Old Hwy 28 to Lemhi Pass in Salmon, ID

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Inscription: Lewis Learns from the Lemhi Shoshone Lewis and Clark in Lemhi County At the Lemhi Shoshone camp Lewis learned of the danger and hunger that threatened the tribe. He asked the chief about routes west, but Cameahwait's descriptions were discouraging: rocky rivers, deep canyons, terrible mountains. Lewis proposed an arrangement. If the Lemhis and their horses would help the Corps of Discovery cross the mountains, the explorers would complete their voyage to the Pacific and return home, and send traders with guns the Lemhis wanted for defense agains their enemies. But the Lemhi were suspicious of Lewis. Only a courageous few went east with Cameahwait to help the Expedition. "these people had been attacked by the Minetares of Fort de prarie (sic) this spring and about 20 of them killed and taken prisoners... to avoid their enemies they were obliged to remain in the interior of these mountains... sometimes living without meat and only a little fish roots and berries." - Meriwether Lewis, August 13, 1805 Inscription: Meriwether Lewis Makes Contact Lewis and Clark in Lemhi County Lewis's advance party entered the valley below in search of the Lemhi Shoshone, whose horses the Expedition would need to cross the mountains. The first Indians Lewis saw fled before he could reach them, but he soon came upon three women. When Lewis had won their confidence with gifts, they agreed to take the explorers to their camp. Alerted by the Lemhis who had seen Lewis earlier, sixty warriors galloped up, expecting to find enemy raiders. But when the women showed them the gifts they'd received, alarm turned to joy and the explorers were welcomed as honored guests. "I gave these women some beads a few mockerson awls some pewter looking-glasses and a little paint... I now painted their tawny cheeks with some vermillion, which with this nation is emblematic of peace." - Meriwether Lewis, August 13, 1805 Inscription: William Clark's Scouting Mission Lewis and Clark in Lemhi county Was the Salmon River as treacherous as Cameahwait, the Lemhi Shoshone chief, had said? Clark and eleven men had come to find out. Finding a navigable, westward-flowing river was the major objective of the Expedition at this time. Clark stayed in the Lemhi camp for several hours, smoking and talking with tribal leaders. He asked their help in portaging the Expedition's baggage across Lemhi Pass and left Sacajawea in the camp to help organize the effort. Then he set out down the river with "Toby," an older Lemhi man who had volunteered his services as guide. Toby would show the explorers just how bad it was downriver! "I informed the Indians (of)... our good intentions toward them (,) my concerns for their distressed situation... also... the object of my journey down the river and requested a guide to accompany me, all of which was repeited (sic) by the Chief to the whole village." - William Clark, August 20, 1805 Inscription: The Withington Caldera Lewis and Clark in Lemhi County About 50 million years ago, this was one of the most violent landscapes on Earth. A sub-surface mass of molten rock rose and subsided in cycles, spewing gas, mineral fragments and ash in explosions hundreds of times more powerful that an atomic bomb. When it was all over, igneous rock thousands of feet thick covered the land and there was a broad, shallow crater or caldera across the valley from this site. Geological forces that created the Beaverhead Mountains behind you the and Lemhi Range before you buckled the caldera beyond recognition but the rock it created is still visible. Inscription: Sacajawea Comes home  Lewis and Clark gave Sacajawea a miracle: a return home for the first time since her kidnapping several years earlier. She gave them as much: a Lemhi Shoshone interpreter and an advocate for the Expedition in buying Lemhi horses. It was a bittersweet homecoming. Yes, she was reunited with her brother, Cameahwait. But she learned that of the rest of her family, all but one other brother and a nephew were dead. She helped lead the effort to portage the explorers' baggage across Lemhi Pass. When the path was decided, she followed it with her husband, son, and new friends. "I left our interpreter and his woman to accompany the Indians to Capt Lewis tomorrow, the Day they told me they would Set out." - William Clark, August 20, 1805 Credit to: <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109459" target="" rel="">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109459</a> , <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=213343" target="" rel="">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=213343</a> , <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=231270" target="" rel="">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=231270</a> , <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109446" target="" rel="">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109446</a> , <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109445" title="Link: https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109445">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109445</a>

Sharkey Hot Springs

Inscription Rheumatism and Recreation Pioneer miner and rancher Frank B. Sharkey, who settled near this site in the 1870s, praised this sprig as he soaked in its soothing waters. Around 1890 Eleihu Barnes erected as shanty over the springs to keep the cows out. In the late 1920s Tom Benedict built an enclosed concrete pool remembered fondly as the "plunge." The site was abandoned in the late 1960s and the spring reverted to a "gross slimy hole." In 1973 the BLM burned the buildings and filled in the pool for safety reasons. Locals continued to use the area by engineering home made soaking tubs. On August 20, 2002, the BLM reopened Sharkey Hot Springs for present and future generations to enjoy. Pahgu-yuah (hot springs) of Puha pay (medicine water) were a sacred place for Lemhi Shoshone (…) cleanse and (…) and body Credit to: <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109462" title="Link: https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109462">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109462</a>

Lewis and Clark: Unfurling the Flag

Inscription The Corps of Discovery were the first U.S. citizens to reach the Northwest by land, strengthening the American claim established in 1792 when mariner Robert Gray discovered the Columbia River. When Lewis unfurled the Stars and Stripes, he made two different statements. To the Lemhi Shoshone people who lived here, the flag introduced a new nation to a remote tribe never before visited by Euro-Americans. For America's European rivals in the region - Spain, Russia, and Great Britain - Lewis's flag was another red, white and blue pin on the map. "we saw two women, a man, and some dogs on an eminence immediately before us... leaving my pack and rifle, I took the flag which I unfurled and advanced singly toward them..." - Meriwether Lewis, August 13, 1805 Credit to: <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109463">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109463</a>

Lewis and Clark: Which Way Did They Go?

