Santa Fe Trail Ruts, Dodge City, KS11
Dodge City,KS(Ford County)
**Santa Fe Trail Ruts** - National Register of Historic Places Ref # 66000343, date listed 19661015
9 mi. W of Dodge City on U.S. 50
A National Historic Landmark (www.nps.gov/nhl/find/statelists/ks/KS.pdf).
The Santa Fe Trail Ruts located 9 miles west of Dodge City, Kansas are remains of the once major thoroughfare of westward expansion. Much of the remains have been lost. However, a splendid specimen of some approximate 140 acres have been preserved by the Boothill Association.
On January 29, 1822, four trail-worn men rode into Franklin, Missouri. Forty-eight days before, they had left San Miguel--fifty miles southeast of Santa Fe. The adventure of Captain William Bucknell saw the first successful Missouri to Santa Fe trading expedition and set the state for enterprising men to throng the trail to the City of Holy Faith. In this apparently simple act was summed up much that lent to the Santa Fe Trail and its namesake city an air of El Dorado. It was partly this that caused early traders to gamble their lives and fortunes against distance, terrain, weather, hostile Indians and the caprice of Mexican customs officials.
The Santa Fe trail was more than an escape valve for high spirited men, or simply the route by which the mule came to Missouri. It was a commercial and cultural link between the borderlands of the United States and Mexico. Manifest Destiny would travel this trail. At its end was an empire of mesa and mountain, of canyon and river and of vast distances and desert, all ripe for the picking. The trail then became a military highway clogged with the freight and banners of war. (1)
References (1) NRHP Nomination Form npgallery.nps.gov/pdfhost/docs/NHLS/Text/66000343.pdf
Santa Fe Trail Ruts, Dodge City, KS11
Dodge City,KS(Ford County)
**Santa Fe Trail Ruts** - National Register of Historic Places Ref # 66000343, date listed 19661015
9 mi. W of Dodge City on U.S. 50
A National Historic Landmark (www.nps.gov/nhl/find/statelists/ks/KS.pdf).
The Santa Fe Trail Ruts located 9 miles west of Dodge City, Kansas are remains of the once major thoroughfare of westward expansion. Much of the remains have been lost. However, a splendid specimen of some approximate 140 acres have been preserved by the Boothill Association.
On January 29, 1822, four trail-worn men rode into Franklin, Missouri. Forty-eight days before, they had left San Miguel--fifty miles southeast of Santa Fe. The adventure of Captain William Bucknell saw the first successful Missouri to Santa Fe trading expedition and set the state for enterprising men to throng the trail to the City of Holy Faith. In this apparently simple act was summed up much that lent to the Santa Fe Trail and its namesake city an air of El Dorado. It was partly this that caused early traders to gamble their lives and fortunes against distance, terrain, weather, hostile Indians and the caprice of Mexican customs officials.
The Santa Fe trail was more than an escape valve for high spirited men, or simply the route by which the mule came to Missouri. It was a commercial and cultural link between the borderlands of the United States and Mexico. Manifest Destiny would travel this trail. At its end was an empire of mesa and mountain, of canyon and river and of vast distances and desert, all ripe for the picking. The trail then became a military highway clogged with the freight and banners of war. (1)
References (1) NRHP Nomination Form npgallery.nps.gov/pdfhost/docs/NHLS/Text/66000343.pdf