This Marker on the Overland Trail

The stone's opening year runs a season early: mail coaches began using this route on July 21, 1862, after raids on the Sweetwater road pushed Ben Holladay's line south. The crossing it points to, nine miles west, was where the trail met the North Platte, a good ford in low water and a treacherous one in spring, also known as Bennett's Ferry. Stansbury's survey had camped there in the fall of 1850, and the next station west, Sage Creek, was raided often enough to make this one of the trail's dangerous stretches.

What the plaque says

This marker on the Overland Trail. Platte River crossing nine miles west 1861 to 1868 Erected by the Historical Landmark Commission of Wyoming

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fort Fred Steele State Historic Site — 13 mi
  A fort built in 1868 to guard the Union Pacific's North Platte crossing, which became the collecting yard for railroad ties floated down the river.

More markers nearby

• Fort Fred Steele — 12 mi
• The Parco Inn — 19 mi
• Rawlins — 25 mi
• Rawlins Springs — 25 mi