Hunt's 1811 Astorian Overland Expedition

The diary this panel quotes leaves out the man hired to see the Astorians through this country. Edward Rose, son of a white trader and a Cherokee and African American mother, had lived among the Crow, who called him Five Scalps, and Hunt took him on as guide and interpreter for Crow territory. Suspecting a plot to lead the party into a Crow ambush, Hunt paid him off with half a year's wages, a horse and three beaver traps, and left him with the Crow. Rose went on to guide William Ashley and Jedediah Smith.

What the plaque says

Hunt's 1811 Astorian Overland Expedition The fur industry ruled the northwest at the beginning of the 19th century; however, much of the interior of the western United States remained a mystery. The Lewis and Clark expedition constituted the only organized exploration, a fact which frustrated John Jacob Astor, owner of the Pacific Fur Company. Determined to expand his fur empire, Astor sent companies of men, called Astorians, to scout a route between Astoria, Oregon and St. Louis. In 1811, Astor appointed Wilson Price Hunt head of an expedition to find an overland route. After leaving the Missouri River, Hunt's party traveled over 2,000 miles westward in seven months. Though planning to use the northern route of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, Hunt decided to head south and travel across northern Wyoming to avoid the Blackfeet. The party entered Wyoming in August. On the 18th, while still in eastern Wyoming, Hunt wrote in his diary, "we found it necessary to leave the mountains and turn back toward the broken countryside. When we had pitched camp...Mr. McKenzi and I scaled the nearby slopes. Our view extended in all directions. In the west we saw far off some mountains that appeared white in several spots, and we assumed that this was the snow-covered Big Horn (Range). Below the peaks, herds of buffalo ran over the plains." The Astorians finally reached the Pacific Coast in February 1812 after losing a man and many supplies trying to navigate the Snake River in Idaho.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Eagle Butte Mine Overlook — 30 mi
  A working Powder River Basin coal mine that still takes visitors, in the basin that mines close to forty percent of the nation's coal.