Sutler’s Store and Pony Express Barn are just as Will Braddock would have seen them in 1867.
Will Braddock spent his first Christmas in the far west in 1867 at Fort Bridger, which at that time was still Dakota Territory. I reveal in Chapter 1 of Bear Claws, The Iron Horse Chronicles–Book Two, that Will had wintered-over at the fort with his uncle’s survey inspection team. Since Bear Claws begins in March 1868, I did not describe what Christmas would have been like at Fort Bridger. I did point out that Will would have spent a boring, cold time isolated at the famous fort. The weather that winter was brutal!
Covered wagon like Will’s friend Jenny McNabb and her family would have used on their journey along the Overland Trail in 1867.
My wife, Barbara, and I visited Fort Bridger in the summer of 2012 when I took the photographs shown here. Famed mountain man Jim Bridger, along with his partner Louis Vasquez, founded the fort in 1843. Bridger identified an opportunity to provide supplies and blacksmithing services to fellow trappers working the nearby streams, wagon train emigrants bound west on the Overland/California Trail, and Mormon settlers trudging along the Mormon Trail. His efforts proved fairly successful.
Will Braddock probably bought jaw breakers in this Sutler’s Store.
The Mormons bought the fort in 1857, but when the US Army arrived to engage in the “Mormon War” in October of that year, the Mormons burned the fort down before retreating to Salt Lake City. After the war, the Army reestablished a fort there, occupying it almost continuously until 1890. Bridger’s original stockade fort was small, but the new, expanded one was patterned after the numerous open forts the military built to protect the route of the first transcontinental railroad. Today’s open fort is what Will Braddock would have known.
The Pony Express no longer raced through when Will Braddock was here, but the barn existed then as it does today.
Fort Bridger’s location on Black’s Fork of the Green River was a good one. Over the years, in addition to serving as a supplier to the mountain men and a stop for the Oregon Trail’s travelers, the fort was a Pony Express relay barn, a Wells Fargo stagecoach station, and a Union Pacific Railroad depot. Jim Bridger battled the United States Government for years, claiming the Mormons had forced him out, wanting compensation for a lease of what he continued to think of as his property. Following his death in 1881, Congress authorized a small payment to his widow.
Typical Army Officer’s Quarters which Will Braddock would have seen in 1867.
The site is now the Fort Bridger State Historic Site, administered by the Wyoming Department of State Parks and Cultural Resources. Modern Interstate 80 bypasses Fort Bridger, abandoning the routes of the Oregon, California, and Mormon Trails, the short-lived Pony Express, the Wells Fargo stagecoach, the first transcontinental railroad, and the original Lincoln Highway. Don’t let that deter you from visiting. It’s only three miles to the fort from Exit 34, just east of Evanston, Wyoming.
If Will Braddock were here today, he would join Barbara and me in wishing you a
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
My wife, Barbara, and I enjoyed an early Christmas dinner at Michael’s Restaurant at South Point Casino in Las Vegas last night, December 18.
Added to my website is the Google Translate feature. By clicking on the button at the bottom of any page or posting on this website you can select any of 103 languages, in addition to the English in which I wrote it. Whether you prefer French, Arabic, Chinese, or any of one hundred other languages, Google will instantly translate the contents for your reading pleasure. Give it a try. I hope you enjoy this added feature provided by Google and WordPress.
I enjoy rereading historical novels by authors that are largely forgotten today. Here I am relaxing at home with a copy of Captain from Castile by Samuel Shellabarger. I wrote about Shellabarger and Rafael Sabatini, two of my favorite forgotten authors, in my recent contribution to the blog Mad About MG History. You can read it here: 
On October 29, 2016, my novel Bear Claws, The Iron Horse Chronicles–Book Two, received the Will Rogers Silver Medallion Award for 2016 Western Fiction for Younger Readers. The Will Rogers Medallion Award Committee’s program states that books in the Younger Readers’ category “contain excellent stories, deal with growing up (and grown up) problems and themes, provide inspiration and, most importantly, hours of enjoyment and entertainment.” The program further indicates that “outstanding books in this category will fill an almost impossible task of being interesting to an entire age span [from older elementary school children to young adults] and to adults as well.”
