MHM The Red River Cart - Morris MB - Manitoba Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

Marker Name: The Red River Cart Languages: English Location: Main Street South (Highway 75) at Montreal Avenue (Highway 23) Morris Marker Text: The Red River Cart The two-wheeled oxcart is a fitting and famous symbol of the pioneer era on the Red River. The carts, hewn out of native Manitoba oak or maple by the Metis, were used primarily for transport over winding prairie trails but could easily be adapted as rafts for crossing rivers or for protection during hostile attacks. The Metis, in the settlement at Grantown, now known as St, Francois Xavier, were skilled builders of these carts, charging about 10 dollars each. The first one noted by Alexander Henry the Younger in 1801, has solid wheels, sawed off the ends of trees with a diameter of three feet. Later wheels had four or more spokes. Wood was used exclusively since repairs could be readily made near any bluff with only an axe for a tool. No nails or bolts were used in the construction. The chief characteristic of these carts was a "tooth stabbing screech." No grease was used because the dust stirred up would solidify on the axles. "The Red River cart brigades" wrote historian Joseph Kinsey Howard, "never sneaked up on anybody. On a still day you could hear them coming for miles, and see the great clouds of yellow dust they raised: and if the buffalo of the buffalo of the plains finally flee into holes in the ground, as the Indians believed, well, it was no wonder." The carts were used for the buffalo hunt, for freighting trade goods between the Red River and St. Paul, and in the supply of the far western fur trade forts. Some 2500 carts travelled the St. Paul route in 1869 with most of the traffic moving along the trail through "Scratching River" now know as the town of Morris. Cart made by Warner, Ed and Len Jorgenson Agency: Not listed Website: Not listed Link to HistoricPlaces.ca or mhs.mb.ca: Not listed

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Date Logged Log User Rating   06/17/2017 PM8 visited it 05/29/2010 PeterNoG visited it

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