Research
efforts completed, in progress, or planned; also Collections and Informational Materials
available.
RESEARCH PROJECTS
ON THE BOZEMAN TRAIL
--Wyoming State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO).
Twenty-four sites were located and selected for the National Register by the Wyoming
State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), with work done over an extended period of time
by Sheila Bricher-Wade and Dr. Sherry Smith. Nine of these were applied for and are now
listed on the National Register. The Department lost Sherry Smith before the others could
be done and the agency has not had time to complete the nominations, but initial work is
on file. The overall application document and the nine individual sites applications are
available from SHPO office in Cheyenne, WY or in the Wyoming Room at the Sheridan County
Library.
--Fort Leavenworth Army Command and Staff College at
Leavenworth, KS does ongoing research on the Rosebud, Little Bighorn, and Fetterman
Fight sites, and others. They visit the sites about six times each summer and have
published an Atlas of the Indian Wars and Cultural Sites, which is on file at the
Sheridan Library. Their work relates primarily to tactics of guerrilla warfare, and they
have used these studies to plan strategy for wars today conducted against enemies who use
guerrilla-type warfare.
--Jack McDermott is Project Director for an FHA grant from the
American Battlefields Protection Project (out of the National Park Service), to
investigate and prepare a study/action plan for six battlesites of the three campaigns of
General George Crook, all of which used the Wyoming segment of the Bozeman Trail as their
primary route of transportation. Research has been done at the National Archives; Library
of Congress; U.S. Military Institute, Carlisle, PA; Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential
Center, Fremont, Ohio; Rapid City, South Dakota, Library; Rapid City School of Mines; plus
on-the-ground investigation with Jerome Greene.
-- Jerome Greene, Regional NPS historian at Aurora, Colorado,
has recently completed a "Reconaissance of the Indian Wars Battlesites," on
an in-house grant from the American Battlefields Protection Program. Copies are available
from the American Battlefields Protection Program and are on file in the Wyoming Room at
the Sheridan County Library.
--Montana Dept. of Transportaton has done a reconnaissance of
all sites where trails cross highways and roads in Montana.
--Howard Boggess and Mike Penfold, both officers of the
board of directors of the Frontier Heritage Alliance, have spent many hours during the
summers of 1998 and 1999 exploring in the Bozeman Trail corridor on the Crow Reservation
in southeastern Montana, and on west towards Livingston, Montana. They've made use of
diaries, topographical maps, global positioning systems, and interviews with landowners,
as well as just getting out on the land looking for wagon ruts, rock cairns, and other
evidence that can help determine where the various routes of the Bozeman Trail may have
gone. Penfold and Boggess have had the help of interested friends and also an intern
provided by the Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks Department. For more on their work, pull
up Bozeman Trail Fieldwork in the Index.
PRIMARY BOZEMAN TRAIL COLLECTIONS
Libraries:
• Wyoming Room, Sheridan County Fulmer Public Library,
one of the most extensive Bozeman Trail collections in existence is located here.
The Wyoming Room houses the complete Bozeman Trail Collection of
Father Barry Hagan, CSC, former archivist at the University of Oregon at Portland. It was
donated by him to the Fort Phil Kearny/Bozeman Trail Association and is on permanent loan
to the Library. The collection arrived as seventeen huge boxes of papers, fifty-two rolls
of microfilm, and twenty-four large recipe boxes of cards. It includes everything, he
says, relating to the Bozeman Trail that is in the National Archives, and those parts of
the tapes of Judge Eli Ricker from the Nebraska Historical Society that relate to the
Bozeman Trail, plus much more. The collection was organized in a user-friendly fashion by
Dr. Susan Badger-Doyle, and is used by researchers from around the nation and elsewhere.
The Bozeman Trail and Fort Phil Kearny collections of Elsa Spear
Byron, Carl Oslund, Texaco, Waynard Olson, Vie Willits Garber, and some of Robert A.
Murray's materials are part of the collections. Photos of the trail from 1908 taken by Vie
Willits Garber, who rode the trail from Ft. Reno to C. F. Smith by herself, and wrote her
master's thesis in botany on the plants found along the way, are included.
The library itself also has a large collection of other Bozeman
Trail materials, including General Carrington's scrapbook, with procedures of his Court
Martial trial at Ft. McPherson after the Fetterman disaster; Charles Schreibeis's account
of Fort Phil Kearny history; Dr. Susan Badger-Doyle's doctoral dissertation on the Bozeman
Trail and her Bozeman Trail bibliography; and maps, newspaper clippings, magazines, and
books.
