THE “OVERLAND ROUTE” STATION AT COLUMBUS
Julesburg, 372 miles west of Omaha, was in 1865 an important stage station on the Overland Route, and as a supply point was the subject of much attention from the Indians. On one occasion a thousand Sioux and Cheyennes attacked it, but were finally driven off. The station was named after one Jules, agent for Ben Holladay’s stage line. He was killed by J. A. Slade, a noted desperado, who fought both for and against law and order. His career and that of his faithful wife are set forth in Mark Twain’s “Roughing It.”
AT NORTH PLATTE, NEBRASKA, COLONEL CODY (BUFFALO BILL) HAS A RANCH WHICH HE NAMED “SCOUT’S REST” IN MEMORY OF FRONTIER DAYS
Long after Julesburg was an Overland Route railway station, the buffalo fed on the plains around it. These animals should have some share in the credit for the construction of the Overland Railways. Their destruction, if deplorable, was a factor in the success of the builders. They provided sustenance for the brawn of the workman almost all the way across the plains from Omaha to the Rockies, and while rib steaks and succulent humps comforted the inner man their robes kept warm the outer one. The camp hunter did not have to travel far for meat those days. Time was, and not so many years ago, when an Indian would trade a buffalo robe for a cup of sugar or a yard of red flannel, but now save in a few parks and exhibition places the buffalo has passed away. The plains were at one time strewn with their white bones. It was the custom of the Mormons to use the frontal bones of their skulls as tablets whereon to write brief messages to the wagon trains following. One may be seen in the Commercial Club museum, Salt Lake City, bearing in Brigham Young’s writing the inscription:
THE NORTH PLATTE, KNOWN TO CIVILIZATION SINCE THE EXPEDITION OF JOHN JACOB ASTOR IN 1812
“Pioneers camped here June 3, ’47, making fifteen miles a day. All well.
Brigham Young.”
After Sidney, a rich farming town of two thousand people, and in 1868 a military post of importance, the Overland Limited stops at Cheyenne. Shortly before reaching Cheyenne, Long’s Peak, with snow-clad summit appears above the horizon.
