who added immeasurably to the success of the expedition. Francois Labiche, another half-Indian half-Frenchman, enlisted with the expedition on November 30. Another boat, the "White Pirogue," may have been acquired at Kaskaskia. Clark and the men of the Corps departed Kaskaskia on December 3, and camped just below Ste. Genevieve. Lewis remained at Kaskaskia, probably meeting with locals and taking care of the military and paperwork sides of the expedition. On December 4, Clark and the men moved further up the river, passing Ste. Genevieve on the left side, a very prosperous town of about 1,000 residents--equal in size to St. Louis in 1803. Clark and the men next viewed the remains of Fort De Chartres, abandoned for over 30 years, on the right side. On December 6, Lewis left Kaskaskia and traveled to Cahokia along the Illinois roads. Both Lewis and Clark arrived in Cahokia on December 7.

For more information please see Preparing for Trip West, from which this is excerpted, on the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial's Lewis and Clark Journey of Discovery website. See also Donald Jackson, Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, with Related Documents, 1783-1854. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1962.

The Journey

In December 1803, William Clark established "Camp River Dubois" on the Wood River at the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, north of St. Louis, Missouri, and across the river in Illinois. While at the camp it was Clark's responsibility to train the many different men who had volunteered to go to the Pacific on the expedition and turn them into an efficient team. By and large, most of the members of the Corps of Discovery were strangers to one another. The youngest man, George Shannon, was 17 years old, the oldest, John Shields, was 35. The average age of all the men was 27. Clark had the men build a fort and cabins out of logs. He drilled the men, teaching them how to march in formation, use their weapons as a team and shoot effectively at targets. Most of all, he tried to get the men to respect military authority and learn how to follow orders. When they would later face danger on the frontier, there would be no time for the men to question the officers.

During the winter, Meriwether Lewis spent a lot of time in the little town of St. Louis. Lewis had to gather more supplies and equipment for his journey, because there were so many volunteers that there were over twice as many men set to go on the expedition as he had originally planned for! Lewis also talked with fur traders who had been up the Missouri River, and obtained maps made by earlier explorers. On March 9, 1804, Meriwether Lewis attended a special ceremony in St. Louis, during which the Upper Louisiana Territory was transferred to the United States. Two months later, on May 14, the expedition was ready to begin. William Clark and the Corps of Discovery left Camp River Dubois, and were joined by Meriwether Lewis in St. Charles, Missouri, a week later. The party numbered more than 45, mostly young, unmarried soldiers. The civilians who made the journey were primarily the guides and interpreters. Among the more well-known were Sacagawea, her husband Toussaint Charbonneau, their newborn son Jean Baptiste Charbonneau ("Little Pompey"), William Clark's black slave York, and an interpreter named George Drouillard (pronounced Drewyer). An additional group of men, engagés (hired boatmen), would travel only to the Mandan country for the first winter, and these included six soldiers and several French boatmen.

Travel up the Missouri River in 1804 was difficult and exhausting due to heat, injuries and insects as well as the troublesome river itself, with its strong current and many snags. The expedition used Lewis's 55-foot long keelboat and two smaller boats called pirogues to carry their supplies and equipment. The boats used sails to move along, but in going upriver against a strong current, oars and long poles were used to push the boats. Sometimes the boats had to be pulled upriver with ropes by men walking along the shoreline. They averaged 10-15 miles per day.

Although there were some initial disciplinary problems, the men began to work together as a team, and to like one another. One man they especially liked was Charles Floyd, one of the three sergeants. Suddenly, on August 20, 1804, Sgt. Floyd got sick and died. It is believed that he died of a burst appendix. Floyd was laid to rest on top of a large hill by the river, in modern-day Sioux City, Iowa, where today there is a large monument to mark the spot. Sgt. Floyd was the only person to die on the two and one-half year journey, even though great danger lay ahead.

