Rolling, rolling, rolling

Have you ever really sat and thought about the Westward expansion when families decided to leave their homes in the East to move into this area and beyond? I have, especially when my friends and I visited Palo Duro Canyon in Texas. Driving down into the canyon made us all stop and think about the first travelers to the area who were moving along in the flat terrain of the area and all of a sudden came upon this large canyon. We all agreed that we would have been discouraged and joked that we probably would have just stopped or turned around. Thankfully early travelers kept going and settled the West. But how did they get here? And once they were here how did they get supplies here?

One way that people and supplies traveled here in the early 1900’s was in wagons. Conestoga, or covered wagons, and freight wagons were a couple of the more well known vehicles to travel west at the time. We have a wonderful example of a freight wagon that came in with the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection. The plaque on this freight wagon reads: “Four-Horse Freight Wagon Austin to Coleman Run C. 1910”. Calvin Smith, the Executive Director of the Western Heritage Museum Complex and Lea County Cowboy Hall of Fame actually worked on preserving this wagon back in the early 1970’s for Mrs. Linam-Webber. He tends to call the freight wagon “the Suburban of the day,” a multipurpose and multifunctional vehicle. Imagine you are a family leaving your home in the East and you are going to be taking a wagon to your new home in the West. What would you bring? You only have limited space and power depending on the size of wagon and how many horses, oxen, and/or mules you may have to pull the wagon. Clothes and personal effects would be placed in chests and trunks while other items would be transported loose. Some families even brought such prized possessions as pianos and organs across the vast distances.

With very few roads and trails out this way, traveling was extremely difficult. Wagons were built tough: wood and iron, but traveling across the West was hard on the vehicles, people, and freight. When traveling, people had to bring everything that they would need with them; there were no rest stops or convenience stores along the way. They had to be prepared for traveling in rain, sun, and snow, over flatlands, mountains, and across rivers. When not transporting people to their new homes, wagons were also used to transport goods to these new towns where people were settling. In a time where super-stores were not on every corner, people relied on their local general stores to provide them with supplies they would need to survive: flour, fabric, sugar, etc. These supplies came to the general stores in freight wagons.

As Calvin stated, these were multipurpose and multifunctional vehicles. Wagons such as the one from the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection really helped to settle and supply the West. Sadly, because traveling was so rough on the wagons, very few remain in good shape. We are very lucky to have a freight wagon so well preserved in our collection. Thelma Linam-Webber wanted to preserve history in order to share it with future generations, which is exactly what she did with this freight wagon. Come on into the Western Heritage Museum Complex and Lea County Cowboy Hall of Fame and take a look at this piece of history in the South Gallery. Imagine what you would have brought with you if this was all the room you had and you were moving across the country. Would all your possessions fit or would you have to pick and choose what to bring? Thankfully the settlers before us made such decisions and paved the way for us today. I’d like to wish you all a very Happy New Year from all of us at the Western Heritage Museum Complex and Lea County Cowboy Hall of Fame!!