BETTER HALF OF THE UNITED STATES 



The first exploration of the strange new land of the 

 mysterious West owed its initiative to the public spirit 

 of President Jefferson. He had, indeed, but the vaguest 

 conception of the possible utility of the country, and 

 realized that its development would come long after he 

 should have passed from the stage of events. But lie 

 was a patron of science, and felt, moreover, a patriotic 

 curiosity to learn what sort of a property the nation had 

 acquired. Congress cheerfully authorized the expedition 

 which Jefferson proposed. The result was the journey 

 of the famous explorers Lewis and Clark, begun in 

 May, 1804. Starting from St. Louis, they ascended the 

 Missouri river to its sources, crossed the Kocky Moun- 

 tains in Montana, and followed the Columbia river to its 

 outlet in the Pacific Ocean. When they returned and 

 presented their report, the public obtained its first glim- 

 mering of knowledge concerning the geology, climate, 

 and animal and human life of the Far West. The subject 

 was then one of remote interest to the nation, which had 

 scarcely acquired its foothold, through actual settlement, 

 on the northwestern Territories between the Alleghanies 

 and the Mississippi. 



The second notable explorations were those of Zebulon 

 Pike, which developed a superficial knowledge of Colo- 

 rado and Mexico. Then came Bonneville, Fremont, and 

 their contemporaries and successors, with adventurous 

 settlers and hardy gold-hunters treading close upon their 

 heels, and effecting little substantial development for 

 decades. Francis Parkman, fresh from college, roamed 

 through the country as far as the Black Hills and old Fort 

 Laramie in 1847-8, and left a lively account of the savage 

 wilderness in The Oregon Trail. 



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