By October the Corps of Discovery reached the villages of the Mandan Indian tribe, where they built Fort Mandan (near present-day Stanton, North Dakota), and spent the winter of 1804-1805. The Mandan people lived in earth lodges along the Missouri River. Their neighbors the Hidatsa lived along the Knife River close by. The villages of the Mandan and Hidatsa people were the center of a huge trade network in the West. Lewis and Clark were not the first European-Americans to visit this part of the country. During the winter Lewis and Clark recruited a Frenchman who had lived with the Hidatsa (sometimes referred to as the Minnetari) Indians for many years. His name was Toussaint Charbonneau, and the captains wanted him to act as an interpreter. They got a real bargain, because along with Charbonneau would come his 16-year-old Shoshone Indian wife, Sacagawea, and her newborn baby boy. Sacagawea had been captured by a raiding party of Hidatsa warriors five years earlier, and was taken from her homeland in the Rocky Mountains to the Knife River village where she met her husband. Lewis and Clark knew that they would probably meet Sacagawea's people in the Rocky Mountains, and that they might have to ask for horses if they could not find a nearby stream which led down to the Columbia River. So Sacagawea would be invaluable because she could speak to her people directly for the explorers.

On April 7, 1805, Lewis and Clark sent the keelboat back to St. Louis with an extensive collection of zoological, botanical, and ethnological specimens as well as letters, reports, dispatches, and maps. Members of the expedition who had caused problems were sent back as well. As the keelboat headed south, the expedition, now numbering 33, resumed their journey westward in the two pirogues and six dugout canoes. The Corps of Discovery now traveled into regions which had been explored and seen only by American Indians.

The men pulled and sailed their boats up the Missouri River through what is now Montana. By early June they reached a place where two rivers met. Lewis and Clark knew they needed to find the correct fork of the river. If they didn't, they might not get to the Pacific Ocean in time for the winter. The only clue they had was that the Indians had told them that the Missouri had a huge waterfall on it. They led small groups of soldiers up each river, Lewis going up the right fork and Clark up the left, both looking for the waterfall. When they returned, both Lewis and Clark had decided that the left fork was the right river, even though neither party saw a waterfall. Although the rest of the party disagreed, they followed the two captains up the left fork, calling it the Missouri and naming the right fork the Marias River after a cousin of Meriwether Lewis.

Sacagawea fell very sick, and the expedition moved slowly against the strong current of the river. Lewis became impatient, and led a small party of men overland to see if he could find the waterfall--otherwise, they would have to turn back and follow the other fork of the river. On June 13, he spotted a mist rising above the hills in front of him. After a few minutes of walking, Lewis looked down into a deep ravine, and saw a beautiful, huge waterfall. He knew they were on the right river. Lewis scouted ahead and found that there was not just one waterfall but five, and that they stretched for many miles along the river--an area now known as Great Falls. The canoes could not be paddled upstream against such a current. They would have to be portaged (taken out of the water and carried) around these waterfalls. Sacagawea was well again after drinking water from a mineral spring. The pirogues were left behind by this point, so Lewis tried to put his special collapsible, iron-framed boat from Harpers Ferry together. He was very disappointed when the boat did not work, but Clark was ready to help by having two more dugout canoes made.

They set out westward once more, paddling upstream. Soon they entered the Rocky Mountains and saw incredibly beautiful scenery with tall evergreen trees. By August 17 they reached the Three Forks of the Missouri, which marked the navigable limits of that river. At this spot the Missouri was fed by three rivers, which they named the Jefferson, Gallatin, and Madison after government officials in Washington. They turned up the river named for President Jefferson and finally reached its headwaters, where the once mighty Missouri could be easily straddled by a man. Now that they had reached the crest of the Rocky Mountains, it was hoped that the headwaters of the Columbia would be nearby, and that the men could float and paddle their way downstream to the Pacific Ocean. However, they found nothing but more mountains stretching off as far as they could see. Lewis knew then, as he crossed the Continental Divide through Lemhi Pass, that there was no easy water route to the West Coast.

This mountainous area was the homeland of Sacagawea's people, the Shoshone. Lewis, who needed horses to get his expedition over the mountains, was finally able to contact the elusive Shoshone, who had never seen a white man before. When Sacagawea came along the trail with her baby son on her back, she suddenly recognized the chief of the Shoshone, the man for whom she was supposed to interpret--and he was her brother! Although she got to see old friends and her family, Sacagawea did not decide to stay with the Shoshone. She continued with Lewis and Clark, her husband and baby, as the captains looked westward and hoped to find a way to the Pacific Ocean before the harsh winter weather set in.

