 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (November 2010) |
The Cherokee Trail was a historic overland trail through the present-day U.S. states of Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, and Wyoming that was used from the late 1840s up through the early 1890s. The route was established in 1849 by a wagon train headed to the gold fields in California. Among the members of the expedition were a group of Cherokee.[1] When the train formed in Indian Territory, Lewis Evans of Evansville, Arkansas, was elected Captain. Thus, this expedition is sometimes written as the Evans/Cherokee Train.[2] In 1850 four wagon trains turned west on the Laramie Plains, along Wyoming's southern border to Fort Bridger.
According to one source, "Neither the number of wagons nor the number of people that eventually used this road to cross the Sierra Madres makes this trail significant. What makes this road unique is that Native Americans and their traveling companions did not just cross the Continental Divide; they made a path over the mountains and through the Wyoming Basin." [3]
The trail was also known as the Trappers' Trail, but the Trapper's Trail from 1820 in Colorado often varied from Cherokee Trail and took a different route in Wyoming. It also went to Taos, New Mexico.
- ^ Foreman, Grant. Early Trails Through Oklahoma Archived 2009-12-05 at the Wayback Machine, Oklahoma Chronicles 3:2 (June 1925) 99-119 (retrieved August 18, 2006)
- ^ "Fletcher, Dr. Jack E. and Patricia K. A. "Pioneering the Trail." Undated. Accessed January 21, 2018.
- ^ Gardner, A. Dudley. "Wyoming History: The Cherokee Trail - Part I." Western Wyoming Community College. Rev. 2002. Archived 2016-11-19 at the Wayback Machine