Showing posts with label Green River Wyoming. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Green River Wyoming. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 9, 2019
Thursday, August 15, 2019
August 15, 1919. The Motor Transport Convoy reaches Ft. Bridger and tensions rise on the border.
The Motor Transport Convoy left Green River and made 63 miles to Ft. Bridger, opting to stay on the location of that former post. The post had been occupied intermittently since the 1840s, but had been last abandoned by the Army in 1890.
The entry that day was the longest to date because of the diarist interest in a significant engineering project the party undertook.
The trip made the local papers retrospectively.
At the same time, it looked like the tensions on the border with Mexico were about to erupt into war once again. The Cheyenne, Casper and Laramie newspapers took note of the renewed tensions and didn't take note of the Motor Convoy at all.
Closer to that border, an item for today?
The trip made the local papers retrospectively.
At the same time, it looked like the tensions on the border with Mexico were about to erupt into war once again. The Cheyenne, Casper and Laramie newspapers took note of the renewed tensions and didn't take note of the Motor Convoy at all.
Closer to that border, an item for today?
Wednesday, August 14, 2019
August 14, 1919. The Red Desert "exerting a depressing influence" on the personnel of the 1919 Motor Transport Convoy.
On this day in 1919, the diarist for the 1919 Motor Transport Convoy reported that parched landscape of the Red Desert was exhibiting a "depressing influence on personnel".
And they had a fair amount of trouble including a breakdown that required an Indian motorcycle to be loaded into the Militor.
You'd see a lot of motorcycles on the same stretch of lonely highway today. The highway itself is unyielding busy but the desert is still a long stretch in Wyoming. People either love it or find it dispiriting even now.
Oddly, Rock Springs hardly obtained mention in today's entry, even though it is now a larger city than nearby Green River, which is the county seat. But it is remarkable to note that the convoy was able to stop, grind a valve, and get back on the road, which is what they did, having the valve ground (or probably grinding it themselves, in Rock Springs.
The final destination that day was Green River, which they arrived in relatively late in the evening, in comparison with other days reported in the diary, after a 13.5 hour day.
Rawlins was the last substantial town that the convoy had passed through prior to this day, and its paper memorialized their stay in the and through the town with a series of photographs in the paper that was issued on this day.
The Casper paper mentioned another momentous event, the transfer of 14,000 acres from the Wind River Indian Reservation to be open for homesteading, a post World War One effort to find homesteads for returning soldiers.
That act was part of a series of similar ones that had chipped away at the size of the Reservation since its founding in the 1860s. While the Reservation remains large, it was once larger until events like this slowly reduced its overall extent.
14,000 acres is actually not that much acreage, but what this further indicates is an appreciation on the part of the government that the land around Riverton Wyoming was suitable for farming, as opposed to grazing. The various homestead acts remained fully in effect in 1919 and indeed 1919 was not surprisingly the peak year for homesteading in the United States, as well as the last year in American history in which farmers had economic parity with urban dwellers. But the land remaining in the West that was suitable for farming, as opposed to grazing, was now quite limited. Some of that land was opening up with irrigation projects, however.
None of this took into mind, really, what was just for the native residents of the Reservation and that lead to the protests in Chicago. Interestingly, those protests do not seem to have been undertaken by Arapaho and Shoshone tribal members, who indeed would have been a long way from home, but rather from Indians who were living in those areas, showing how the the efficient development of the spreading of news was impacting things.
Locally Judge Winters was stepping down as he felt that private practice would be more lucrative and he'd be better able to support his family Judge Winter was a legendary local judge and his son also entered the practice of law. While I may be mistaken, Judge Winter came back on the bench later, perhaps after his children were older. His son was a great University of Wyoming track and field athlete and graduated from the University of Wyoming's law school in the 1930s. Because of the Great Depression, he was unable to find work at first and therefore only took up practicing law after the Depression eased. He was still practicing, at nearly 100 years old, when I first was practicing law and he had an office in our building. He and his wife never had any children.
You'd see a lot of motorcycles on the same stretch of lonely highway today. The highway itself is unyielding busy but the desert is still a long stretch in Wyoming. People either love it or find it dispiriting even now.
Classic, retired, Union Pacific Depot in Rock Springs, Wyoming.
Union Pacific freight station, Rock Springs.