The explorers traveled overland on horseback, north to Lolo Pass, where they crossed the Bitterroot Range on the Lolo Trail; this was the most difficult part of the journey. The men almost starved on the trail, and were lucky to stumble into the camps of the Nez Perce Indians. They treated the explorers with kindness, feeding and helping them, pointing the way to the Pacific. Lewis and Clark left their horses for safekeeping with the honest Nez Perce, and finished making dugout canoes. They floated down the Clearwater, Snake, and Columbia rivers, portaging dangerous waterfalls and trading with friendly Indians along the way. They reached the Pacific Ocean by mid-November 1805. They had fulfilled the goals set for them by President Jefferson. Now they had to make it through another winter and return with their information.

Once in sight of the ocean, the expedition was lashed by harsh winds and cold rain as they huddled together on the north side of the Columbia River. It was decided to stay on the south side of the river, inland where the winds and rain would be less harsh and there would be more elk to hunt for food and clothing. In December the explorers built Fort Clatsop (near present-day Astoria, Oregon), and settled in for the winter. Lewis and Clark accomplished considerable scientific work, and gathered and recorded information regarding the country and its inhabitants. The men spent most of the winter making clothing and moccasins out of elk hides, and trying to hunt for food in an area which seemed to have very little game. No contact was made with any trading ships, and Lewis and Clark knew that all the men would have to return to the United States by an overland route.

On March 23, 1806, the return trip began. After a tough journey up the Columbia River against strong currents and many waterfalls, the party retrieved their horses from their friends the Nez Perce, and waited in the Indian villages for the deep mountain snows to melt. It wasn't until June that they could get over the mountains and back to the Missouri River basin. After crossing the Bitterroots, Lewis and Clark decided to split their party at Lolo Pass in order to add to the knowledge they could gather. They wanted to be certain that there was not an easier way to cross the continent to the Pacific, and that they had not missed an important potential route or pass. Confident of their survival, Lewis went north along the Missouri River while Clark went south along the Yellowstone River. They planned to rendezvous where the Yellowstone and Missouri rivers come together in western North Dakota. Clark took the larger group with him, including Sacagawea, her husband and son, and York. Lewis took along the best hunters and outdoorsmen, including George Drouillard and the Field brothers.

While on the Marias River in Montana, Lewis's small group had a fight with a party of Blackfeet Indians, and was forced to kill two of them who tried to steal their guns and horses at a place now know as Two Medicine Fight Site. This was the only violent incident of the entire journey. While out hunting one day, Lewis was accidentally shot by Cruzatte, a nearsighted member of his own crew. The painful wound in Lewis's backside kept him from being able to sit down or continue his journal writing. Soon after this near-disaster, the Corps of Discovery was reunited in North Dakota. They returned to the Mandan villages where they left Charbonneau, Sacagawea and the baby behind. Clark promised to take care of the baby, who he nicknamed "Pomp." Three years later, Charbonneau and Sacagawea brought Pomp down to St. Louis, where William Clark saw to his schooling.

The Lewis and Clark Expedition returned to St. Louis on September 23, 1806. When people in the settled portions of the United States heard that Lewis and Clark had returned from the West, they could barely believe it. Most people had given them up for dead. If wild animals, hunger, harsh weather or Indians hadn't killed them, perhaps they had gotten lost, they thought. Of course, none of those things happened. Lewis, Clark and nearly all their men returned to St. Louis as heroes. The Corps of Discovery disbanded in St. Louis and their detailed descriptions of the journey, maps and the numerous specimens they had collected were sent to Philadelphia to be housed in part at the American Philosophical Society and later at the Academy of Natural Sciences.