You may recall that last year Eagle Talons, The Iron Horse Chronicles–Book One, received the Will Rogers Bronze Medallion Award for 2015 Western Fiction for Younger Readers.
Michael is an outstanding writer of western and historical novels. His books have won numerous awards including the Western Heritage Wrangler Award and Western Writers of America’s Spur Award. You can learn more about Michael Zimmer, his books, and his awards at his website: 
The travois is beautifully displayed in the Plains Indian Museum of the Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Cody, Wyoming. There, an Indian family is portrayed moving across the prairie with the warrior in the lead serving as a scout and being prepared to defend his family. Trailing him is his daughter guiding a dog pulling a small travois which is loaded with household items such as bedding and cooking utensils.
The warrior’s wife rides a horse pulling a large travois. The larger travois were frequently constructed with the poles from the family’s teepee. The buffalo skins that covered the poles to make the teepee were then loaded on the cargo area of the travois. The travois could also be used to transport sick or wounded people. I describe various uses of the travois in Bear Claws, The Iron Horse Chronicles–Book Two.
On my return trip to Nevada after attending the Wyoming State Historical Society annual meeting, I passed through Cody, Wyoming, in order to visit the Buffalo Bill Center of the West. The center consists of five different museums. As you can see from this photo of the entrance, the day I spent there was blustery with intermittent rain and snow.
The Plains Indians Museum contains a wealth of artifacts and information about the Northern Plains tribes. I was particularly interested in studying those items pertaining to the Sioux, the Arapahos, and the Cheyennes, because those tribes will feature predominantly in my next novel.
I thoroughly enjoyed the Draper Natural History Museum. The visitor can stand close to a grizzly bear and envision what it would be like to face one of these creatures in the wild. Will Braddock, or course had two run-ins with grizzlies in Bear Claws. I also wrote in a post on February 8, 2016, about the movie The Revenant, in which the character Hugh Glass was attacked by a grizzly.
I was fortunate to be in the Cody Firearms Museum when a member of the staff presented a fascinating review of the types of revolvers, rifles, and carbines used in the mid-1860s. I describe many of these weapons in The Iron Horse Chronicles, and I will also be covering them in my new book about the Bozeman Trail. By coincidence, the recent November 2016 issue of True West magazine contains a feature article about the collection of firearms in this museum.
On September 11, 2016, I spent the day at Fort Phil Kearny, Wyoming, touring the interpretive center, walking the remains of the old fort, and tromping the nearby battlefields. I had this opportunity because I was attending the annual meeting of the Wyoming State Historical Society in nearby Buffalo. At that meeting the society awarded Bear Claws, The Iron Horse Chronicles–Book Two, the first place award in the category of fiction for 2016.
Fort Phil Kearny was built by the U.S. Army in 1866 on the Bozeman Trail to protect travelers heading to the Montana goldfields from attack by the plains Indian tribes that resisted the encroachment on their final good hunting grounds. Red Cloud’s War made life miserable and dangerous for the travelers and the military defenders for two years before the Sioux, Cheyennes, and Arapahos prevailed and drove the soldiers away. They promptly burned the fort down. No original structures remain at the site, but a marvelous layout of the dimensions with identification markers for the buildings and facilities enables the visitor to gain a valuable picture of the installation.
More fights occurred at Fort Phil Kearny between the Indians and the Army than at any other post on the western frontier. The largest loss of life (81) by the Army occurred five miles from the fort when the Fetterman Massacre took place on December 21, 1866, at what is now known as Massacre Hill. This loss was not surpassed until Custer’s Last Stand a decade later. Red Cloud’s War is the only one which the Indians are considered to have won.
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