From Covered Wagon to Freeway Travel
Posted by: 
brwhiz
N 40° 50.468 W 115° 45.220
11T E 605071 N 4521868
This Historical Marker for the California Trail is located in Elko City Park, just southeast of the Northeastern Nevada Museum at 1515 Idaho Street in Elko, Nevada.
Waymark Code: WMG7PX
Location: Nevada, United States
Date Posted: 01/25/2013
Views: 5
From Covered Wagon
to Freeway Travel
Centruies of water runoff from mountain peaks cut channels through Nevada's mountain formations and deserts, creating river corridors that support a variety of wildlife and plants. One such river is the Humboldt, which flows across most of northern Nevada. For centuries Shoshone and Paiute Indian tribes explored every bend in the river is search of edible plants and wild game. What was taken each year by these gatherers and hunters was replaced by nature, thus maintaining a natural balance.
From nearly 250,000 emigrants, their oxen, mules, horses and cattle followed the road along the Humboldt, in the process upsetting the centuries-old natural balance. Emigrants took advantage of the variety of plants and wildlife, depleting much of the river's natural resources and leaving little or nothing for the native tribes.
The constant processions of emigrant wagons compacted the soil along the Humboldt's bank, creating a well-defined road. This roadbed evolved into part of the right-of-way of the Central Pacific Railroad in 1869, linking the eastern and western United States. The route has served as northern Nevada's primary transportation corridor up to the present day.
During the 1960s and 1970s, I-80 was built through Nevada following the Humboldt River and paralleling the original emigrant trail.
[Drawing of Pioneer Women Washing Clothes]
"I also saw ... a very singular hot spring. It was on the rocky Bank of the Humboldt...the water came out of the solid rock in a stream as large as a man's leg and was boiling hot. Some emigrants who were camped near had clothes in a kind of basin formed by the falling water, where they were boiling. that was the best place to wash clothes I've seen yet."
James Berry Brown, August 30, 1859
[Drawing of Water Barrel]
Water Barrels
Filled at places along the trail where water was plentiful, they slaked the
thirst of both people and animals on long waterless stretches of the trail.
[Drawing of Washtub with Washboard]
Washtub & Washboard
The labor-intensive predessor of the modern clothes washer, these
were used on the trail to wash clothing and the emighrants themselves.
[Drawing of Stewpot]
Stewpot
An essential item for use in preparing meals along the trail and would
also be needed by emigrants after they arrived in California.