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Okla-homey
6/9/2007, 06:45 AM
June 9, 1856 Mormon handcart pioneers depart for Salt Lake City

151 years ago today, in an extraordinary demonstration of resolve and fortitude, nearly 500 Mormons leave Iowa City and head west for Salt Lake City carrying all their goods and supplies in two-wheeled handcarts. Of all the thousands of pioneer journeys to the West in the 19th century, few were more arduous than those undertaken by the so-called Handcart Companies from 1856 to 1860.

http://img297.echo.cx/img297/5890/2092vk.jpg
Circa 1920 watercolor of the 1856 journey by one who made it as a child

The secular and religious leader of the Mormons, Brigham Young, had established Salt Lake City as the center of a new Utah sanctuary for the Latter-day Saints in 1847. In subsequent years, Young worked diligently to encourage and aid Mormons who made the difficult overland trek to the Great Salt Lake.

http://img297.echo.cx/img297/8863/by1851big0pa.jpg
Brigham Young, c. 1851

In 1856, however, a series of poor harvests left the church with only a meager fund to help immigrants buy wagons and oxen. Young suggested a cheaper mode of travel: "Let them come on foot with handcarts or wheelbarrows; let them gird up their loins and walk through and nothing shall hinder or stay them."

http://img297.echo.cx/img297/6948/handcartlg2qb.jpg
Reproduction handcart loaded w/a family's effects.

Amazingly, many Mormons followed his advice. On this day in 1856, a band of 497 Mormons left Iowa City, Iowa, and began the more than 1,000-mile trek to Salt Lake City. They carried all their goods in about 100 two-wheeled handcarts, most of which were heaped with the maximum load of 400 to 500 pounds. Each family usually had one cart, and the father and mother took turns pulling while any children old enough helped by pushing.

http://img297.echo.cx/img297/802/oregon20handcart20trail7ss.jpg
Map of the Route. "Oregon Trail" in pink, "Handcart Trail "in blue. The two trails shared a common route for much of their length.

The handcart immigrants soon ran into serious problems. The Mormon craftsmen who had constructed the handcarts back in Iowa City had chosen to use wooden axles instead of iron in order to save time and money. Sand and dirt quickly wore down the wood, and water and heat made the axles splinter and crack. As the level terrain of the prairies gave way to the more rugged country of the Plains, the sheer physical challenge of hauling a 500-pound cart began to take its toll. One British immigrant who was a skilled carpenter wrote of having to make three coffins in as many days.

http://img297.echo.cx/img297/6169/thorpe757ur.jpg
Mormon Handcart Re-enactors

Some of the pilgrims gave up. Two girls in one handcart group left to marry a pair of miners they met along the way. The majority, however, struggled on and eventually reached the Salt Lake Valley. Over the course of the next four years, some 3,000 Mormon converts made the overland journey by pushing and pulling heavy-laden handcarts. Better planning and the use of iron axles made the subsequent immigrations slightly easier than the first, and some actually made the journey more quickly than if they had used ox-drawn wagons. Still, once the church finances had recovered, Young's followers returned to using conventional wagons. The handcart treks remained nothing less than heroic. One Mormon girl later estimated that she and her family had each taken over a million steps to reach their goal, pushing and pulling a creaking wooden handcart the entire way.

http://img142.echo.cx/img142/2623/insane7zo.jpg

jk the sooner fan
6/9/2007, 07:16 AM
none of the pictures are showing

soonerhubs
6/9/2007, 08:12 AM
Excellent thread/post Homey. Everytime I drive across Wyoming I think of how simple it is to make those miles versus 150 years ago.

Scott D
6/9/2007, 08:32 AM
hubler less posting, more pushing wheelbarrows. :D

soonerhubs
6/9/2007, 08:59 AM
hubler less posting, more pushing wheelbarrows. :D
Your avatar makes me think... How would a Paris Hilton have handled such an ordeal? I'm thinking wolf food by the 1st day's afternoon. :)

royalfan5
6/9/2007, 09:56 AM
What, no mention of this winter camp in Omaha? They have a nice Temple among other things there now. My officemate takes his youth group there all the time.

stoopified
6/9/2007, 10:10 AM
Your avatar makes me think... How would a Paris Hilton have handled such an ordeal? I'm thinking wolf food by the 1st day's afternoon. :)
Wolf brand chili?

Scott D
6/9/2007, 10:25 AM
Your avatar makes me think... How would a Paris Hilton have handled such an ordeal? I'm thinking wolf food by the 1st day's afternoon. :)

I think even the wolves would have left her to lesser scavengers....like the paparazzi ;)

TUSooner
6/9/2007, 06:49 PM
It almost makes me want to gird my loins.

Okla-homey
6/9/2007, 07:19 PM
none of the pictures are showing

they are now, you gotta have faith...kinda like believing in them golden plates what got give to Joe Smith by that angel feller. And them special specs what made it possible for him to read the hieroglyphics thereon.

Oh, almost forgot, the fact that notwithstanding the fact there is not a scintilla of archeological or genetic evidence to bolster them scriptures, that the "Lost Tribe of Israel" saddled-up and rafted over here to the western hempishere thousands of years before Columbus and his ilk made it.

