Wagons of the West

There was great rejoicing within the walls of Fort Phil Kearny when the wagons of Gilmore and Porter's bull train came into view in June of 1867. It had been a long hard winter for the soldiers. The massacre and mutilation of nearly 100 of their comrades while on patrol in December had been heavy on the minds of all at that isolated post deep in hostile Sioux Indian country. Adding to Gilmore and Porter's welcome at the post was news that the wagons contained not only much needed provisions but also 700 of the new .50 caliber Springfield breechloading rifles and 100,000 rounds of ammunition. These were the first breechloaders to reach Western army posts.

The arrival of the wagons had a further interest for the post's commander, General Wessels. Logs were needed to strengthen and enlarge the post, and a supply of cordwood must be put in against the rigors of the coming winter. After some hesitation Gilmore and Porter agreed to cut and haul this wood from a forest of pine trees about six miles from the fort.

Few Indians had been seen since the December massacre. However, a company of soldiers was detailed to guard the woodcutters and escort the wagons from the pine grove to the fort.

At the woodcutting camp, the wagon boxes were removed from the running gear as it was easier to haul long logs on the cross beams. These 14 wagon boxes were arranged in an oval to form a corral into which the animals could be driven at night.

All went well for about a month, but on August 2 the 32 men at the wood camp became involved in one of the most desperate battles in the annals of the West. It was barely light when a large mounted group of Sioux was spotted on a ridge beyond the camp. By prearranged plan, the woodcutters and soldiers took cover at the wagon box corral. If there was any doubt of the Indians' intentions it was soon dispelled. Thegreat horde of Sioux, led by Red Cloud, their bodies painted white, green and yellow, seemed to come over the ridge in endless numbers. The plain near the corral came alive with mounted Indians, loosing flights of arrows at the men in the corral, and filling the air with their war cries. It was an awesome and fearful sight. Between two and three thousand Sioux seemed about to engulf a handful of men forted up behind a few wagon boxes. The outcome appeared inevitable, but the 32 men led by Captain James W. Powell had decided to sell their lives dearly.

They were armed with the new fastshooting "trap-door" Springfield breechloading rifle. Instead of the slow, tedious loading of the old muzzleloaders, all the men had to do now was flip up the breech and quickly slip in a fresh cartridge. Six hours after the start of the battle 300 of the attackers were dead. The Sioux's repeated attacks had been successfully repulsed. The beleaguered camp was eventually reached by a relief force from the fort, supported by muledrawn ambulances and wagons. Three of Captain Powell's men had given their lives.

Six hours after the start of the battle 300 of the attackers were dead. The Sioux's repeated attacks had been successfully repulsed. The beleaguered camp was eventually reached by a relief force from the fort, supported by muledrawn ambulances and wagons. Three of Captain Powell's men had given their lives.

The battle was a turning point in the Indian war along the Bozeman Trail. Known as "The Wagon Box Fight" it represented three of the major factors that brought civilization to the West wagons, effective weapons, and courageous men.

Our narrative is concerned with the wagons, the use to which they were put, and the people who used them. It may be well to look back a bit to the ancestry of the wagons of the West.

Pennsylvania artisans such as those who had made history with their long "Kentucky rifles" are a part of that ancestry. They devoted their skills to the large vehicle usually drawn by six heavy horses. It was somewhat sway-backed in appearance with high panelled sides and outward slanting ends. It had a heavy "linsey-woolsey" cloth cover supported on cross ribs and drawn together at the front and back. Traditionally the running gear was painted red and the wagon bed (box) blue. The boat-like, curved underline and higher ends of the Conestoga were designed to keep the heavy loads from shifting while going up or down hills.

There was something majestic in the progress of these ponderous wagons, moving slowly along with the rhythmic pounding of hooves, the rumble of wheels, the creaking of harness, and the tinkle of bells suspended above the hames on the collar of each horse. Conestoga wagons, probably the first distinctive type developed in America, deserve their own story, which is told in Conestoga Wagon 1750-1850 by George Shumway and Howard C. Fry. Our immediate concern is the role or influence Conestoga wagons had beyond the Mississippi.

