South Pass (Wyoming)
At South Pass, west view
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The South Pass ( 2265 m above sea level) in the U.S. state of Wyoming was the first crossing over the crest of the Rocky Mountains, which could be happening with loads caravans and vans. He became the central point of all trade and settlers flows for the colonization of the American West in the years 1830-1869.
About the South Pass ran the Oregon Trail, the California Trail and the Mormon Trail, and the Pony Express. Today the pass is insignificant.
Geography
The South Pass crosses the Continental Divide of North America south of the Wind River Range in the U.S. state of Wyoming. Between the Sweetwater River, east to the Platte River and ultimately the Mississippi River flows and the headwaters of the Pacific Creek, which flows through the Little Sandy Creek, Big Sandy River, Green River and the Colorado River to the Gulf of California and the Pacific Ocean, is only a broad, gentle pass.
South of the pass lies the Great Divide Basin, an outflow -free area.
History
Indians of the peoples of the Cheyenne and Crow knew the pass from time immemorial. The whites were the central parts of the Rocky Mountains until well into the 19th century unknown. The Canadian North had British, well researched in particular by the Hudson 's Bay Company, the South knew the Spaniards of the Viceroyalty of New Spain or the 1821 independent Mexicans.
In the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the United States bought the French colony of Louisiana west of the Mississippi River and met from 1804 to 1806 with the Lewis and Clark expedition for the first time over the Rocky Mountains before. Lewis and Clark topped the mountains on a northern route on Lolo Pass and brought the news to the East, that the Rocky Mountains were largely impassable. Only on foot, without major expense, they could crossed and the areas of the West are achieved.
As 1812/13 six trappers of the American Fur Company returned from their outpost Astoria Idaho in the United States, showed them the way through the South Pass Indians. A newspaper in St. Louis reported in June 1813 about her trip and mentioned that it
All of the route is no obstacle that anyone would dare to call a mountain, quite apart from that it is the most direct and shortest way from here [ St. Louis ] is the mouth of the Columbia River.
The knowledge went under, however, because the Astorians their official report formulated so vague that the location and nature of the passport remained unknown. The reason is speculated that the American Fur Company did not act in areas of the central Rocky Mountains and the knowledge of the pass did not want to make available to its competitors.
In February 1824 trapper Jedediah Smith moved on behalf of the fur trading company Rocky Mountain Fur Company of the Black Hills to the west and was demonstrated by the Cheyenne and Crow the area and the South Pass. He recognized the importance of the passport immediately. The company extended its hunting areas in the west of the Rocky Mountains, one of her trapper, Jim Bridger discovered the Great Salt Lake and the trappers of the company made on the rivers of the region the catch of a lifetime.
The independent French-Canadian trapper Etienne Provost was among the pioneers in the South Pass and the Great Salt Lake. Reports that he had achieved both places first, but are pretty sure is incorrect. They go back to his own testimony, which was not published until long after his death in 1905, in time for other confirmed information is credible.
1830 William Sublette brought the first wagon over the South Pass, he was transporting on the way to the so-called Rendezvous inventories and exchange goods to the trappers in the mountains and took on the way back the skins for sale in St. Louis.
1836 Marcus Whitman moved with his family as a missionary over the pass to Oregon in 1841 John Bidwell went with a small group of settlers over the Rocky Mountains to California. But it was not until May 1842 before Marcus Whitman led the first large-scale settler Trek with 100 covered wagon on the Oregon Trail soon mentioned way over the pass. Around the agreement between the United States and Britain on the common colonization Oregon 1846 Oregon compromise, the figures increased further. 1848 attracted followers of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter -day Saints, also called Mormons, over the pass, looking for a place where they could pursue without discrimination of their young religion. They founded the city of Salt Lake City on the Great Salt Lake and in the coming years they were followed by another trailer on the Mormon Trail.
In 1849 word spread of the discovery of gold in California last year, the California Gold Rush began and people flocked through the South Pass on the California Trail. In 1860 the Pony Express led over the pass and 1867 saw the pass its own small gold rush. Gold rush founded three settlements in the immediate vicinity of the pass: South Pass City, Atlantic City and Miner 's Delight.
The importance of the South Pass collapsed abruptly when in 1869 the first transcontinental rail link was opened. You no longer led through the South Pass, but extends further south. However, there was temporarily a railroad through the South Pass: From 1962 to 1983 industrial railway from the west led forth over the pass to the mine in Atlantic City on the east side.
The South Pass today
Today only the small Wyoming Highway 28 crosses the verkehrlich meaningless Pass, which is designated as a National Historic Landmark since 1961.
Atlantic City, so named because the town is located on the east side of the pass, still exists today as a settlement with 39 inhabitants ( 2000). South Pass City and Miner 's Delight are leaving, South Pass City is designed as an open air museum with 25 restored houses, Miner 's Delight a ghost town.
Transverse to the pass, the pass runs along the Continental Divide Trail, a long distance footpath of approximately 5000 km ( 3100 miles ) along the Continental Divide.