• Montana Room at the Billings Public Library, Billings,
MT
• Johnson County Library, Buffalo, WY
This library has an extensive Bozeman Trail collection and a number of oral histories
of early settlers on tape and transcribed with reference cards.
• Fort Laramie Library, Wyoming
• Denver Public Library, Denver, Colorado
• Montana State Historical Society, Helena, Montana
• Wyoming State Museum and Archives Department,
Cheyenne, Wyoming
• American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming
Laramie, Wyoming
THE ARMY:
• Fort Leavenworth Army Command and Staff College.
Fort Leavenworth has extensive records relating to Bozeman Trail history.
• Carlyle Barracks, PA:
Much of the records of the campaigns of General George Crook who used the Bozeman
Trail in his three Indian Wars campaigns of the 1876 era are here, as well as the papers
of prominent Bozeman Trail military figures.
HISTORIC SITES:
• Fort Phil Kearny State Historic Site (and
National Historic Landmark):
Has files with materials relating to the fort proper, the Fetterman and Wagon Box
battles, and the Fort Phil Kearny log. Some of the photos and collections of the Fort Phil
Kearny/Bozeman Trail Association primarily related to the Fort Phil Kearny, Fetterman, and
Wagon Box sites are also filed here.
• Fort Laramie National Historic Site, near town of
Fort Laramie, WY
• Fort Fetterman State Historic Site, near Douglas,
WY
Fort Fetterman displays and collections relate generally to the 1876 era and the
settlement era after Fort Fetterman was abandoned as a military post and became a town.
• Pioneer Museum State Site at Douglas, WY
The Pioneer Museum contains many artifacts, especially from Fort Fetterman, which
later became the town of Fetterman, and was in turn abandoned as Douglas grew. The museum
also has the research materials, primarily archaeological investigations, of J. W. Vaughn
and Floyd Bishop.
• Little Bighorn Battlefield, Crow Agency, MT
Materials relating to the Bozeman Trail were inventoried and copied by Charles
Luxmoore of Sheridan, and are in the Fort Phil Kearny/Bozeman Trail Association
collections at the Sheridan Library.
• Chief Plenty Coup Museum and Historic Home State Park
(and National Historic Landmark) This site is dedicated primarily to the history of
Chief Plenty Coups and the Crow people and contains many artifacts relating to Plenty
Coups and Crow history.
• Bannack State Park
The entire town of Bannack is itself something of an artifact from the gold rush days.
The buildings have been preserved and are not occupied. This may be the most pristine
example of an early day mining town in existence.
• Virginia City and Nevada City:
These towns contain over 200 old buildings, and over 200,000 artifacts. These early gold
mining towns were purchased recently by the State of Montana and are managed by the
Montana Heritage Preservation Commission out of the Montana State Historical Society.
Thousands of artifacts are being inventoried, catalogued, and properly cared for here.
Original buildings are being refurbished. Please see Articles and Opinions in Index for a
feature story on Virginia City.
UNIVERSITIES & COLLEGES:
• American Heritage Center at the University of Wyoming,
Included in the Bozeman Trail related collections at the AHC is the extensive
collection of Dr. Grace Raymond Hebard, historian, professor, attorney, and author (with
E.A. Brininstool) of The Bozeman Trail, (1922) , recently reprinted in a two-volume
paperback. Hebard was instrumental in obtaining the funding for the stone monuments and
markers placed along the Bozeman Trail routes by the State of Wyoming in 1914. Hebard's
collection, one of the largest in Wyoming, includes material from the entire route of the
Bozeman Trail through to Virginia City, Montana, and was described by publisher Arthur
Clarke as "without exception the most valuable source work on this important highway
of westward expansion."
• University of South Dakota, Vermillion, SD
The University houses the American Indian Research Project under the direction of Dr.
Joseph Cash and Herbert Hoover, who conducted nearly 1,000 oral history interviews among
various Indian tribes, including the Rosebud Sioux, Crow, and Cheyenne. Thirty selected
audio cassettes tapes, with teacher's guides included, are available for purchase as a
package or individually.
• Montana and Wyoming Universities and State Colleges at
Missoula, Bozeman, Billings, MT; and Laramie, WY
INDIAN COLLEGES:
• Sinte Gleska (Lakota), Martin, SD
(First four-yr. Indian college)
• Oglalla Lakota College, Kyle, SD
• Dull Knife College (Cheyenne), Lame Deer, MT
• Little Bighorn College (Crow), Crow Agency, MT
COUNTY/CITY MUSEUMS:
• Jim Gatchell Museum, Buffalo, WY
The Museum owns a large collection of artifacts from Fort Phil Kearny, the Bozeman
Trail, and Indian wars. These were collected by early Buffalo historian Jim Gatchell. They
are presently applying for accreditation, and if their application is accepted, the museum
will be one of only four accredited in Wyoming.