Lewis and Clark made their way east, pausing for three weeks at Locust Grove, home of Clark's sister, and finally arriving in Washington, D.C., where they told President Jefferson in person about the wonders they had seen in the West. Both Lewis and Clark were rewarded for their success. Clark was appointed Indian agent at St. Louis after his marriage in 1808. Five years later, he became Governor of the Missouri Territory. In 1822, President Monroe appointed him Superintendent of Indian Affairs to establish and secure treaties with the western tribes. He died in St. Louis in 1838 and is buried at Bellefontaine Cemetery. Lewis was appointed to the governorship of the Louisiana Territory, a challenging position in which he struggled to appease many divided factions. Lewis failed at many aspects of the governorship, however, most notably in the public perception of how he spent official government funds. Lewis was traveling to Washington, D.C., in 1809 to explain his actions and clear his name, when he died of two gunshot wounds, one to his head, the other to his heart on October 11th. Most historians believe that Lewis committed suicide due to depression and problems in his life and career, while a popular belief continues that he was murdered, perhaps by representatives of his political enemies. The explorer was buried not far from where he died, and today a memorial along the Natchez Trace Parkway pays tribute to the man who led the Voyage of Discovery to the Pacific Ocean.

For more information please see The Journey and Others Who Made the Journey from which this is excerpted, on the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial's Lewis and Clark Journey of Discovery website.

Scientific Encounters

It has been described as "the greatest camping trip of all time," a voyage of high adventure, an exercise in manifest destiny which carried the American flag overland to the Pacific. The Lewis and Clark Expedition was all of this and more. Between 1804 and 1806, Lewis and Clark made the first systematic reports, based on scientific measurement and observations, of the Missouri River--not only its course, but its flora and fauna, depth and current, tributaries and inhabitants. They continued onward to document their observations in the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Northwest. Lewis and Clark described for science at least 120 mammals, birds, reptiles and fish, as well as at least 182 plant species. They made the first attempt at a systematic record of the meteorology of the West, and less successfully attempted to determine the latitude and longitude of significant geographical points. These facts set them apart from other contemporary expeditions, most notably those of Zebulon Pike, which made no new scientific discoveries.

As the expedition began to move up the Missouri River, Lewis focused on the details--the animals, the type of rocks, the trees and grasses--along the route. How fast was the current? How high the cliffs? Was that bird or plant different from one known in the East? Lewis went on to describe some of the animals, including the eastern wood rat--the first animal new to science encountered on the voyage--in what is today Osage County, Missouri. The explorers encountered fierce grizzly bears which attacked them. The bears were so tough that even several rifle shots wouldn't kill them. The grizzly bears were truly the kings of the western plains. Lewis and Clark were fascinated with the little prairie dogs that built huge underground villages. They saw so many buffalo that at one point they recorded that they had to "club them out of the way." Other new species that the Corps of Discovery encountered included pronghorn antelopes, bighorn sheep, black tailed deer (or mule deer), mountain beaver, white weasel, mountain goat, coyote and various species of rabbit, squirel, fox and wolf. In addition to their descriptions, Lewis and Clark sent back a large number of zoological specimens, including a few live ones, as well as skins, bones, skeletons, teeth, talons and horns. Among the five live animals Lewis sent Jefferson in 1805 was a "barking squirrel," or black-tailed prairie dog, which lived out the rest of its life at the White House.

The geographical findings were in themselves of outstanding significance. Lewis and Clark determined the true course of the Upper Missouri and its major tributaries. They discovered that a long, instead of short, portage separated it from the Columbia River, which proved to be a majestic stream rivaling the Missouri itself rather than a short coastal river. Neither the Missouri nor the Columbia was found to be navigable to its source, as many had believed. The explorers also learned that, instead of a narrow and easily traversed mountain range, two broad north-south systems, the Rockies and the Cascades, represented major barriers. Passing for the most part through country that no European-Americans had seen, the two captains dotted their map with names of streams and natural features.

Clark made his scientific mark primarily in the field of cartography, for which his training consisted mainly of some experience in practical surveying and a limited amount of Army mapping. Yet his relatively crude maps, prepared under field conditions, enriched geographical knowledge and stimulated cartographical advances. Of particular importance were the three progressively improved maps Clark drew between 1804 and 1810 of the Western United States and lower Canada. These were mainly based on the observations of the two captians, data provided by the Indians, earlier maps of the West, and the journals of preceding explorers. According to historical cartographer Carl I. Wheat, the last of the three (c.1809) was of "towering signficance" and was "one of the most influential ever drawn" of the United States.