"Prairie schooners," the popular name given to wagons of the westward emigrants, while perhaps getting their name from the schooner-like rounded lines of the Conestoga, are not necessarily Conestogas. Some Conestoga wagons were used, but usually these big Pennsylvania turnpike vehicles were too heavy for travel across the plains. The Conestoga was replaced by a different style of wagon, many made in Pittsburgh, some in St. Louis, and in various other places. Features of the Conestogas were incorporated in the manufacture of many of the lighter wagons, so they were not without influence.

The first major wagon road established across the prairies west of the Mississippi was the Santa Fe Trail. The Louisiana Purchase, approved in 1803, opened the way. Captain William Becknell, is usually conceded to be the father of the Santa Fe Trail, after covering the

ground with pack mules in 1821. On his return trip, with his trade goods loaded in wagons, he proved that one large wagon could hold almost as much as a whole train of pack animals and you didn't have to unload it every night. By this time Mexico had declared its independence from Spain, and there was gold and silver waiting in Santa Fe as well as beaver pelts to exchange for the various goods and wares heretofore available there only through long treks to Chihuahua, Mexico. Clumsy woodenwheeled carts were the major conveyances of the New Mexicans.

There was little or no iron in the handmade carts (carretas) the New Mexicans had been using ever since Capitan Juan de Oñate led a train of carts into the Rio Grande valley in 1598. The solid wood wheels were usually made from the trunk sections of large cottonwood trees. Treks to Chihuahua hauling supplies in the rickety, creaking carts were hard, time-consuming journeys through dangerous Indian country. Goods brought to their front door by the American traders were a welcome change.

As news of the Santa Fe trade spread, more and more wagons traveled from their starting points on the Missouri River, westward over the various western branches of the trail into Santa Fe. One of the best chroniclers of this early trade is Josiah Gregg who first started his wagons on the first of their numerous journeys down the trail in 1831. His book Commerce of the Prairies is considered a primary source of information.

Gregg tells us that a few light Dearborn wagons came into use, but most wagons used on the Santa Fe Trail were manufactured in Pittsburgh. These trailblazers of commerce were the highsided freighting type with covers of a coarse fabric called "Osnaburg sheets." Usually the motive power was an eight to twelve span of mules or oxen. The oxen were favored. Indians had less interest in the oxen than mules or horses, and they were cheaper. Oxen were less excitable, had a tough hide, could sustain themselves on the prairie grasses along the way, and had fewer diseases. Also, the oxen harness was much cheaper than that for mules. The ox was an all-purpose animal a source of motive power, meat, leather, lubricants and adhesives; his horns had various uses from holding gunpowder, to drinking cups or trumpets.

"Bull-whackers" traditionally carried a 15 to 18-foot whip and possessed a colorful, if unprintable, vocabulary (of which the less offensive words were "gee" for a turn to right and "haw" for a turn to the left). He usually walked near his high wheeler and kept his animals in line by his voice commands and the popping of his bullwhip. The Santa Fe Trail proved to be a great training ground for the many trails that lay ahead.

By the mid-1840s, just when the Santa Fe trade was doing well, we found ourselves in a bitter war with Mexico. The Southwest and California were the prizes at stake, and in 1846 the First Dragoons, led by General Stephen W. Kearny, accompanied by a great muledrawn wagon train, swept into New Mexico. They had little opposition, the New Mexicans having long been disenchanted with their government in faraway Mexico City.

Kearny decided to leave his wagons in Santa Fe and proceed rapidly across New Mexico and Arizona to California by horse and pack train, sending back word as to the best route for a following road-building force.

The man selected to undertake the road-building job across the deserts and mountains from Santa Fe to San Diego was a young captain named Philip St. George Cooke. A major part of Cooke's force was made up of Mormons, who, at the urging of their new leader, Brigham Young, agreed to go to New Mexico and help build the first road to California, in return for soldier's wages, rations and the right to keep, on discharge in California, the weapons issued to them. Cooke's force became known as "The Mormon Battalion."

Great hardships and problems were experienced by Cooke and his men. Leaving Santa Fe on October 21, 1846, Cooke had 448 men, 6 large carts, 12 mule-drawn wagons and a few lighter vehicles. With a somewhat depleted force he finally made his way to the San Pedro River in southeastern Arizona, then into Tucson, up to the Pima Villages, along the Gila to Yuma, across the California desert, up the grade to Warner's Ranch, and thence to San Diego, which was reached on January 29, 1847.

