Introduction
Imagine that you wanted to travel from Missouri to Oregon. Sounds easy, right? Just take an airplane and in a few hours, you’ll be there. Let’s say you were wanting to do that very same travel in the mid 1800s. Then, you would either go by foot or wagon on the Oregon Trail. On a plane, you have an almost guaranteed chance of survival. Not on the Oregon Trail, though. The number of problems on the trail could be as numerous as the number of milliliters of water in a full bathtub. Today, you can grab a frozen food from your freezer and zap it in the microwave, and there’s your breakfast. On the Oregon Trail, they had to hunt for food. Imagine that! Right now, you probably have a group of people who you hang out with. You might have to leave friends and family as you ride on the wagon train, and meet others you had never fathomed even existed. Discover life from nearly 200 years ago in the turn of a page.
The Time Period
The time period of the Oregon Trail was truly an important time. During the 1800s, there were no airplanes, cars, no taxis to get you from here to there. Back in those days, you would have to travel by covered wagon. A covered wagon was much more than just a storage unit. It could be a shelter, a protective shield for you to stand behind. In fact, if you pulled upon the drawstrings, the thick tarp would protect you from the horrid wind and rain. On the Oregon Trail, you wouldn’t go alone. You would travel with a wagon train. When you had a covered wagon, it was similar to toys you may buy in the store that you don’t have the battery for it included. The wagon would be the toy, and the battery would be either a mule or an oxen. Likewise, at the end of the day, the animals would be very tired. The more animals you would have, the better off you would be. The effect of exhaustion wouldn’t be as much. But what kind of animal would you buy? A mule was speedy, but not as strong as the hefty but slow oxen. The people on the Oregon Trail would move with limited belongings. What would you bring in your wagon. Buckets, candles, skillets of iron, and family heirlooms were among the most popular of items. The Oregon Trail had loads of loaded wagons traveling through present day Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming, and Idaho. Imagine traveling by foot for days across those states, none of the current transportation systems! Clearly, the time period was one of the important elements of the Oregon Trail.
Problems and Viruses
The Donner Party was stranded in the Sierra Mountains in 1846. Many died in their time in the mountains before they were rescued.
There were quite a few problems and tear-jerking incidents that happened on the Oregon Trail. Sometimes, a pioneer may catch a contagious illness that would eventually spread to many of the others on the wagon train, and many people would end up intending to go to Oregon, but never making it all the way there. Some sicknesses that pioneers may have had outbreaks of were cholera or typhoid, both caused mostly by consuming contaminated food or water, sometimes influenza, most commonly caught by pregnant women or obese people. They might also catch smallpox because of a virus called the Variola virus. Sadly, if you got an infected limb, there wasn’t really a good treatment for it, except for, of course, cutting that limb off from your body. That method of getting rid of an infection by saw was called amputation. Another method of “healing” was called bloodletting. Back then, a belief was that if you were sick, you had bad blood flowing through your body. Bloodletting was where a nurse would cut open a vein or artery to let the blood flow out. It was not very effective. Performing bloodletting would result with the patient becoming much more weak. One extreme tragedy in 1846 was called the Donner tragedy, for the man leading the Donner party was a man who went by the last name of Donner. The party was going along the Oregon Trail, but they were moving as slow as a sloth. The people decided that they should just take a little shortcut across to the California Trail. Then, the Donner party came across the Sierra Mountains. It was quite a horrible obstacle in their path. There was no game to hunt there, so some had to sacrifice their mules, oxen, and even pets sometimes for food. By the time the remaining of the party were rescued, 41 people had already died. Clearly, traveling on the Oregon Trail was not always the happiest, best experience.
Food
The food you might get if you were on the Oregon Trail would have to mainly be hunted, if there was any game. Children would collect buffalo dung, or buffalo chips, to fuel the fires. The dry grass would burn too quickly.
The selection of food on the Oregon Trail was not very elaborate. It consisted of coffee, beans, rice, bacon, biscuits, cakes, and sometimes the day’s hunt, usually a wild bird. Sometimes, there wouldn’t be a fresh kill for days. The pioneers would have to survive on coffee, extremely salty jerky, and biscuits. During problematic times, someone’s pet may have had to have been killed for food. Though some facts about food sound quite terrible, it wasn’t always so bad. In fact, the wagon train made a new discovery: butter made the easy way. The pioneers would hang a bucket of milk on the end of a wagon train, and the swishing motion churns the butter, without the hours and hours of doing the laboring work. All in all, the food on the wagon train had not much variety.
People On the Oregon Trail
Native Americans sometimes would help the pioneers, but grew to distrust them. Soon, they didn’t want anything to do with the travelers on the Oregon Trail.
There were many types of people that you might meet if you were traveling upon the Oregon Trail. One of them would be the captain. They were usually a member of one of the families traveling on the wagon train. Occasionally, though, they could just be an outsider who knew the trail and wagons well. The captain would decide when it was the right time to leave, stop for the day, and when they would start and go again. They would also decide that if somebody did something bad, they would be the ones to punish that person or group of people. Another type of person you might meet could have been a Native American. Sometimes, they would supply the travelers with food, supplies, and shelter. They did not do so for long, though. The Native Americans grew to not trust and dislike the pioneers for many reasons, such as them not using all parts of the animals on the Native American land that they killed. They would take only some, and leave the rest to rot. Also, instead of meeting people sometimes, the pioneers would have to leave loved ones. Friends and family would often be left behind, and you wouldn’t be able to contact them for a while. You would also meet many others who you would become close with on the wagon train. Truly, there were many people whom you would encounter, and leave behind, on the Oregon Trail.
Conclusion
On the Oregon Trail, you wouldn’t have cars to travel, only a covered wagon. Many problems had occurred, and many died, trying to reach their dream destination. The food did not have very much variety, but the pioneers made some great discoveries, and the people you would meet were very numerous. If you wanted to go to Oregon right now, go to your computer and book a flight, but just imagine what you would have had to do 200 years ago, in the 19th century.
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