Stephen Aron

And for some reason, the Indians riding in circles around the wagon trade.

That's the most familiar cinematic image.

During the 1840s, people certainly circled wagons, sometimes to pen stock in and the like, but it was not done as a protection against Native Americans.

Indeed, there were a couple of significant incidents of violence between Native peoples and immigrant travelers during the 1840s.

But the numbers were relatively small.

Yes, there was a great deal of suspicion.

Yes, people brought a great deal of bias and prejudice.

But during the 1840s and 50s, so long as Americans in limited numbers were primarily passing through these native countries,

There were generally peaceful relations in which people traded with one another rather than fought one another.

This changes in the 1850s as greater numbers move across the plains and start using up vital resources on the plains.

That creates greater resentment.

And also then into the 1850s and 1860s as people not only pass across the plains, but

but begin to settle on the plains.

And that then becomes the precipitant for the most famous of wars, the Plains Indian Wars of the 1860s and 1870s.

Well, as long as you also trade with us and we'll trade you some food or moccasins, you give us some goods we want, things remain relatively quiet or peaceful.

And that pile of trash, by the way, is a really important factor.

How much people leave behind along the way in order to make their wagons move more quickly.

Yeah, I think when you read the trail diaries, sometimes you see the romance of the journey.

As I emphasize, men going and shooting the first buffalo they'd ever killed or something often leads to this sense of great excitement and adventure.

But oftentimes the drudgery and the misery also comes across quite profoundly, especially as you look at sort of just the way in which the elements seem to conspire against you, not just...