Cooke, later a colonel, wrote: "History will search in vain for an equal march of infantry. They had opened the first wagon road through the Southwest to California. It was used by thousands of emigrants in following years, and as a practical railroad route was one of the reasons of the Gadsden Purchase."

This road-building march of Cooke's Mormon Battalion proved the feasibility of an all-year transcontinental road. Later, parts of the road were used for the first transcontinental stagecoach line and the carrying of coast-to-coast mail.

When Cooke arrived at his San Diego destination the conquest of California was nearly complete. This conquest led to one of the greatest migrations of all time when gold was discovered in the millrace at Sutter's Mill by John Marshall, a skilled wagonmaker from New Jersey who had succumbed to the lure of Western adventure.

At this time there was an economic recession in the East. Free rich land in the Territories and gold in California gave great impetus to the "Go West" spirit and the hope that a richer life might await at the end of the trail.

This mass migration to the West, over routes that became known as the Santa Fe Trail, the Oregon Trail, the Mormon or Salt Lake Trail, the California Trail, and other lesser-known routes, involved wagons.

A fair question needing an answer is: "Where were all these wagons to be found?" The Conestogas were made in the Lancaster region of Pennsylvania, a modification of the Conestogas called "Pitt wagons" were made in Pittsburgh, and as early as 1813 a young man named Downing had begun to make fine wagons in Concord, New Hampshire. There were small wagonmaking shops scattered throughout the East.

By 1830 well over a half million people had swarmed into Ohio and even more into Indiana and Illinois. Wisconsin and Missouri had begun to enjoy a rapid population growth. Wagon-makers in all these areas contributed to the supply of prairie schooners, freight-ing wagons, army supply wagons and ambulances, and some lighter vehicles. The trade of the wainwright and wheel-wright began to boom.

Much of the country east of the Mississippi was farm country and farmers needed wagons. It was no great task to alter the design of a farm wagon or a Conestoga to a prairie schooner. The basic running gear and wheels were the most vital parts.

Wagon builders often used the deep body and hooded top design of the Conestoga but the prairie schooner had to be lighter; provision must be made for a high driver's seat so that he could survey the land ahead, and seats for women, children and older members of a party must be provided. Colors were toned down to a less-conspicuous brown or dark green. The "covered wagon" or "prairie schooner" had to be a combination of many things, providing the facilities of a chuck wagon, a sleeping car, and a freight wagon.

Joseph Murphy of St. Louis became famous for his big wagons especially favored by freighters. Louis Espenscheid, also of St. Louis; Bain of Keno-sha, Wisconsin; Schuttler in Jackson, Michigan; Mitchell, Wilson, Studebaker and Deere eventually became names to reckon with in the wagon trade.

This quotation from the journals of pioneer Albert J. Dickson is of particular interest: "Most of the trailers, like ourselves, used ordinary wagons, though many of the Murphy type with high flaring boxes were in evidence. Wagon-making, even with primitive tools, was still important as a home craft. One of our own wagons was homemade. During the winter when work was slack, it was not an uncommon sight to see a man who was handy with tools at work on his wagon. A good homemade wagon was often hard to tell from a 'boughten' one . . . Hardwood timbers for axles, bolsters and other heavy parts were hewn with a broad axe and shaped with a drawing knife. Swamp oak was the toughest wood for the purpose. Hubs were hewn from the block and dressed down to shape. For these, Osage orangewood was a favorite material."

Our Western voyagers, in homemade wagons or "boughten" ones, assembled into groups at such jumping-off places as St. Joseph, Fort Leavenworth, Independence, or possibly Westport (later Kansas City, Missouri).

There were hot deserts to cross, snow in the mountains, rivers to ford or ferry, uncertain forage for the animals (including milk cows and sheep often accompanying the wagons), drought or floods, rattlesnakes, prairie fires, buffalo stampedes, wagon breakdowns, the possibility of dreaded cholera, and of course the dangers posed by Indians.

In the other hand there might be plentiful spring grasses if the travelers were wise and started early in the year. Buffalo, antelope and deer, passenger pigeons and sage grouse might be easily found for the pot. Much of the route lay along the easy course of the Platte River. The golden lands of the West lay at the foot of that beautiful rainbow on the far horizon!

