There were also numerous other rules required of passengers, including abstaining from liquor, not cursing or smoking if ladies were present, and others. The alkali dust bit into the eyes, and one's lips cracked and irritated, hurt for weeks afterward. Stations were added or deleted when necessary. Travel by stagecoach in the west's early days was described by Thomas Donaldson in his 1941 book, Idaho of Yesterday. Byways & Historic Trails Great Drives in America, Soldiers and Officers in American History, Easy Travel Organization Tips You Will Love, Bidwell-Bartleson Party Blazing the California Trail. This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Costing $1200 - $1500, these coaches weighed more than two thousand pounds. At the end of the trial, over which "judge Lynch" presided the three condemned men were placed in a wagon, a single rope tied round each man's neck with the other end of the ropes secured to a single limb of an elm tree, which stands today at the edge of a road, near Wellington, and were hanged. [7] By the mid 17th century, a basic stagecoach infrastructure had been put in place. But normally not more than 15 miles from the last stop. The Overland Trail:Stage Coach Vocabulary- Last Updated 19 April 1998, Stagecoach History: Stage Lines to California, Wild West Tales: Stories by R. Michael Wilson; Stagecoach, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Stage_station&oldid=1115595755, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0. Designed by the Abbot Downing Company, the coach utilized leather strap braces underneath, giving them a swinging motion instead of a spring suspension, which jostled passengers up and down. The stage stations were one-story log houses with dirt of mud roofs, the men and horses sleeping under one shelter. Stage stations were built every 15-20 miles. The first stagecoach started out from San Francisco on September 14, 1858, at ten minutes after midnight. [10], Steel springs had been used in suspensions for vehicles since 1695. A novel sight Mountain Stagecoach by Rey Britton and Company, Adventures & Tragedies on the Overland Trail, John Butterfield & the Overland Mail Company, Canyon Station Treasure Near Kingman, Arizona, Cowboys, Trail Blazers, & Stagecoach Drivers List, Clark Old Chieftain Foss Boisterous California Stage Driver, George Baldy Green A Popular Stage Driver, A Journey to Denver via the Butterfield Overland Dispatch, Knights of the Lash: Old-Time Stage Drivers of the West Coast, Delia Haskett Rawson Carrying the U.S. Mail, Russell, Majors & Waddell Transportation in the Old West, Virginia Dale, Colorado Stage Station Treasure, Wells Fargo Staging & Banking in the Old West. The teams for the long trips consisted of some hundred or more mules, purchased from a class of stock that, were noted for extreme endurance; for they were destined to make many an excursion that would test their utmost endurance and patience without succumbing. In 1892, when the Cheyenne and Arapahoe country was opened to settlement, Henry Todd retired from service of the Southwester Coach Company and filed on a homestead near Calumet. Stagecoaches, often known by the French name "Diligence" - a smaller model with room for six passengers and a bigger one for ten, drawn by two horses (in the city, on the plain or on a good road) or three (on intercity and elevated roads) - were the main means of public transportation in Ottoman Palestine between the middle of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. This town today is one of those passed through on the Fort Elliott trail, now a modern highway, leading out of Elk City, Oklahoma. Such relays date back nearly 4,000 years and were used widely in ancient Babylonia, Persia, China . Joseph Ballard described the stagecoach service between Manchester and Liverpool in 1815 as having price competition between coaches, with timely service and clean accommodations at inns. They were truly unsung heroes. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". "With all of this dirt and neglect, it must be said that as a rule the people who kept the home stations were good, decent people, charitable and attentive to the travelers. He was a member of the third Territorial Legislature and the author of the Herd Law. 12:30 PM - Amethyst Kiah. By clicking Accept All, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. By the end of the 17th century, stage-coach routes ran up and down the three main roads in England. The first division ran from St. Joseph, MissouritoFort Kearny, Nebraska; the second division from Fort Kearny to Horseshoe Station (above Fort Laramie), Wyoming; the third from Horseshoe Station to Salt Lake City, Utah; the fourth from Salt Lake City to Roberts Creek, Nevada; and the fifth division, from Roberts Creek to Sacramento, California. Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors. Two men in Concord, New Hampshire, developed what became a popular solution. Passengers were appalled by the dirt and squalor that greeted them at the station. Reforms of the turnpike trusts, new methods of road building and the improved construction of coaches led to a sustained rise in the comfort and speed of the average journey - from an average journey length of 2 days for the Cambridge-London route in 1750 to a length of under 7 hours in 1820. The feed problem at each station required long hours of toil by men hardened to all conditions of weather and living. If passengers wanted to sleep, they were required to sit up, and it was considered bad etiquette to rest ones head on another passenger. How many horses usually pulled a stagecoach? In 1864, Holladay obtained a contract to carry mail from Salt Lake to the Dalles, Oregon, via Boise City in Idaho Territory and Walla Walla and Wallula in Washington Territory, a distance of 675 miles. Going to the dug-out occupied by Bill Brooks, one of the leaders of the gang, they called him out, and with a pistol pointed straight at his breast, informed him that he was under arrest. Stagecoaches also became widely adopted for travel in and around London by mid-century and generally travelled at a few miles per hour. Provincial routes developed in the following century, particularly in the 1770s. Donec gravida mi a condimentum rutrum. The body of the carriage rests upon large thongs of leather, fastened to heavy blocks of wood, instead of springs, and the whole is drawn by seven horses.[18]. Place of rest provided for stagecoach travelers. For this distinguished guest, the road between Jaffa and Jerusalem was greatly improved, making possible the passage of carriages. Other owners would take more enthusiastic suitably-dressed passengers and indulge in competitive driving. 18, T. 9 N., 26 E.), Le Flore County, about 1 miles northeast of present Spiro. Between home stations, there were several relay rider or swing stations. Stations were attacked and the horses stolen, the stations burned and keepers killed, especially during the Pauite Indian War starting in May 1860. The first stagecoach in the American colonies was owned by Jonathan Wardwell of Boston. But normally not more than 15 miles from the last stop. The speed of travel remained constant until the mid-18th century. The terrain and its effect on horse travel determined the number and the distance between stations. Organised long-distance land travel became known as staging or posting. 7 Did stagecoaches travel at night? What was the station called on a stagecoach? [12], The period from 1800 to 1830 saw great improvements in the design of coaches, most notably by John Besant in 1792 and 1795. Five miles east of Holloways was Edward's Store (Sec. Their most profitable contracts were with U.S. Mail and were hotly contested. Studded with 153 stations, the Pony Express trail used 80 riders and between 400 and 500 horses to carry mail from the settled Midwest to the new state of California. (This station was better known locally after the Civil War as "Carriage Point."). The Pony Express Riders were brave and to be admired. [22], The railway network in South Africa was extended from Mafeking through Bechuanaland and reached Bulawayo in 1897. If passengers wanted to sleep, they were required to do so sitting up, and it was considered bad etiquette to rest ones head on another passenger. Once when a driver turned back, Henry Todd "fired" him, swung the pouches across his own back, swan the raging stream, and delivered the mail at Fort Sill a few hours later. They included: "The best seat is the one next to the driver. He hitched the pony to a rickety buckboard, placed a trusted man on the seat, and started him down the trail with the first mail. Tie a silk kerchief around your neck to keep out dust and prevent sunburns. A canvas-topped wagon had a lower center of gravity, and it could not be loaded on the roof with heavy freight or passengers as an enclosed coach so often was. The yard of ale drinking glass is associated by legend with stagecoach drivers, though it was mainly used for drinking feats and special toasts.[2][3]. They carried "way pockets" into which settlers deposited letters. Or any of a hundred other things we take for granted in the United States today. The business establishments consisted of the blacksmith shop, one store, on livery stable, and three saloons. Stage passengers could be victims, but usually thieves were after money or gold being transported, especially by stages operated by Wells, Fargo. By the mid 17th century, a basic infrastructure had been put in place. STAGECOACH TRAVEL. Four coaches of the Southwestern Coach Company were lost in tragedies of the South Canadian River, but on each occasion the United States mail was saved. Other uncategorized cookies are those that are being analyzed and have not been classified into a category as yet. Don't discuss politics or religion, nor point out places on the road where horrible murders have been committed. On November 1, 1866, Holladay sold his entire operation to Wells Fargo because he saw that the construction of the transcontinental railroad by Union Pacific was shortening his route across Nebraska. The larger stations, called Home Stations, generally ran by a couple or family, were usually situated about 50 miles apart and provided meager meals and overnight lodging to passengers. "Never ride in cold weather with tight boots or shoes, nor close fitting gloves. Transcontinental stage-coaching ended with the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869. Then the former prisoners relieved the passengers of all their valuables and order the driver to select the bet mules for their mount. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. However, lodging was often no more than a dirt floor. Through metonymy the name stage also came to be used for a stagecoach alone. Your refund request will be reviewed on an individual basis by your local Stagecoach team. Prior to its arrival, a network of stagecoach routes existed.[23]. Here, drivers were usually switched. Stage fare was twenty cents per mile. Its trails reached out and traversed all sections of the Indian country, going into Fort Smith, Arkansas, Fort Dodge, Kansas, to Paris, Gainesville, Henrietta, and Mobeetie, Texas. Hailey's stage line from Walla Walla to Boise and on to Kelton, Utah, was said to be one of the longest stage roads in the United States. Part of this was due to greatly improved roading see Turnpike trusts and part to improved vehicles. Those were the times when the stage was most vulnerable to robbery. Walker's Station (Sec. Designed by the Abbot Downing Company, the coach utilized leather strap braces underneath, giving them a swinging motion instead of a spring suspension, which jostled passengers up and down. Pony stations were generally located between 5 to 20 miles apart. New stations were then added where needed. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. Stock feed was hauled from Wichita by wagon, as no part of the country then had ever been touched by the plow. People's Histories include personal memoirs and reminiscences, letters and other historical documents, interviews and oral histories, reprints from historical and current publications, original essays, commentary and interpretation, and expressions of personal opinion, many of which have been submitted by our visitors. By 1836 the scheduled coach left London at 19:30, travelled through the night (without lights) and arrived in Liverpool at 16:50 the next day, a distance of about 220 miles (350km), doubling the overall average speed to about 10 miles per hour (16km/h), including stops to change horses.[5]. A stagecoach is a four-wheeled public transport coach used to carry paying passengers and light packages on journeys long enough to need a change of horses. This led to the arrest of "Texas Red" and "Granger" Dyer, two of five members of an outlaw gang that was active at that time. The coaches themselves were not always the enclosed vehicles seen in movies often they had canvas sides stretched over supports; though there were springs, the coaches' had little or nothing in the way of shock absorbers, and no windows to let fresh air in or keep dust or weather out. Each division of the Pony Express route had an established number of home stations with various relay rider or swing stations between them. In the twinkling of an eye, one prisoner was out of the coach, had grabbed the sheriff, and relieved him of his guns. The Pony Express was an American express mail service that used relays of horse-mounted riders. It was the longest stagecoach service in the world. Speeds improved from 4 or 5mph (6.4 or 8.0km/h) in the 1690s to 10mph (16km/h) in the 1830s. Maximum efficiency was a priority. These owners were (often very expert) amateur gentlemen-coachmen, occasionally gentlewomen. At the beginning of the Pony Express, the relay rider stations were set approximately twenty to twenty-five miles apart, but afterward more relay rider stations were established at shorter intervals, with some twelve to fifteen miles apart. In those days, before the era of railroads and the age of miracles, the company's operations ranked as probably the greatest chain of transportation operating throughout the West. One pamphleteer denounced the stagecoach as a "great evil [] mischievous to trade and destructive to the public health". Before rail service reached the West Coast steamboats, stagecoaches, and wagons were the principal means of transportation to and from the inland areas of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho territories. Feet are interlacing, heads severely bumped, Friend and foe together get their noses thumped; Dresses act as carpets-listen to the sage; Life is but a journey taken in a stage.. The horses were changed three times on the 80-mile (130km) trip, normally completed in 17 hours. Pony Express, which began operations in 1860, is often called first fast mail service from the Missouri River to the Pacific Coast, but the Overland Mail Company began a twice-weekly mail service from Missouri to San Francisco in September 1858. Or daily changes of clothing. The stage stations were one-story log houses with dirt of mud roofs, the men and horses sleeping under one shelter. By 1830 some journey times had fallen to as little as 20 per cent of the same route in 1790. In addition to the stage driver or coachman who guided the vehicle, a shotgun messenger armed with a coach gun might travel as a guard beside him. Stagecoaches are more comfortable than riding your own animal. He found another horse, which he purchased, and started himself with the second mail.
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