I’m reading “Undaunted Courage,” the story of the Lewis and Clark expedition by Stephen Ambrose. My journey by bus will parallel their expedition's route as I go from Buffalo south to Chicago, then north to Minneapolis, Fargo and Bismark. I’ll be practically tracing their path through Montana, Idaho and Washington State.
Ambrose writes that in 1803, people knew that the Pacific Coast lay 2,000 miles west of the Mississippi River, which at that time formed the westernmost boundary of America. But people knew almost nothing of the territory within those 2,000 miles. There was a suspicion of a mountain range, which the most scientific people of the day thought were as high as the Appalachians. They knew of a river called the Colorado, and another, discovered by the British, called the Columbia. Thomas Jefferson knew of the existence of the Missouri River, which empties into the Mississippi River at St. Louis. But nobody knew where the Missouri River went, or if it was navigable, of if the land was suited to agriculture, or anything about the Native American tribes who lived along it.
Rivers were the highways of America in 1803. Most roads were impassable to wagons and stagecoaches – goods moved most easily by water. So finding out if the Missouri was navigable, and if it connected with the Pacific Ocean, was crucial information to President Jefferson. His American dream was expansion to the Pacific Coast, even though the British, the French and the Spanish had claims on the unknown territory, forming obstacles to his dream.
Meriwether Lewis and William Clark were willing to risk everything in order to explore it. Planning and packing for the trip took Lewis several years. Once he crossed the Mississippi, he could not drop into a store and buy cough syrup if he needed it, as I will be able to do on my trip. He had to carry everything that he could imagine might be necessary. And he didn’t know all that might be necessary because he had never been in this territory before, nor had any other white man. He was a long-time woodsman, frontiersman, and Army officer, however, so he had ideas -- but no sure knowledge -- of what he would need.
One of his most important priorities, set by President Jefferson, was journaling about what he learned about soil conditions and rainfall (to know if the land was farmable), to map the Missouri River (to know if farm produce could be transported on it), and to write down what he learned about the customs, religions, and herbal knowledge of the Native Americans.
Ambrose said Lewis ran out of tobacco and whiskey and other items during the expedition. But he returned with enough ink to have taken notes on a whole new, similar trip. As a writer, I approve of Lewis’s priorities.
And I'll be reporting on a continent that is unknown to me. I've flown across it twice, but going mile by mile in a bus will be completely different. It will give me a sense of the size of America. And as I talk to people in each town and city, I hope to know the size of its heart.
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