Some found the hardships and dangers too great and turned back; the more determined went on. Emigrants who were firmly determined to run the gantlet of the dangers had to be protected along the trails. Thus came into being important army and trading posts in the then unorganized and unnamed territories west of the Mississippi, such as Bent's Fort, Fort Union, Fort Kearny (not to be confused with Fort Phil Kearny), Fort Laramie, Fort Bridger and Fort Hall. All these posts depended on wagons for supply and support.

who were firmly determined to run the gantlet of the dangers had to be protected along the trails. Thus came into being important army and trading posts in the then unorganized and unnamed territories west of the Mississippi, such as Bent's Fort, Fort Union, Fort Kearny (not to be confused with Fort Phil Kearny), Fort Laramie, Fort Bridger and Fort Hall. All these posts depended on wagons for supply and support.

Problems of supply and support differed in each area. The army relied on private freighting contractors for major supplies. The greatest of these contractors was the firm of Russell, Majors and Waddell, headquartered at Fort Leavenworth. It is claimed at one time they possessed over 500 freighting wagons and 7,500 oxen; they employed about 1,600 bullwhackers along with scouts, herdsmen, wagon masters and clerks. Their wagons transported many thousands of pounds of supplies a year, not only to army posts but also to Indian reservations.

The freighting wagons traveled in great trains for efficiency and protection. Special wagons were fitted with provisions for the men, cooking utensils, medicines, lanterns, wagon jacks, rope, pulleys, ox shoes, extra wheels, spokes and tires, bars of iron, tools and even a small forge. Under every wagon hung the grease or tar buckets. In themselves the large wagon trains were a small-self-contained army. Outriders on horses were a customary requisite. Travel varied from 10 to about 15 miles a day, and the wagons could carry loads up to 6,500 pounds or more. Each night the wagons were drawn into a tight circle.

These wagons were usually straight-sided, high-sided, canvas-covered vehicles of heavy construction with high wheels and broad tires. Sometimes two wagons were coupled together and pulled by an increased number of oxen or mules. There was relative but not strict uniformity in the construction and design of the "freighters."

Uniformity, however, was the watch-word of the army. Government specifications for the Six Mules Army Wagon, the Two or Four Horse or Mule Wagon, The Dougherty Spring Wagon, and the Ambulance Wagon, involved 38 pages of details and 27 pages of drawings. Ash, white oak, hickory and elm were the woods specified for various parts of the army wagons. The mule seemed to be traditional with the army as a draft or pack animal, being used at Western posts almost exclusively.

The six-mule wagon was a primary support and long-distance supply wagon for the army in the field. It weighed about 1,950 pounds. The smaller twoor four-horse (mule) wagons weighed about 1,500 pounds. All the types of army wagons mentioned here were topped with heavy canvas and had brakes of one kind or another.

The Dougherty wagon was a lighter vehicle usually drawn by four mules. It was designed as a traveling wagon for officers and their families or for carrying mail, the paymaster, or light express. It was equipped with three seats, roll-down duck curtains, a covered luggage boot at the rear, and could accommodate five persons plus the driver. In the army-oriented early writings of Martha Summerhayes and Josephine Clifford, the Dougherty type and other light wagons are referred to as "ambulances." Wagons of the Dougherty type had folding seats and on occasion could be turned into an ambulance in the sense we usually regard one.

From the ambulance, army wagon, and wagons of the emigrant trains, focus changed to a new Western form of transportation in the 1850s. San Francisco, San Jose, Sacramento, Stockton and Marysville began to bustle with activity; there was great need for an express, mail and passenger service between these towns and up into the mining areas such as Angel's Camp, Placerville and other settlements where hundreds of Argonauts were grubbing for gold.

The first stage line was run from San Jose to San Francisco in late 1849. It used a rather crude wagon compared to the handsome Concord coaches that arrived in San Francisco in June of 1850 after a long trip by clipper ship around Cape Horn.

While the "Concord coaches," made by Abbot-Downing Company of Concord, New Hampshire, attained the greatest fame, there were good coaches made by other firms that saw service in the West also; many were made in Troy, New York. Beazie & Barnard, established in 1815; Thomas Williams 1815; Orsamus Eaton 1820; Uri Gilbert-1831 (became a partner of Eaton in 1844); were all famous Troy wagon, coach and carriage makers.