Lewis and Clark also made significant additions to the botanical knowledge of the continent. Jefferson believed that the voyages of discovery would add to the world's supply of food crops and plants beneficial to human kind. Lewis and Clark were directed to pay special attention to "the soil & face of the country, it's growth & vegetable productions, especially those not of the U.S." Lewis and Clark collected hundreds of plant specimens and recorded information on their habitats, growth, and uses by American Indians. Lewis showed a talent for observation, exemplified in his description of camas, sometimes known as quamash, an important food plant for the Nez Perce. In a beautifully crafted essay for his journal record, Lewis carefully described the plant's natural environment, its physical structure, the ways Nez Perce women harvested and prepared camas, and its role in the Indian diet. The explorers discovered about 80 species new to science, including future state flowers for Oregon, Idaho, and Montana, as well as the state grass of Montana. Their collections formed the basis for the first major scientific publication that described and illustrated the plants west of the Mississippi River. Lewis and Clark sent back numerous botanical specimens during the expedition, orignially held in two collections, one in Britain and another at the American Philisophical Society in Philadelphia. In the latter half of the 19th century, the two collections were brought together in their permanent Phildelphia home of the Academy of Natural Sciences.

More than a mere stunt to see if the continent could be crossed and conquered, more than a diplomatic mission to Indian peoples, the Lewis and Clark Expedition was a scientific foray. It is this aspect of the expedition, fulfilled in every sense, which sets the Lewis and Clark Expedition apart and plays a major role in its resonance 200 years later.

For more information please see The Science of the Lewis and Clark Expedition on the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Lewis and Clark Website, portions of which were excerpted for this piece. Additional information for this essay was taken from: Ferris, Robert G. and Roy E. Appleman, eds. Lewis and Clark: Historic Places Associated With Their Transcontinental Exploration (1804-06). Washington, D.C.: United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service, 1975.

American Indians

The Lewis and Clark Expedition set out with several goals when it left the St. Louis area in 1804. One of these was to conduct diplomacy with and gather information about the various nations of American Indians they would encounter on their journey. During the course of the expedition, contact was made with at least 55 different native cultural groups. Other groups, such as the Crow (Absaroke), almost certainly saw the explorers without the explorers ever seeing them. Some groups were encountered only through individual members, while others were met with in formal councils. Still other American Indians participated in the expedition by literally saving expedition members from starving and losing their way as they crossed the continent. Some, like the Lakota and Blackfeet, had hostile encounters with the Corps, while others, like the Mandan, Hidatsa and Nez Perce, forged friendships and alliances whose written descriptions in the journals still resonate with good will after 200 years. Lastly, the expedition itself was staffed with at least six people who were all or part American Indian. George Droulliard, one of the most essential members of the Corps, was half Shawnee, while Pierre Cruzatte and Francois Labiche were half Omaha. Although little is known of Jean Baptiste Lepage, he was also almost certainly part American Indian, as were most of the French engages who helped pole and haul the boats up the Missouri in 1804. Lastly, Sacagawea and her baby boy Jean Baptiste, Lemhi Shoshone by birth and Hidatsa by adoption and clan, added important insights into American Indian cultures that the expedition members might never have understood otherwise.

At least 300 distinct languages existed in North America in pre-Columbian times. Sign language was highly developed among the Plains Indians as a method of communicating between different tribes. In addition to language differences, cultures varied in size, wealth and economic systems. The Great Plains Indians and the Northwest Indians are two diverse groups that Lewis and Clark encountered on their journey. (Milner 1994, 15)

The history of the Great Plains Indians can be traced back at least 13,000 years and possibly even millenia. During the last stages of the Ice Age, small bands of people migrated in search of megafauna, or game, such as mastodons and mammoths. As game became extinct, their cultural organization became more complex, shifting to bison hunting and living in earth-lodge dwellings. However, European contact brought much change. Prior to this contact, tribes of the plains lived by agriculture or gathering. The introduction of horses by the Spanish in the late 16th century provided Indians with a more efficient method of hunting buffalo. Many groups--the Kiowa, Cheyenne, Sioux, Comanche and others--shifted to a nomadic culture. Portable tipis, immense value placed on horses, and the accumulation of herds were common patterns among these groups. Others such as the Mandans, Arikara, Hidatsas, Pawnee, Wichita and Omaha remained horticultural societies, establishing permanent settlements in the river valleys of the plains.

