On the Trail of History and Her Ancestral Roots

COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa — On the banks of the Missouri River, wooden wagons are rolling over asphalt at the beginning of a journey west--a journey that will retrace the trail taken by various branches of my family on horseback, in covered wagons and on foot 150 years ago.

Armed with portraits and journals of my ancestors, I am joining the others who have set aside the routines of their lives to join the Mormon Trail Wagon Train. There are about 500 of us gathered at the start of this journey; more than 5,000 are expected to join in before we reach our destination.

Some of my ancestors, including two of my great-grandfathers, were born on this trail. They were among the 60,000 to 70,000 pioneers who made it to the Salt Lake Valley--others, some 6,000, were buried along the way. The survivors not only settled Utah, but went on to found cities in California, Arizona, Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, Canada and Mexico.

Handed-down family stories--some horrific, some hilarious--have lured me here, equipped with a tent and a wooden cart that I intend to pull for 1,000 miles. I want to see what my ancestors saw, and try to understand, on a personal level, the story of the settling of the American West, with all of the living and dying that went into it.

Over the next three months, I will be tracing the stories my grandmother told me from pioneer journals: how her grandmother Emily Holman Lewis left her Maine roots, became a frontier doctor in the wilderness and delivered more than 1,000 babies without ever losing a mother; how Paul Poulsen and his brothers left their furious father behind and sailed from their Danish fishing village to walk across this country; how English immigrants Squire and Emily Hepworth came through a terrible storm at sea and up the Mississippi to join the wagon train, with my great-grandfather Thornton being born in a wagon on the Nebraska prairie; Martin and Sarah McPhie coming from Scotland; Marie Davidsen, from Norway; and all the others whose bloodlines would combine into one American family.

*

As I look at the others who have come to take part in this journey, I wonder what they will find along the way. Some wear pioneer-style clothing that they have sewn themselves. As we slip into a less complicated but more difficult pioneer way of living, will priorities change? What will we find we can, or can’t, do without? Much of what the pioneers experienced was unique to America, an America that has changed vastly since their day.

Now, as 150 years ago, we are a diverse group: There are participants from Japan, England, Austria and New Zealand, from a small town in Florida and from Beverly Hills. Most are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and had ancestors who walked this trail. Others are members of other faiths, or no faith at all, who feel drawn to understand what these people accomplished and why.

Today’s group of travelers comes much better prepared than those at this site a century and a half ago. There are, among other conveniences, cell phones on this trip.

*

My ancestors who traveled this trail had different languages, backgrounds, dress and customs, but were forced to depend on one another to survive. Most were ill-prepared for the trip. That they and so many others made it is testament that we don’t have to be alike to be together. And testament that humans working together can bring about miracles.

I have many questions about pioneer life. I wonder how the experiences of men, women and children on the trail were different. What did they do to keep up morale in spite of danger, disease, extreme weather and fatigue? How did the experiences of the long-time Americans in their wagons differ from those of the immigrants with their handcarts?

And I wonder about how the pieces fit together.

At what point did newcomers begin to think of themselves as part of America and of America as part of them? Who came west and how does their experience differentiate us from the rest of the country today? Nearing the close of the 20th century, what has lasted from the pioneer heritage of our country?

These are questions I’ve wanted to spend some time on.

Now I have three months and more than 1,000 miles to think and talk them over, not only with modern Americans on the trail and in towns along the way, but with those who came before and left their records.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

The Mormon Trail

1847

After the assassination of U.S. Mormon Church founder Joseph Smith and seeking relief from religious persecution, Mormons, led by Brigham Young, fled their settlement in Nauvoo, Ill., in 1846. They got as far as Council Bluffs, Iowa, before bad weather forced them to set up winter camp. In the spring of 1847, they continued on the journey that led them to the valley of the Great Salt Lake in what was then Mexican territory. Their route became a primary pathway to pioneer settlement of the West.

1997

This spring and summer, hundreds of people on foot, wagon and horseback in the Mormon Trail Wagon Train are retracing the route of the Mormon migration from Iowa to Utah 150 years ago. By the time the modern-day wagon train reaches Salt Lake City in July, 5,000 people are expected to join in some portion of the journey. The 1,000-mile trip is being taken at the rate of about 15 miles a day.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

The Mormons

Membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints at the time of the migration to Utah was less than 100,000--with an estimated 70,000 making the trip west over a two-decade period beginning in 1847. Today, the church puts its membership at nearly 10 million.

Worldwide: 9,694,549

United States: 4,809,604

Utah: 1,480,000

California: 740,000

Los Angeles County: 350,000

Orange County: 67,000

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

No Stranger to Adventure

Kathy Stickel, 27, of Huntington Beach is a descendant of pioneers who crossed the plains. She is pulling a handcart--as her ancestors did--along the 1,000-mile route and will file periodic reports from the trail. In the past, her curiosity and restless nature led her to work at a wild animal training center, Yosemite National Park, a department store and, for a while, The Times. She has been a volunteer in public schools, with the Nature Conservancy and California State Parks, and as a missionary in Russia for a year and a half.