It was claimed that more than 5,000 stages built in Troy, were in use in the United States, Canada, Mexico and South America, by the 1850s.

The story of the express companies and stagecoach lines in the 1850-80 period is a fascinating and somewhat complicated one. Adams and Company, founded in 1849, the early leader in the express field, failed during the panic of 1855. Wells, Fargo appeared in 1852 and proceeded to dominate the express and banking field. Today, Wells Fargo Bank is a prominent institution in San Francisco and its history room a source of fascinating displays and information for those interested in the gold rush period.

The number of stagecoach lines mushroomed in the 1850s but many of these were merged into the California Stage Company, which carried most of the Wells, Fargo business, or were absorbed into the Pioneer Stage Line.

The drivers were a special breed, often called “jehus” (from the Hebrew and meaning a fast, reckless driver). One such was Hank Monk who gave Horace Greeley the ride of his life. They had an unusual vocabulary, too. One passenger described it as “a language that placed blasphemy as a comparative light offence!” Skill went along with the language, however, and it was said by him that “more skill was necessary to drive a stage down the Sierra than to be a member of Congress!” Roads were improved, bridges built and ferries established, much of it by private enterprise. Despite the efforts of highwaymen like Tom Bell, Black Bart and Dutch Kate, the stage lines prospered. James E. Birch and Frank Stevens became top men in the industry.

Probably the two best-known coaches in Western use were the nine and the six-seated Concords and the less pretentious passenger wagons popularly known as “mud wagons.” In addition to the rated capacity the coaches hauled as many additional passengers as wished to brave a precarious seat on the top.

The “mud wagon” models were lighter, with roll-down curtains on the sides and a flatter underbody. They had a boot in the rear and space under the high driver's seat for baggage, as in the Concord models, and likewise were suspended on thoroughbraces (strips of leather attached to brackets fore and aft which tended to absorb and cradle the shocks of the rough roads). This thoroughbrace suspension made it easier on passengers and horses alike.

Concord coaches were destined to play very important roles in history; they were to carry passengers and mail on the trans-Mississippi leg of the first through-service from east to west over the route of the Overland Mail Company, generally called the Butterfield Route. John Butterfield's company had won the government's mail contract September 16, 1857. Throughout the entire life of the stagecoach lines, mail contracts were a vital element.

The Butterfield Route was somewhat controversial. Arguments in favor noted that it was the best all-year route that could be found. Arguments against claimed that the 25-day run was too long, passed through hot, hostile Indian country with little along the route but rattlesnakes and Gila monsters. However, the postmaster general was a Southerner and he wanted one of the two starting points to be Memphis; Tipton, Missouri, at the end of the rail line, was to be the other eastern terminus. The two branches were converged at Fort Smith; thence the course proceeded in a southwesterly direction via Forts Washita, Belknap and Chadbourne, to Franklin (El Paso). From the Rio Grande the route followed a generally westerly direction through Apache Pass, Tucson, the Pima Villages and on down the Gila River to Fort Yuma. Crossing the sand dunes westward the road finally climbed up out of the desert to Warner's Ranch and then turned in a northwesterly direction to Los Angeles and on to San Francisco.

By September 16, 1858, all was ready for the first runs, one coach to start at the western terminus and one at the eastern. Approximately 250 coaches and mail wagons had been obtained, 141 stations had been built, wells dug, roads improved, 1,800 horses and mules placed in stations.

Despite the relatively short time allowed for these exhaustive preparations, the stages started on time with a whoop and a clatter and went on to build one of the best, if short-lived, stage line records in history.

While the Butterfield stages provided the first transcontinental mail and passenger service, it was not the first line through Arizona. An earlier contract had been awarded to the San Antonio & San Diego Mail Line (SA&SD) to run a semi-monthly service between those two points. Numerous problems confronted the company. At first pack mules were used, which caused it to be dubbed "The Jackass Mail," but in 1857 25 Concord coaches were put on the route. The schedule was erratic and plagued with Indian trouble. After the Butterfield line was established, some sections of the SA & SD Mail Line were abandoned; others were maintained, however, until 1861.