Oddly, Rock Springs hardly obtained mention in today's entry, even though it is now a larger city than nearby Green River, which is the county seat. But it is remarkable to note that the convoy was able to stop, grind a valve, and get back on the road, which is what they did, having the valve ground (or probably grinding it themselves, in Rock Springs.
Rawlins was the last substantial town that the convoy had passed through prior to this day, and its paper memorialized their stay in the and through the town with a series of photographs in the paper that was issued on this day.
The Casper paper mentioned another momentous event, the transfer of 14,000 acres from the Wind River Indian Reservation to be open for homesteading, a post World War One effort to find homesteads for returning soldiers.
That act was part of a series of similar ones that had chipped away at the size of the Reservation since its founding in the 1860s. While the Reservation remains large, it was once larger until events like this slowly reduced its overall extent.
14,000 acres is actually not that much acreage, but what this further indicates is an appreciation on the part of the government that the land around Riverton Wyoming was suitable for farming, as opposed to grazing. The various homestead acts remained fully in effect in 1919 and indeed 1919 was not surprisingly the peak year for homesteading in the United States, as well as the last year in American history in which farmers had economic parity with urban dwellers. But the land remaining in the West that was suitable for farming, as opposed to grazing, was now quite limited. Some of that land was opening up with irrigation projects, however.
None of this took into mind, really, what was just for the native residents of the Reservation and that lead to the protests in Chicago. Interestingly, those protests do not seem to have been undertaken by Arapaho and Shoshone tribal members, who indeed would have been a long way from home, but rather from Indians who were living in those areas, showing how the the efficient development of the spreading of news was impacting things.
Locally Judge Winters was stepping down as he felt that private practice would be more lucrative and he'd be better able to support his family Judge Winter was a legendary local judge and his son also entered the practice of law. While I may be mistaken, Judge Winter came back on the bench later, perhaps after his children were older. His son was a great University of Wyoming track and field athlete and graduated from the University of Wyoming's law school in the 1930s. Because of the Great Depression, he was unable to find work at first and therefore only took up practicing law after the Depression eased. He was still practicing, at nearly 100 years old, when I first was practicing law and he had an office in our building. He and his wife never had any children.
Wednesday, July 31, 2019
Today In Wyoming's History: July 31
Today In Wyoming's History: July 31: 1919 Sportscaster Curt Gowdy born in Green River.
Sunday, December 16, 2018
Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: Casa Oracion, Green River Wyoming
Churches of the West: Casa Oracion, Green River Wyoming:
This small Prairie Gothic style church in the courthouse district of Green River, Wyoming is now used by this Protestant Spanish language church. Other than that, I don't know anything about it.
This small Prairie Gothic style church in the courthouse district of Green River, Wyoming is now used by this Protestant Spanish language church. Other than that, I don't know anything about it.
Monday, April 11, 2016
Monday at the Bar: Courthouses of the West: Old Sweetwater County Courthouse, Green River Wyoming
Courthouses of the West: Old Sweetwater County Courthouse, Green River Wyom...:
This is the old Sweetwater County Courthouse in Green River Wyoming. This courthouse, built in 1906, is on the same block as the new courthouse that replaced it. Fortunately, this attractive originalcourthouse was preserved when the new one was built. I don't know what use this courthouse serves today.
Monday, April 4, 2016
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Transportation, late 19th Century
A modern highway map shows as distance of 211 miles from Worland, in the southern half of the basin, to Rawlins, and 293 miles from Cody to Green River, but modern transportation systems are not remotely like those of 1879. In practical terms, Green River and Rawlins were further from the Big Horn Basin in 1879 than they are now from Outer Mongolia, and criminal prosecution was nearly impossible.
There were no roads leading south from the basin, only trails. At least one yearly trip to the Union Pacific had to be made, though, because in the early 1880s this was the nearest railhead, the only real opening to a market to sell cattle and get supplies. E. W. Copps declared that the cattle drive from Buffalo to Rawlins, a trip that did not require a traverse of mountains, took eighteen days. Coming from the basin, however, a cattle owner first had to get out, and any exit required going over an 8,000-foot pass, such as Birdseye Pass or Cottonwood Pass; thus, David John Wasden's estimate of six weeks for a round trip seems about right. Of course, the return trip, when cattle were not being driven, did not take as long but was still arduous. Owen Wister describes a 263 mile excursion from Medicine Bow "deep into cattle land," a trip taking several days by wagon, while "swallowed in a vast solitude." His description sounds like a journey north into the Big Horn Basin.
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