Don Wildman

Certainly, I realized this is some 87 people who will comprise the Donner party alone.

But you focus on two families.

Where had these two families come from and where was their destination specifically?

They were in the airstream, weren't they?

Everybody else was in the camp trailer that I camped in as a kid, that's for sure.

Donner family, George, his wife, Tamsen, several children.

There was George's brother, Jacob, his wife, and five children.

The Reed family, as you say, James, his wife, Margaret, and their four children.

And all of these folks together have decided to head for California as opposed to other places.

They were specifically decided not to go to Oregon, but they were going to California, which was in a few years going to turn out to be a whole different story.

But for now, it was about the land.

Yes.

And at that point, they would have been traveling for a long, long time, because this all really begins in mid-May of 1846, and it's all about when they leave, right?

This is a major theme of this story.

They leave Illinois first, and they reach Independence, Missouri in mid-May 1846.

Here is where traditionally folks stocked up on provisions, joined the trains that they would join, and they do so, heading out with a train of 500 wagons.

Am I right?

I mean, this is a major...

migration of people.

Yes.