Little is known of the early history of the Northwest Coast Indians, though anthropologists believe these groups represent the most elaborate nonagricultural culture in the world. These Indian groups established permanent settlements with clearly defined territories. The economy was based almost entirely on salmon and other marine life and required large amounts of seasonal labor.

The cultural influences of American Indians on the United States and the world go very deep. The American Indians gave Europeans the cultivation of corn, the potato, the sweet potato, tobacco, pumpkins, the tomato and, philosophically, conceptions of democracy radically different from the ancient Greek city-states. The Six Nations, an alliance of the Mohawk, Seneca, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga and Tuscarora nations, practiced a participatory democracy from which Ben Franklin drew inspiration when uniting the English colonies during the Albany Conference. Within the present day United States, the Acoma and Hopi pueblos, settled around A.D. 600-1000 stand as possibly the oldest occupied communities in the continental United States, discovered and settled long before the Europeans came.

In order to negotiate intelligently with the American Indian tribes and their leaders along the route, Lewis received a "crash course" in diplomacy and about the known Indian cultural groups from Dr. Benjamin Rush and others in Philadelphia. Lewis also knew that gift giving and trade were important parts of most known Indian cultures, and that he would have to have trade goods for diplomacy and for acquiring needed goods and food along the route. Lewis also brought along peace medals produced by the U.S. Government in silver for presentation to American Indian chiefs. Peace medals are a fascinating yet little-known aspect of American history. They were an integral part of the government's relations with American Indians in the 18th and 19th centuries. At the time, these medals represented a covenant between nations, and were valued equally by tribal people who had had contact with European-Americans and by the governments of Britain, Spain, France and the United States, each of which issued them. Lewis and Clark took along three large medals with an image of President Jefferson on them, 13 middle-sized Jefferson medals, 16 small Jefferson medals, and 55 of the "season medals" struck during the presidency of George Washington. All but one of these medals were given out during the expedition. The obverse (front) of the Jefferson medals had a formal bust of President Jefferson in low relief, along with his name and the date he entered office. The reverse showed clasped hands and bore the motto "Peace and Friendship." This design depicted Indian nations as coequals of the United States.

Although the men of the expedition did not know what to expect on their trek, they were prepared to meet the various Indian tribal groups and curious about what they would be like. Previously, almost nothing had been known of the American Indians westward from the Mandan villages, in present North Dakota, to the Upper Columbia River. Lewis and Clark and their men left behind various accounts of different tribal groups and their interactions with them. Although the information is often inaccurate, and not every tribe is handled equally or in some cases discussed at all, today these descriptions provide insight into what the expedition members experienced during their journey.

Whether Lewis and Clark knew it or not, they were the "spearpoints" of an invasion of American Indian homelands in the West. Whether or not their actions were deliberate, they touched off an invasion which displaced entire peoples and tribal groups with European descended settlers, backed by the U.S. Army and English land law. It is for this reason and others that many native peoples see no reason to be happy about the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial, and why this event should be looked upon by all as a "commemoration" rather than a "celebration."

For more information please see Native Peoples on the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial's Lewis and Clark Journey of Discovery website, portions of which were excerpted for this piece.

Milner, Clyde, Carol O'Connor and Martha Sandweiss. The Oxford History of the American West. New York: Oxford U Press, 1994.

Lamar, Howard R. The New Encyclopedia of the American West. New Haven: Yale U Press, 1998.

The Trail Today

Two hundred years later, what can be found on the Lewis and Clark Trail today? The pathway taken by these explorers has been greatly altered over the past two centuries. Highways cross the continent where once only American Indian trails and rivers were used for travel and communication. Towns and cities founded by American pioneers moving westward have altered the landscape, and the courses of rivers--such as the Missouri--have been altered by dams, in some instances forever covering campsites once used by the Corps of Discovery. There are however large areas such as Nez Perce National Historical Park that remain relatively unspoiled. Historian Dayton Duncan notes that "Without a doubt, the most unchanged section of the entire Lewis and Clark route is the White Cliffs section of the Missouri River in north-central Montana--a stretch of the river, now protected by Congress, that is only accessible by boat (usually canoe). This is the place, with its eerie sandstone formations, that Lewis described as 'scenes of visionary enchantment' ." The Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail traces the route of the explorers as closely as possible given these changes over the years. Today you can follow in the approximate footsteps of Lewis and Clark, by boat, canoe, or kayak, by car or bus, on foot or bicycle, or by train, exploring the route they traveled and reliving the adventure of the Corps of Discovery.

