Lewis and Clark Campsites: August 3 and 4, 1804

The Otoe, Jiwere, and the Missouria, Nutachi, of the 1804 council are one nation now, the Otoe-Missouria Tribe of Indians, with headquarters at Red Rock, Oklahoma. Their 1854 treaty left them a reservation on the Kansas-Nebraska border near the Big Blue River, where the people divided into a Quaker Band and a traditionalist Coyote Band. Congress arranged the sale of 120,000 acres in 1876, and in 1881 sold the rest and forced the tribe into Indian Territory. In 2011 the tribe counted 3,089 citizens; at most three still spoke Chiwere, now taught in weekly classes.

What the plaque says

Lewis and Clark Campsites August 3 and 4, 1804 On August 3 Lewis and Clark held a council with the Oto and Missouria Indians at a site they named "Council Bluff," near present Fort Calhoun, Nebraska. It was the first of many councils they would hold on their journey to the Pacific Ocean. Following the council, the ex- plorers moved upriver, camping south of to- day's community of Blair. Besides describing the council, Clark's journal notes the merits of "Council Bluff" as a location for "a Trading establishment & fortification." In 1819 the army established Fort Atkinson.. From the Indians and "Mr. Faufong, the interpeter," they learned that it was a 25-day journey to Santa Fe. On August 4 the party camped at a site north of Blair. Clark was concerned over the disappearance of Private Moses B. Reed. Reed had asked permission to return to the previous night's camp to get a knife he left behind, but it was only a pretext to desert. He was captured two weeks later and dishonorably discharged from the army. Nebraska State Historical Society National Park Service

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fort Atkinson State Historical Park — 8.1 mi
  The first U.S. Army post west of the Missouri, a garrison town of more than a thousand people on Council Bluff from 1820 to 1827, rebuilt on its own foundations.
• Winter Quarters and the Mormon Pioneer Cemetery — 16 mi
  The Latter-day Saint camp of 1846 to 1848 on Omaha land in what is now Florence, where hundreds died the first winter, and the cemetery and trail center beside it.
• Malcolm X Birthsite — 19 mi
  The North Omaha lot where Malcolm Little was born in May 1925 and his family was driven out by the Klan, saved by Rowena Moore and now planned as a cultural center.
• Joslyn Art Museum — 21 mi
  Omaha's free art museum, a 1931 Art Deco memorial with two modern pavilions, and the keeper of Karl Bodmer's watercolors from the upper Missouri in 1833 and 1834.

More markers nearby

• Congregational Church of Blair — 0.5 mi
• DeSoto Townsite — 3.1 mi
• Brewster Cemetery — 4.2 mi
• Cuming City Cemetery and Nature Preserve — 4.3 mi