Inscription Lewis and Clark fans love the sturdy the overland portion of the Trail in Montana and Idaho. There's little question about the route on the Missouri or Columbia rivers, but the mountains present challenges to explorers then and now. The evidence in the journals and maps can be value or contradictory. Doing what you're doing - looking at the terrain - may either resolve questions or suggest new alternatives. The route across (or through?) the Pattee Creek canyon below you is still debated today. But that's part of the magic of the Expedition: it's interactive. Anyone can join the Corps of Re-Discovery. "the road after leading us down a long descending valley for 2 Ms. Brought us to a large creek about ten yards wide: this we passed and on rising the hill beyond it had a view of a handsome little valley to our left of about a mile in width..." - Meriwether Lewis, August 13, 1805 Credit to: <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109478">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109478</a>

WestWard View

Inscription (first marker) "Immence Ranges of High Mountains Still to the West of Us..." - Meriwether Lewis, August 12, 1805 Filling in the Blanks The maps of North America carried by Lewis and Clark showed only a vast, uncharted space between the Mandan villages of the Missouri Rier and the Pacific Coast. The mountains separating the Missouri and Columbia river drainages were drawn as a single ridge. There was hope of finding a simple land route, or portage, over the Rocky Mountains. Map makers two hundred years ago did not know what the West was like. The modern map above is just a small slice of the United States along the Lewis and Clark Trail. Imagine trying to find you way across this land without such a map. Lewis and Clark, and many others who follow after them, have filled in the blanks for us. Inscription (second marker) A communication Across the Continent by water "...this I can scarcely hope..." Two days before reaching the Continental Divide, Meriwether Lewis speculated that the Columbia River would not have the same moderate character as the Missouri. “I do not beleive (sic) that the world can furnish an example of a river running to the extent which the Missouri and Jefferson’s rivers do through such a mountainous country and at the same time so navigable as they are. if the Columbia furnishes us such another example, a communication across the continent by water will be practicable and safe. but this I can scarcely hope from a knowledge of its having in it comparitively (sic) short course to the ocean the same number of feet to decend which the Missouri and Mississippi have from this point to the Gulph (sic) of Mexico.” -- Meriwether Lewis, August 10, 1805. Dividing the Waters of North America North America’s Rocky Mountains split the waters of the continent. To the east, the Missouri-Mississippi River system rolls placidly through the plains to the Gulf of Mexico. To the west, the Columbia River system roars to the Pacific through deep, narrow. How Did He Know? Lewis estimated the gradients of the two river systems by this formula: Gradient = "Rise" (Elevation)/"Run" (Distance) The Continental Divide at Lemhi Pass is 7,373 ft. above sea level. Water on its western slope runs about 600 miles to the Pacific Ocean. On the east side, water runs about 2,400 miles to the Gulf of Mexico. Having reached the headwaters of the rivers, Lewis could use the formula at the left to calculate river gradients. He suspected the gradient of the Columbia River would be about four times greater than that of the Missouri/Mississippi Rivers. As gradient increases, water flows faster. Lewis expected the rivers west of the Divide to be much swifter and more dangerous than the Missouri. Credit to: <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109542" target="" rel="">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109542</a>, <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109507">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109507</a>

Agency Creek / Lemhi Pass

Inscription First Taste of the Columbia "we proceeded on to the top of the dividing ridge from which I discovered immence ranges of high mountains still to the West of us with their tops partially covered with snow. I now decended the mountain about 3/4 of a mile which I found much steeper than on the opposite side, to a handsome bold running Creek of cold Clear water. here I first stated the water of the great Columbia river. First Camp on the Columbia "after a short halt of a few minutes we continued our march along the Indian road which lead us over steep hills and deep hollows to a spring on the side of a mountain where we found a sufficient quantity of dry willow brush for fuel, here we encamped for the night having traveled about 20 Miles." - Meriwether Lewis, August 12, 1805. Inscription Who passed this way? In August of 1805 members of the Lewis and Clark Expedition and Shoshone Indians crossed Lemhi Pass six times in 15 days. • Monday, the 12th --- Lewis, McNeal, Drouillard & Shields --- headed west • Thursday, the 15th --- Lewis & 3 men with Cameahwait & 60 Shoshones --- headed east • Monday, the 19th --- Clark & 11 men, Charbonneau, Sacajawea, Pomp, Cameahwait & Shoshones --- headed west • Wednesday, the 21st --- Charbonneau, Sacajawea, Pomp, Cameahwait & Shoshones --- headed east • Sunday, the 25th --- Shoshone messengers sent by Cameahwait --- headed west • Monday, the 26th ---Lewis and the main Expedition aided by Shoshones --- headed west Credit to: <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109543" target="" rel="">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=109543</a> , <a href="https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=110838" title="Link: https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=110838">https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=110838</a>

Old Hwy 28 to Lemhi Pass

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