Archive for August, 2008
French mining engineer writes of Western travels in 1867
While kicking the dust off some boxes of old books, I ran onto a little volume I forgot I have. So I pulled it out of the box, blew some clouds of dust around the room, and took a close look at this little jewel. The title in English is “The Rocky Mountain West in 1867,” and in French it is titled “Le gand-ouest des Etats-Unis.” What I have is the English translation done by Wilson O. Clough. The original — and I do not speak or read any sort of French — was a collection of letters written by Louis L. Simonin, a French mining engineer and professor of geology. The letters were written to an unidentified friend in Paris.
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If you love the Old West, take a look at another very useful site
I found another site dedicated to the history and tales of America’s Old West that you really need to see if you haven’t seen it yet: Legends of America bills itself as “a travel site for the nostalgic and historic minded.” It really is all that and more.
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Powering those wagons westward — mules or oxen, which were considered best?
Throughout the history of animal drawn transportation, the animal power of choice has usually been horses, mules, or oxen. Which were best?
The answer, of course, depended upon the type of wagons, the load being hauled, and the distance involved. In general, freight wagons or any wagons carrying much of a load for much distance of all, relied on either mules or oxen. Both animals were powerful and reliable. For heavier loads, such as some of the bigger pieces of mining equipment, and very long hauls, oxen generally won the day. They were slower than mules, but generally surer, and a big plus was that oxen could travel on grass alone while mules generally required grain feeds in addition to grass.
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