In 1861 the Civil War came over the Western horizon. It was not long before the Butterfield line was cut by Confederate forces; all operations on this southern route were suspended and equipment removed to prevent its capture. The next wagons to come over the Butterfield route were the 200 army wagons accompanying General Carle-ton's California Volunteers who pro-ceeded to drive Confederate forces back into Texas and secure the territory now within the states of Arizona and New Mexico for the Union.

With the southern stagecoach route cut, the Federal government's attention turned to a central route connecting California with the Midwest and North-ern states.

Few appropriations had been made by the government to build a network of good roads along the central route, interest there primarily having centered on plans for building a transcontinental railroad. Numerous surveys had been made with that purpose in mind. It is to these various surveys that the subsequent development of Western wagon roads owes much. The U.S. Topograph-ical Engineers played a vital role and among the many surveys or expeditions we must recall Lewis and Clark, Zebulon M. Pike, Stephen H. Long, John C. Fre-mont, William H. Emory, Andrew S. Gray, Howard Stansbury, Dr. F. V. Hayden, Clarence King, John Wesley Powell, George M. Wheeler, Edward F. Beale and others. The work of these men was helped by fearless early adven-turers like Jim Bridger, Kit Carson, James Ohio Pattie, Jedediah Smith, Ewing Young, Peter Ogden, Joseph Reddeford Walker, Pauline Weaver, Old Bill Williams and men of their trail-wise backgrounds.

The building of wagon roads lagged until after the severing of the Butterfield route. However, it was not too long before stages were covering the road to Salt Lake City and on into California.

Stage lines, freighting and express progressed into big business, with investments of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Struggles for control left in their wake the fading of Russell, Majors and Waddell and Butterfield, with Ben Hol-laday rising to control of staging throughout the West. Holladay was a shrewd and practical man who grew up in Missouri. He had served in the crew of freighting trains and in one way or another built up a great freighting and stagecoach line operation. He was a great manipulator. He soon foresaw a lessening role for the staging and freighting business with the linking of the east-west rail lines (which were creeping toward a meeting at Promontory Point) and in 1866 retired from the field with over a million dollars in pocket, leaving Wells, Fargo in control. Wells, Fargo soon thereafter ordered more fine Concord coaches.

The Concord [California] Daily Mirror on April 15, 1868, recorded: "A novel sight was presented in the Concord Railroad Yard, at noon Wednesday, in the shape of a special train of 15 long platform cars, containing 30 elegant coaches from the world-renowned carriage manufactory of Messrs. Abbot, Downing & Co., and four long box cars, containing 60 four horse set harnesses from James R. Hill & Co.'s celebrated harness manufactory, and spare work for repairing the coaches, such as bolts, hubs, spokes, thoroughbraces, etc., all consigned to Wells, Fargo & Co., Omaha and Salt Lake City, the whole valued at $45,000 perhaps. It is probably the largest lot of coaches ever sent from one manufactory at one time.

"The coaches are finished in a superior manner, the bodies red, and the running part yellow. Each door has a

The handmade carts of the Metis and other buffalo hunters found the going rough over roadless prairies. FREDERICK REMINGTON A handsome picture, mostly landscapes, and no two of the 60 are alike. They are gems of beauty, and would afford study for hours. They were painted by Mr. J. Burgum.

When the transcontinental rail line was completed in 1869 and branch lines pushed their rails outward, the stagecoach and freighting business began to wane, but feeder lines continued in the West a generation or more after the wagons had disappeared in the East.

Some stage lines, active in Arizona, continued to make history as the 19th century drew toward a close. A holdup of the stage to Tombstone stirred up a great controversy as to whether it was actually engineered by some of the socalled "good guys" (the Earps and Doc Holliday) or the "bad guys" (the Clanton gang).

There was violence, too, in Southwest freighting. In the 1860-1870 era Tully & Ochoa, operators of the largest freighting enterprise from Santa Fe to Tucson, employed hundreds of men. Their wagons carried merchandise through hostile Apache country that involved constant vigilance and the facing of frequent attack.