On July 3, 2002, President Bush was joined by Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton and other cabinet members in the East Room of the White House to usher in the Bicentennial of Lewis and Clark's Voyage of Discovery. Across the nation events commemorating the bicentennial of the expedition have begun and will continue through 2006. President Bush remarked that "American history is filled with remarkable examples of heroism and adventure, and the voyage of Lewis and Clark is one of the most remarkable of them all."

The National Park Service's unique contribution to the bicentennial--the Corps of Discovery II: 200 Years to the Future--is a traveling education center that will recreate the epic journey and be the unifying component for the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial observance. Over the next four years it will make stops in large urban areas, American Indian reservations and small towns along the original Corps of Discovery's route, and later travel to areas off the original trail from Florida to Texas, Minnesota to California. The traveling exhibit includes two interpretive tents with displays and a performance tent-- the Tent of Many Voices--with space for demonstrations, lectures, cultural presentations and audiovisual shows. Performances will be provided in partnership with American Indian tribes, State governments, local agencies, the private sector and other Federal agencies. The nation's commemoration of the Lewis and Clark Expedition began with the debut of the Corps of Discovery II at Thomas Jefferson's home, Monticello, on January 14, 2003.

Time magazine estimates that approximately 25 million travelers will traverse the route of Lewis and Clark from 2004 to 2006. Communities around the country are planning local events to commemorate their place in the history of the expedition. Fifteen communities from Charlottesville, Virginia, to Astoria, Oregon, have been selected by the National Council of the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial as sites for national heritage signature events. Each community was chosen for its place in the expedition's chronology, its historical relevance, cultural diversity, tribal involvement, geographic location and sponsoring organizations' capacity. Information about these signature events, as well as news and announcements about the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial, can be found at www.lewisandclark200.org. Examples include:

• The Falls of the Ohio in Clarksville, Indiana, and Louisville, Kentucky, will host a 13-day signature event from October 14-26, 2003, which will open with the reenactment of Lewis's arrival in Louisville and meeting with William Clark on October 14, 1803. It will close with the reenactment of the Corps' departure from Clarksville on October 26.
• On March 12-14, 2004, in St. Louis, Missouri, the National Louisiana Purchase Bicentennial Committee and the National Park Service will host an international ceremony observing the 200th anniversary of the transfer of the Louisiana Territory from Spain to France to the United States. Activities at sites surrounding the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial National Historic Site will feature the cultures of the Louisiana Territory-French, Spanish, Anglo-American and American Indians through interactive displays relating the legacies of these cultures in America and highlighting the roles of each in today's world. Information about this event can be found at http://louisianapurchase.umsl.edu.
• On May 14, 2004, the communities of Hartford and Wood River, Illinois, will commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Corps of Discovery's final departure from its winter encampment at Camp River DuBois. Discovery Expedition reenactors will trace the steps of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, leaving the Camp River DuBois winter quarters to launch their boats from the eastern bank of the Mississippi into the mouth of the Missouri River to begin their journey into the West. By this date a new Lewis and Clark Visitor Center and Camp River DuBois fort replica in Hartford will be complete. To find out more about this three-day event go to www.lewisandclarkillinois.org
• From November 24-27, 2005, there will be a symbolic walk across the four-mile bridge to Astoria, Oregon, from the Fort Clatsop National Memorial. The walk is one of several events cosponsored by the Pacific County Friends of Lewis and Clark and Fort Clatsop honoring the Corps of Discovery's historic arrival at the Pacific Ocean at Station Camp and the winter encampment at Ft. Clatsop.
• An event on August 17-20, 2006, in New Town, North Dakota will mark the 200th anniversary of the Corps of Discovery's return to the Knife River Indian Villages. This event offering American Indian perspectives will contrast the hopes and dreams of President Thomas Jefferson with those of tribal leaders who met Lewis and Clark and focus on the contributions of Sacagawea. For those seeking further information, please go to www.mhanation.com.
• The Lewis and Clark Expedition officially ended September 23, 1806, when the explorers arrived in St. Louis, Missouri. A flotilla of watercraft will travel to various historic sites on the Missouri and Mississippi rivers in commemoration of this bicentennial event. These historic sites will present exhibits and conduct programs during the commemorative weekend. See the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial National Historic Site for more information.