TUSooner
6/9/2007, 07:22 PM
they are now, you gotta have faith...kinda like believing in them golden plates what got give to Joe Smith by that angel feller. And them special specs what made it possible for him to read the hieroglyphics thereon.

Oh, almost forgot, the fact that notwithstanding the fact there is not a scintilla of archeological or genetic evidence to bolster them scriptures, that the "Lost Tribe of Israel" saddled-up and rafted over here to the western hempishere thousands of years before Columbus and his ilk made it.

Maybe them lost tribe folks girded their loins, too.

Okla-homey
6/9/2007, 07:27 PM
Maybe them lost tribe folks girded their loins, too.

and et they Wheaties to By Gum.

jk the sooner fan
6/9/2007, 07:29 PM
yeah i see the pics now, good history lesson for the day

i still think the mormon religion is akin to a christian cult

Okla-homey
6/9/2007, 07:32 PM
yeah i see the pics now, good history lesson for the day

i still think the mormon religion is akin to a christian cult

It ain't Christian my brutha. It's some kind of hybrid. That said, live and let live I say. I've never personally known a member of the LDS Church I didn't consider a good (or in some cases great) person and a fine American.

jk the sooner fan
6/9/2007, 07:35 PM
oh they're very clean healthy living people, no doubt - there are A TON of them working for the government because they can so easily get security clearances.......not much dirt on many of them

i agree, live and let live - i just dont get their whole deal

soonerhubs
6/9/2007, 10:40 PM
Sometime we'll have to visit. I'll give you all the facts. Different than other Christian denominations? Certainly. Not Christian? I respectfully disagree.

From my own personal studies and practices in this Mormon faith, I'd say more credit is given to Christ than most would realize.

Royalfan, I've read about the Winter Quarters temple, but I've not been there yet. I hear it's great.

soonerhubs
6/9/2007, 10:45 PM
I really like the map as well up there. Some of those sites are worth visiting. Sublette Pass has an old mining ghost town there now. Fort Bridger is a fun little historical site. There are even ruts in some of those areas still visible because the wheels carved out the rocks they passed.

Scott D
6/9/2007, 11:05 PM
but can you get a free wheelbarrow with each visit? :D

soonerhubs
6/9/2007, 11:25 PM
but can you get a free wheelbarrow with each visit? :D
Depends on how quick you and your get-away car is.

Scott D
6/10/2007, 12:06 AM
how fast does a get-away car have to be in nebraska? :)

royalfan5
6/10/2007, 12:26 AM
Sometime we'll have to visit. I'll give you all the facts. Different than other Christian denominations? Certainly. Not Christian? I respectfully disagree.

From my own personal studies and practices in this Mormon faith, I'd say more credit is given to Christ than most would realize.

Royalfan, I've read about the Winter Quarters temple, but I've not been there yet. I hear it's great.
You should make the trip. It wouldn't be that bad of drive from Stillwater. You could probably do it in 6.5/7 hrs.

sooneron
6/10/2007, 12:27 AM
Aren't they called wheel barrels??

sooneron
6/10/2007, 12:29 AM
You should make the trip. It wouldn't be that bad of drive from Stillwater. You could probably do it in 6.5/7 hrs.
Yeah, Stoolwater to Neb. - That would be downright scenic. It MIGHT look this nice. :D

http://www.dep.state.fl.us/parks/OPG/paynesprairie/photos/PAP-PrairieView-park.jpg

royalfan5
6/10/2007, 12:30 AM
Yeah, Stoolwater to Neb. - That would be downright scenic. It MIGHT look this nice. :D

http://www.dep.state.fl.us/parks/OPG/paynesprairie/photos/PAP-PrairieView-park.jpg
If you cut over to HWY 15 and 77 once you get north of Wichita, the Blue Valley area is actually pretty nice.

Scott D
6/10/2007, 12:31 AM
yeah..you go to nebraska....I'll go back to bourbon, missouri.

soonerhubs
6/10/2007, 08:41 AM
I didn't realize it was so close. We may have to make the trip.

LoyalFan
6/11/2007, 03:24 AM
And just think! Once they were well established, they felt free to commit acts of which any religious sect ('specially the ragheaded genetically faulty Muslim vermin,) would be proud. See: "Mountain Meadow Massacre" on your friendly local search engine.
Mitt Romney would prefer this was not brought up.

Your turn, Homey.

LF

Jimminy Crimson
6/11/2007, 04:02 AM
In Utah elementary schools, do you think they play a computer game called 'The Handcart Trail'? :D

soonerhubs
6/11/2007, 06:42 AM
And just think! Once they were well established, they felt free to commit acts of which any religious sect ('specially the ragheaded genetically faulty Muslim vermin,) would be proud. See: "Mountain Meadow Massacre" on your friendly local search engine.
Mitt Romney would prefer this was not brought up.

Your turn, Homey.

LF


We've all heard and read about this. You seem so bitter...was your dad killed in it or something?

And if we are to be rehashing the past you might want to google Missouri's history from 1820 to 1850. But that would require the spine to look at both sides of the story. What ever you do, avoid that type of research! :rolleyes:

What religion are you LF? Maybe I can shoot holes in your church's legitimacy. That shouldn't take long.

sooneron
6/11/2007, 06:57 AM
('specially the ragheaded genetically faulty Muslim vermin,)

LF
Sieg Heil!!