Platte River - History

History

Varying cultures of indigenous peoples lived intermittently along the Platte for thousands of years before European exploration. Historical tribes claimed various territories in the region. The Indian tribes typically visited different areas in different seasons, as they followed the bison herds for hunting periods. The introduction of horses, which had escaped from early Spanish explorers in the 1540s, dramatically changed life in the Great Plains. Indian tribes could more easily follow the buffalo herds as they migrated from north to south and back. Before 1870, herds of several 100,000 buffalo periodically migrated across the Platte in following seasonal pasture. The animals often waded or swam across the Platte. The first-known European to see the Platte was the French explorer Étienne de Veniard, sieur de Bourgmont in 1714, who named it the Nebraskier, after its Oto name, meaning "flat water". The French later applied the French word plate (meaning flat, and pronounced plat, or platte) to the river.

Occupied by various Indian tribes for part of each year, the Platte River territory had been claimed by both Spanish and French explorers trying to rule the Great Plains. Spain had "claimed" all of the Great Plains after Coronado's 1541-42 expedition. Jose Naranjo, an African-Hopi who served as a Spanish scout and explorer in the Southwest, was a war captain of the Spanish Indian auxiliaries. By 1714 (the same year the French explorers "discovered" the Platte), he and a small exploration group from the south had reportedly already reached the Platte three times. He later guided the 1720 Villasur expedition to the area in a Spanish effort to stop French expansion onto the Great Plains. Naranjo and Villasur's party made the most northern of Spanish exploration trips into the central plains. A Pawnee and Otoe Indian attack defeated the Spanish forces; the survivors returned to Santa Fe, New Mexico, and the Spanish left the Great Plains to the American Indians.

As a result of the Seven Years War (1756–1763) (called the French and Indian War in America), the French ceded all of their lands in North America east of the Mississippi River to the British. The Spanish took over lands west of the Mississippi River. Since there were few fur-bearing animals on the Platte of interest to the fur traders, the French and British explorers and fur trappers ignored the Platte territory for some time. During the course of the Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815), France briefly reacquired the land west of the Mississippi River from Spain.

In 1804, Napoleon sold the area west of the Mississippi River to the US in the Louisiana Purchase; the US roughly doubled its area at a cost of about $15,000,000. In 1820 the U.S. Army ordered Major Stephen H. Long to explore and map the area around the Platte. Long reported the area as a great American "desert," ignoring that the "desert" provided habitat for more than a million buffalo and numerous American Indians had long lived in the area. As a result of his and other reports, the US initially had little interest in settling the land on the plains. The next "good" land was believed to be in Oregon or California, especially the coastal areas, and those were the destinations of most emigrant traffic. The Mormons settled Utah, largely due to religious persecution in eastern areas. Various gold and silver strikes attracted further emigration to nearly all western states.

The Native American trail west along the Platte, North Platte River and Sweetwater River was first written about after its discovery in 1811 by Wilson Price Hunt of the Astor Expedition. He was returning to the Missouri River posts from the newly established Fort Astoria on the Columbia River near the Pacific Ocean. Because few American trappers and settlers were then in the contested Oregon Territory, his trail discovery was little used and nearly forgotten.

In 1823 Jedediah Smith and several trappers "rediscovered" the route. The trail along the Platte, North Platte and Sweetwater rivers became a major route of fur traders to their summer Rocky Mountain Rendezvous. In 1824 fur trappers and traders directing mule trains carrying trade goods and supplies for the mountain men were some of the first European-American parties to use the trail. On their return trip, the fur traders carried out for furs destined for eastern markets. The fur trade route was used to about 1840.

By about 1832, the fur traders had improved the trail along the Platte, North Platte, and Sweetwater rivers to a rough wagon trail from the Missouri River to the Green River in Wyoming, where most of the Rocky Mountain Rendezvous were held. In 1834 Benjamin Bonneville, a US Army officer on leave, led an expedition to the west financed by John Jacob Astor. They took wagons along the Platte, North Platte and Sweetwater River trail to the Green River in present-day Wyoming. The notable author Washington Irving wrote an account of Bonneville's explorations in the west that made him well known in the US.

Following the fur traders, the major emigration trails established along the north and south banks of the Platte and North Platte River were the Oregon (1843–1869), California (1843–1869), Mormon (1847–1869) and the Bozeman (1863–68) trails. This network of trails, sometimes called the Emigrant Trails or the Great Platte River Road, all went west along both sides of the Platte River. The route along the Platte River included all these emigration trails and was developed as an important trail route used by migrant wagon trains for westward United States expansion after 1841. The settlement of the Oregon boundary dispute with Britain in 1846, the conclusion of the Mexican American War in 1848, and the California Gold Rush in 1849 and other gold and silver strikes rapidly attracted increased emigrant traffic west.

The Platte River in the future state of Nebraska and the North Platte River in Wyoming typically had many channels and islands. The waterways were often too shallow, crooked, muddy and unpredictable for a canoe to travel far. The Platte River valley provided an easily passable wagon corridor; it sloped gradually up in height as it went almost due west from the Missouri. The Platte route had access to water, grass, buffalo and buffalo 'chips,' which the Indians and emigrants used as fuel for fires. Long Native American use had created trails on both sides of the muddy, about 1 mile (1.6 km) wide and shallow (2 inches (5.1 cm) to 60 inches (150 cm)) Platte River. The Platte's water was silty and bad tasting, but it was usable if no other water was available. Emigrants learned to let it sit in a bucket for an hour or so to settle most of the silt. The trail(s) through the Platte River Valley extended about 450 miles (720 km) in the present state of Nebraska. Nearly all the trails from the Missouri converged on the Platte River at or before Fort Kearny in mid-state Nebraska. Historians have estimated about 400,000 emigrants followed the trails along the Platte.

The Pony Express, operational from 1860–61, and the First Transcontinental Telegraph, completed in 1861, both followed the earlier emigrant trails along the Platte. The completion of the telegraph put the Pony Express out of business as it could provide much faster east-west communication. In 1866 the Union Pacific portion of the first transcontinental railroad was constructed along the Platte River as it started west from Omaha. In the 20th century, the Lincoln Highway and later Interstate 80 were constructed through the Platte valley. The highways parallel the Platte and the North Platte through much of Nebraska.

Many of Nebraska’s larger cities originated on or near the Platte River, as it was the first path of transportation. These include Omaha (est. 1854), Fort Kearny (est. 1848), Grand Island (est. 1857) and North Platte (est. 1869). In 1859 settlers built the first irrigation ditch to divert water from the Platte for farming.