Tesla Model 3 Maiden Voyage – Pony Express Museum – St Joseph MO

If you are traveling in the midwest, one thing you won’t come up short with is historical museums. It seems like every hundred miles, a small town comes along with some significant contribution to the formation of this nation. They are usually forgotten about by the people of today. Today, this is just what happened to me when I discovered the Museum of the Pony Express.

IMG_8966IMG_8970

Imagine being being a prospector in the west in the 1850’s. The only communication from the east took about a month to reach you. Let’s stop and let that sink in for a second. Any word of politics, of your families health, of any new information took a month to get to you. By the time word got back to the east, that would have been two months. It’s hard to fathom in todays world of instant communication. To conquer this problem, The Pony Express was created.

IMG_8971IMG_8972IMG_8973IMG_8975

William RussellAlexander Majors, and William B. Waddell were the three founders of the Pony Express. Their idea was to find the shortest route and to use mounted riders, as young as 13, (opposed to stagecoaches), to deliver letters in 10 days. They were told that the idea was impossible, but that did not stop them.

So they built 186 stations, each about ten miles apart, and had the riders travel to each, switching horses every time they came upon a new station. They would only travel with a pouch to ensure they could travel at top speed. Riders would then switch every 70-100 miles. The route started in St Joseph Missouri and ended all the way in Sacramento.

IMG_8976IMG_8977IMG_8979IMG_8980IMG_8981IMG_8983

Today, the original starting station in St. Joseph is now a museum dedicated to these riders. It is definitely surreal walking around and thinking about the hardships all of these riders endured just to bring people their mail. It makes me think about how soft we have become today, for better or worse. The museum is broken up into two sections, one to talk about the trail and one to honor the riders. Many of the riders went on to become famous on the plains in their own right, the most famous being Buffalo Bill.

 

IMG_8984IMG_8985IMG_8986IMG_8987IMG_8989IMG_8990IMG_8991IMG_8992

Closest Supercharger – St Joseph 2 mi

201 N Belt Hwy, St Joseph, MO 64506

IMG_8993IMG_8994IMG_8995IMG_8996IMG_8998IMG_9000IMG_9001IMG_9002IMG_9003

Pony Express Museum

914 Penn St, St Joseph, MO 64503