• Museum of the Rockies, Bozeman, MT
Included in the Museum of the Rockies collections are early Crow photographs by Elsa
Spear Byron and materials on the Nelson Story cattle drive of 1866 on the Bozeman Trail.
•Pioneer Museum, Bozeman, MT
This museum houses a number of artifacts belonging to John Bozeman, as well as items
from Nelson Story, who brought the largest cattle drive up the Bozeman Trail in 1866.
STATE GOVERNMENT:
SHPO (State Historic Preservation Offices in Wyoming and
Montana)
• The National Register of Historic Places Application
overview for the Bozeman Trail, and applications on nine sites in Wyoming are available
from SHPO office in Cheyenne or at the Sheridan County Library. The National Register
application for a Yellowstone Crossing site in Montana is available through the Montana
SHPO offices.
• Wyoming State Parks and Historic Sites Department
Collections are housed in offices in Cheyenne and also at state sites at Fort Phil
Kearny, Fort Fetterman, Guernsey State Park, and Pioneer Museum at Douglas.
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT:
•National Archives
Note: Most of the National Archives records relating to the Bozeman Trail are also
available in the Father Barry Hagan collections at the Sheridan County Fulmer Public
Library. Read about Father Hagan in News section in Index.
• National Anthropological Archives
• Library of Congress
The Library of Congress has the largest collection of archival newspapers in
existence.
•National Park Service
Note Jerome Greene's Reconnaissance of Indian Wars sites under Research category.
•United State Forest Service:
(Note: Big Horn National Forest, Sheridan, WY
•Bureau of Land Management: State offices in Cheyenne,
Wyoming, and regional offices at Buffalo and Casper, Wyoming, and Billings, Montana)
ORGANIZATIONS:
• Montana Parks Association, Billings, MT
• Fort Phil Kearny/Bozeman Trail Association, Sheridan,
WY
• Friends of Fort Fetterman, Converse County Historical
Society
• Montana Heritage Preservation (Management of
Virginia City and Nevada City under the auspices of the Montana State Historical Society),
Helena, MT
• Virginia City Alliance (Contact Mark Weber, Three
Forks, MT)
PHOTO COLLECTIONS:
• At most of the above collections depositories.
• Privately with Elsa Spear Byron's daughter, Marilyn
Bilyeu, Berthoud, CO
• Bighorn National Recreation Area at Lovell, WY, and
Yellowtail Dam, MT
• Museum of the Rockies at Bozeman (These include the
early Crow photos by Elsa Spear)
• American Heritage Center at the University of Wyoming.
• Big Horn County Museum at Hardin (These include
many of the photos by Jessamine Spear Johnson).
ARCHAEOLOGY:
• Wyoming State Archaeologist's Office at the
University of Wyoming, Laramie.
• Wyoming State Parks & Historic Sites:
Jeff Hauff was lead archaeologist for the Wyoming State Parks and Historic Sites
during two summers of sweeps at the Wagon Box Fight site; Mark Miller, State
Archaeologist, and Danny Walker, Assistant State Archaeologist, assisted. This department
and the State Archaeologist's Office also has materials from previous digs at Fort Phil
Kearny by Dr. George Frison, and by Richard Fox.
BOTANY:
• Vie Willits Garber's master thesis from the
University of Wyoming was written on the plants collected during her horseback ride from
Fort Reno to Fort C. F. Smith in 1908. Her thesis and historical collection, including
photos, is housed at the Sheridan County library in the Fort Phil Kearny/Bozeman Trail
Association collections.
• Bill Tall Bull's inventory of area medicinal herbs,
Indian religious plants, etc. is available at Dull Knife College, Lame Deer, MT. This
book is out of print for resale, but there are plans to reprint. Zane Spang uses it for
his Ethnobotany On Horseback Tours of the Cheyenne Reservation.
ANTHROPOLOGY
• Dr. Margot Liberty, ethnologist and co-author, with
John Stands-In-Timber, of Cheyenne Memories, has a considerable collection of
Indian related materials of the trail.
• Joe Medicine Crow, Crow elder, author, teacher, and
anthropologist. Much of Medicine Crow's collections are available at the Little Bighorn
College at Crow Agency, Montana.
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