In addition to the 15 signature events, many States and communities are also hosting events commemorating the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Missouri, the starting point for Lewis and Clark into the largely uncharted West, offers a number of venues to explore the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial. Missouri's events can be found at www.lewisandclark.state.mo.us/ or www.mohistory.org. The Missouri History Museum at Forest Park hosts Lewis & Clark: The National Bicentennial Exhibition, from January 20 through September 6, 2004. This is the opening venue of the national exhibition organized by the Missouri Historical Society. Events commemorating the Lewis and Clark Expedition in Iowa and Nebraska can be found at www.lewisandclarkne-ia.com. These include the annual Sgt. Floyd Re-enactment Days every August in Sioux City, Iowa. The South Dakota State Historical Society and the Museum of the South Dakota State Historical Society will host an online exhibition tour combining photos and Lewis and Clark journal entries with modern visual images and historic renderings.

Information on North Dakota events during the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial can be found at www.ndlewisandclark.com. Montana will host a Lewis and Clark Festival from June 25-29, 2003, to highlight events of the Lewis and Clark Expedition during their stay in Great Falls in 1805, and Clark Day on July 26-27, 2006, at Pompey's Pillar. An entire list of statewide events can be found online at Lewis and Clark in Montana. In Oregon, a play about Sacagawea was performed in January 2003 by the Oregon Children's Theatre (OCT). The play, written by nationally recognized playwright Eric Coble, tells how Sacagawea joined the Lewis and Clark Expedition. In June 2004, People of the River will debut--an exhibit focusing on the American Indians who lived on the rivers from the mouth of the Snake to the Pacific Ocean. The result of a collaborative effort between the Portland Art Museum and the National Museum of American Indians (part of the Smithsonian Institution), this 100-year-old collection of exclusively American Indian artifacts has never been on exhibit or published in journals. This and other events hosted throughout the Northwest can be found on the Lewis & Clark Bicentennial in Oregon or Washington State Historical Society websites.

If you are interested in participating in the Lewis and Clark commemoration and traveling the trail yourself, you will find helpful links to websites that list events in each State and nationally on our Learn More page.

List of Sites Preparing for the Journey •Monticello •Harpers Ferry National Historical Park •American Philosophical Society Hall •Big Bone Lick State Park •Old Clarksville Site •Fort Massac Site   The Expedition ILLINOIS •Old Cahokia Courthouse MISSOURI •Jefferson National Expansion Memorial National Historic Site •St. Charles Historic District •Tavern Cave •Rocheport Historic District •Arrow Rock •Fort Osage NEBRASKA •Leary Site •Fort Atkinson IOWA •Sergeant Floyd Monument SOUTH DAKOTA •Spirit Mound NORTH DAKOTA •Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site •Big Hidatsa Village Site •Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site MONTANA •Lewis and Clark Camp at Slaughter River •Great Falls Portage •Tower Rock •Three Forks of the Missouri •Beaverhead Rock-Lewis and Clark Expedition •Lemhi Pass (also in Idaho) •Clark's Lookout, August 13, 1805 •Traveler's Rest •Lolo Trail (also in Idaho) •Nez Perce National Historical Park (also in Idaho) •Pompey's Pillar (return trip) •Camp Disappointment (return trip) •Two Medicine Fight Site (return trip) IDAHO •Lemhi Pass (also in Montana) •Lolo Trail (also in Montana) •Weippe Prairie •Nez Perce National Historical Park (also in Montana) OREGON •Rock Fort Campsite •Fort Clatsop National Memorial (winter of 1806) WASHINGTON •Cape Disappointment Historic District •Chinook Point •Lewis & Clark Trail--Travois Road   After The Expedition • Locust Grove • Natchez Trace Parkway

Sites are listed geographically and chronologically as they were encountered,
except where noted in italics. You can also explore them with a strictly chronological list.

Chrnological List of Sites