One of the most vicious and destructive Apache attacks on a Tully & Ochoa freighting train occurred on May 10, 1869. Early that day their train of nine wagons and 80 mules bound for Fort Grant with government supplies was attacked by 200 Apache as the train was proceeding along the Canada del Oro on the north side of the Santa Catalina Mountains.

Santa Cruz Castenada, an experienced wagon master, quickly circled his wagons, corralled his animals and with the 13 other freighters in his party prepared for a desperate fight. In one of the wagons was a small cannon. How effectively it was used is not known, but it is believed to have been the first time a cannon was used in Arizona in an Indian attack.

The battle raged all day, the desperate freighters forced to keep up a steady barrage to prevent their being swarmed over by the Apaches. Toward evening, when the freighters were nearly out of ammunition seven cavalrymen enroute to Tucson from Fort Grant came upon the scene and fought their way to join the embattled men.

Three of Castenada's men had been killed, their ammunition was nearly gone, and the cavalrymen had only a meagre supply. Two of the cavalrymen were wounded. There was no alternative but to abandon the wagons and the live-stock and escape the best they could. This they accomplished, the Indians being in no mood for close pursuit now that they had the wagon train.

The old pueblo of Tucson became a vital crossroads for the freighting lines and stagecoaches, and gradually grew into an important commercial center. Drawn to the American freedoms and the new business opportunities above the border were many enterprising families of Spanish lineage. Among these was the Ronstadt family.

Now long prominent in Arizona, the Ronstadts have been engaged in many enterprises, but here we shall recount only the endeavors of Fred Ronstadt who became a leading wagon manufacturer of the Territory.

Although Dalton & Vasquez and Charles Etchells must be included among the Old Pueblo's wagon makers, Fred Ronstadt's wagons have won the greatest recognition in the history of Arizona wagonmaking.

It was an uphill climb for Ronstadt. Coming to Tucson from Magdalena in the 1880s, he had little capital, but was a man of exceptional talent. The Ronstadt wagon business grew and the facilities expanded. From the wagon shop came carriages of all kinds, from delivery wagons to stagecoaches. The best Norway iron was used along with seasoned second-growth hickory and yellow poplar. Hand forgings were employed, and the wagons were painted, hand rubbed and varnished like highquality furniture.

Today Ronstadt's sons still carry on in the old tradition. No longer are wagons on the showroom floor, but you can find just about anything you need in hardware, household utensils and ranch supplies.

Mid-19th century emigrants had a choice of trails to take to the West.

The story of wheeled vehicles in the West is almost impossible to tell in a strictly chronological order, so I will backtrack a bit to treat several wheeled types which differ from the major categories of freighting, army, stagecoach and prairie schooner wagons.

Brigham Young actually used 73 four-wheeled wagons in his march from Nauvoo, Illinois, to Salt Lake City in 1847. The two-wheeled carts, of which such a fine heroic statue stands in Temple Square at Salt Lake City, were used primarily by a later group of Mormon converts on their hard trek to join the Saints in Utah.

We have discussed the crude carts used by the New Mexicans as early as the 16th century. Another crude home-made type of cart was popular with the Metis (half-breeds) on the Canadian border in the early 1800s. They were used often in the gathering of buffalo hides. Lesser known is a type of cart known as a “charette” used by the French and pictured in Alfred Jacob Miller's early painting titled “Landing Charettes.” American buffalo hunters in the 1870s also used carts to carry their hides and buffalo bones to the nearest shipping points. Dump carts were employed extensively in grading for railroads and wagon roads. Later, training carts were used to break horses to harness, and there were two-wheeled vehicles used for many purposes. Probably the most famous was the one-horse shay as immortalized in Oliver Wendell Holmes' poem “The Deacon's Master-piece.” After the war between the states, when buffalo hunting brought near-extinction for that great beast, new herds of horned beasts appeared and munched the prairie grasses. Up from Texas came cattle drives that would have been almost impossible if it were not for the chuck and supply wagons that accompanied them. All activity centered around the chuck wagon. Here was the bacon, beans and coffee, a fire around which to thaw cold bodies and a place to swap lies. Here were the bedrolls to ease aching and weary muscles.The chuck wagon was made on the lines of an ordinary farm wagon except for the rear end. Here an upright box-like section with drawers and shelves held various utensils and supplies of the cook's trade. The tall tailgate face of the box could be let down, and supported by a leg, or legs, it became a work table. A canvas flap was usually suspended above the table to protect the cook in hot or wet weather. Water barrels, bed-rolls, extra saddles, tools and suppliesof various kinds were carried in or on the chuck wagon, driven by the cook, and a supply wagon driven by the “cook's louse” (not a very endearing term for cook's helper).

