Texas Jack by Matthew Kerns

Author:Matthew Kerns
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: TwoDot
Published: 2021-03-02T00:00:00+00:00

“I had, moreover,” he continued, “heard the district spoken of as an excellent game-producing country; and pursuit of large game is to me a great delight: but it was less for any special design of hunting than for the satisfaction of my curiosity and the gratification of my sightseeing instincts that I really decided to attempt the trip.”4

Lord Dunraven was not alone in his desire to “sight see” in the young Yellowstone Park. Newly established by President Grant in 1872, the park was already attracting many such curious tourists. John Colter—an early mountain man and member of the famous Lewis and Clark Expedition—had become one of the first white men to enter the area in the winter of 1807 when he explored parts of the region on a trip to establish a trade partnership with the Crow (Apsáalooke) nation. After wandering unguided for months through a region with typical nighttime temperatures around -30 degrees Fahrenheit, Colter appeared at Fort Raymond, having traveled hundreds of miles. With his descriptions of steaming geysers, bubbling mud pots, and sulphurous springs, Colter was taken as a lunatic, and contemporary reports jokingly referred to his discovery as “Colter’s Hell.” Modern assessments of Colter’s descriptions put his travels near present-day Cody, Wyoming.

In 1856 Jim Bridger reported seeing mountains of glass and yellow rocks, boiling springs, and spouting water in the same region, but was widely ignored due to his established reputation as a foremost “spinner of yarns” and the inaccessibility of the area. The beginning of the Civil War ensured that no explorations could be mounted until 1869, when the Cook-Folsom-Peterson Expedition followed the Yellowstone River to Yellowstone Lake.

A year later, Montana’s surveyor-general, Henry Washburn, along with Nathaniel P. Langford and a detachment of the US Army, spent a month collecting specimens, naming landmarks, and exploring the area. The efforts of these men, as well as geological surveys by Ferdinand V. Hayden, paintings by Thomas Moran, and photographs by William Henry Jackson, led President Grant to sign The Act of Dedication declaring the area the nation’s first national park, after Congress agreed to withdraw the land from public auction.

Nathaniel “National Park” Langford was appointed as superintendent of the park, but without the benefit of funding, staff, or salary, he was left without the means to spend time there. Over the course of five years as the park’s superintendent, N. P. Langford managed to visit the Yellowstone area just twice. The creation of the park had piqued the curiosity of the nation, but the lack of resources meant that the land visitors traveled to see was truly wild. There were no maps, no permanent roads, and no protection from the threats of wild animals, treacherous terrain, and hostile Indians that might be encountered within the confines of the park.

“My first act after making up my mind to undertake the trip to Geyserland,” wrote Dunraven, “was to write my old friend, hunting companion and guide, Mr. John Omohundro, better known as Texas Jack, and endeavor to secure his services for the expedition.

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