Don Wildman

I mean, as far as it... It's a very specific thing we're talking about.

It's one route into a massive territory.

How much was that responsible for the story of the West down the road?

Of course, this journey becomes curtailed eventually by the arrival of the railroad, right?

I mean, that's basically the major factor in why people no longer get into wagons and go west.

What other factors mitigated this form of settlement?

I want to circle back to the impact this had on Native Americans.

This is one of the big takeaways for me in this episode is that for a long time, it wasn't having as much effect as I would have assumed for those 1830s, 1840s.

Coming up into the settlement of the interior of the country, the Western interior, the establishment of states and territories, that's when really the impact is felt, isn't it?

Exactly.

That's where you get the displacement, the relocation to reservations, hunting grounds disrupted.

And these wagon trails really impact the migration of buffalo.

I mean, it's all kinds of effects that this has eventually.

Disease is a huge factor as well, what is introduced to these communities.

And a complete disruption of language and tradition, etc.,

eventually gets gets made but the but so interesting that it isn't the more immediate thing that happens but rather later on let's talk about the legacy factor of all of this how has the oregon trail and migration in general at that time lived on in american culture so much of what your museum is about isn't it so certainly as i mentioned earlier

You know, I think it's really important to underscore how much the

This pioneering period, these wagon trains in early America still have to do with the American psyche.

I mean, culturally, politically, personally even.

Some of it's just simple geography.