Soon after the cattle came sheep, and with them a different kind of wagon. In effect this was a pioneer model of the modern mobile home. It was canvas topped, the sides extending outward above the wheels. A smokestack came up through the roof. Inside were the stove for cooking or heat, the bed, and supplies. Sheepherders often kept their lonely vigil in uninhabited country for long periods of time. Thus necessity was a motivating force in developing their “home on wheels.” Western ranchers made the buck-board popular. A light wagon with a spring seat and suspended so that the floor boards gave an added springy motion, it is now a familiar sight in Western films.

As use of the traditional styles of stagecoaches declined, new stages such as the “Yellowstone Stage,” relatively open and with multiple seats, were designed for sightseers. Where small settlements grew into towns toward the end of the century, a great variety of wagons was needed and they provided the means which helped, materially, to make the West habitable. Aside from commerce there was the doctor's buggy, and the fancy, horse-drawn hearses of the undertaker. It seemed that wagons played an important role in Western living from the cradle to the grave. Certainly they continued to play a major role in 1893 when hundreds were used in the mad scramble upon the opening of the Cherokee Outlet (Strip) in Okla-homa. Wagons are still in use today in the Amish towns of Pennsylvania, on our Indian reservations and on some farms. Many may now be seen in parades or in the various wagon museums from Shelburne, Vermont, to Santa Barbara, California. The parade in connection with Tucson's Fiesta de Los Vaqueros is said to be the largest parade in the country in which no motorized vehicles are permitted all drawn by horses, mules or oxen.

It was into the 1900s before the automobile began to push the wagon from the scene and up to that time wagon-making had been probably the most thriving business in the country. There were wagons for every purpose, from the plain country types to the fancy phaetons, victorias and cabriolets of the cities. There were livery stables in every hamlet.

The buggies (where did they get that name?) were the most popular, and you will find in the 1903 Sears, Roebuck catalog 33 different styles of the one-seater buggy. These and surreys with the fringe on top were the subject of popular songs and sayings.

There were many, many wagon-makers - Kimbarks, Cook & Co., Baker & Hamilton, Davis & Co., U.S. Buggy & Cart Co., J. E. Sawyer, J. C. Keith, Fish Bros., Iona Wagon Co., Kimball, and countless others, but the greatest of all was Studebaker.

Three Studebaker brothers emigrated to Philadelphia from Germany in 1836. One of their descendants, John Studebaker, made his way westward to the Conestoga Valley, always following the wagonmaker's trade. By 1852, having four sons, John settled in South Bend, Indiana. During the Civil War the Studebaker wagon factory prospered and expanded, making hundreds of army vehicles. After the war they turned their attention toward the West, opening branch offices in St. Joseph, Missouri, and in San Francisco, California. They were among the first to adopt a system of interchangeable parts for their wagon models. By 1872 they were selling 7,000 vehicles a year, many of these helped develop the frontiers into rich sources of foodstuffs, metals, minerals and wood products.

The early 1900s was a great era, and those who have not seen the varied collection of vehicles around a town square on marketing day in rural centers, or heard the clang and clatter of dashing horse-drawn fire engines in the cities have missed a very colorful part of life in America.

There are many good books of West-ern history that have general references to early wagons but few sources, indeed, that have specifics. Among books that I have found of special value are Wagons, Mules and Men by Nick Eggenhofer, The Wagonmen by Robert Howard, Western Wayfaring by J. Gregg Lane, and The Wagonmasters by Henry P. Walker. For those with great curiosity there are pertinent data to be dug out in scattered branches of the government archives. In Rawhide Rhymes by S. Omar Barker you will find an excellent poem called “The Chuck-wagon” and in Badger Clark's Sun and Saddle Leather you will find pleasure in reading “Freightin'.” There are other bits and pieces through many printed sources that indicate the wagon's important role. I think you will agree that wagons have left very deep tracks through the highroads of our national history.