Editing Oregon Trail (section)

===Fur traders, trappers, and explorers===
Fur trappers, often working for fur traders, followed nearly all possible streams looking for beaver in the years (1812–40) when the fur trade was active.<ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.history.idaho.gov/Reference%20Series/0444.pdf |title = Idaho Fiur Trade |access-date = April 16, 2009 |url-status = dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090416142248/http://www.history.idaho.gov/Reference%20Series/0444.pdf |archive-date = April 16, 2009}}</ref> Fur traders included [[Manuel Lisa]], Robert Stuart, [[William Henry Ashley]], [[Jedediah Smith]], [[William Sublette]], [[Andrew Henry (fur trader)|Andrew Henry]], [[Thomas Fitzpatrick (trapper)|Thomas Fitzpatrick]], [[Kit Carson]], [[Jim Bridger]], [[Peter Skene Ogden]], [[David Thompson (explorer)|David Thompson]], [[James Douglas (governor)|James Douglas]], [[Donald Mackenzie (explorer)|Donald Mackenzie]], [[Alexander Ross (fur trader)|Alexander Ross]], [[James Sinclair (fur trader)|James Sinclair]], and other [[mountain man|mountain men]]. Besides describing and naming many of the rivers and mountains in the [[Intermountain West]] and Pacific Northwest, they often kept diaries of their travels and were available as guides and consultants when the trail started to become open for general travel. The fur trade business wound down to a very low level just as the Oregon trail traffic seriously began around 1840.

[[File:Alfred Jacob Miller - Our Camp - Walters 371940177.jpg|thumb|''Our Camp'', by Alfred Jacob Miller]]

In the fall of 1823, Jedediah Smith and Thomas Fitzpatrick led their trapping crew south from the [[Yellowstone River]] to the Sweetwater River. They were looking for a safe location to spend the winter. Smith reasoned since the Sweetwater flowed east it must eventually run into the Missouri River. Trying to transport their extensive fur collection down the Sweetwater and North Platte Rivers, they found after a near-disastrous canoe crash that the rivers were too swift and rough for water passage. On July 4, 1824, they cached their furs under a dome of rock they named [[Independence Rock (Wyoming)|Independence Rock]] and started their long trek on foot to the Missouri River. Upon arriving back in a settled area they bought pack horses (on credit) and retrieved their furs. They had discovered the route that Robert Stuart had taken in 1813—eleven years before. Thomas Fitzpatrick was often hired as a guide when the fur trade dwindled in 1840. Smith was killed by Comanche natives around 1831.

[[File:JedediahSmithEnglishVersion.png|thumb|left|The exploration of the West by [[Jedediah Smith]]]]

Up to 3,000 mountain men were [[animal trapping|trappers]] and [[Exploration|explorers]], employed by various British and United States fur companies or working as free trappers, who roamed the North American Rocky Mountains from about 1810 to the early 1840s. They usually traveled in small groups for mutual support and protection. Trapping took place in the fall when the fur became prime. Mountain men primarily trapped [[beaver]] and sold the skins. A good beaver skin could bring up to $4 at a time when a man's wage was often $1 per day. Some were more interested in exploring the West. In 1825, the first significant American [[Rocky Mountain Rendezvous|Rendezvous]] occurred on the Henry's Fork of the [[Green River (Colorado River)|Green River]]. The trading supplies were brought in by a large party using pack trains originating on the Missouri River. These pack trains were then used to haul out the fur bales. They normally used the north side of the Platte River—the same route used 20 years later by the [[Mormon Trail]]. For the next 15 years, the American rendezvous was an annual event moving to different locations, usually somewhere on the Green River in the future state of [[Wyoming]]. Each rendezvous, occurring during the slack summer period, allowed the fur traders to trade for and collect the furs from the trappers and their Native American allies without having the expense of building or maintaining a fort or wintering over in the cold Rockies. In only a few weeks at a rendezvous a year's worth of trading and celebrating would take place as the traders took their furs and remaining supplies back east for the winter and the trappers faced another fall and winter with new supplies. Trapper [[Jim Beckwourth]] described the scene as one of "Mirth, songs, dancing, shouting, trading, running, jumping, singing, racing, target-shooting, yarns, frolic, with all sorts of extravagances that white men or Indians could invent."<ref>Gowans, Fred R. ''Rocky Mountain Rendezvous'', p. 27. Gibbs Smith Publisher. {{ISBN|1-58685-756-8}}</ref> In 1830, William Sublette brought the first wagons carrying his trading goods up the Platte, North Platte, and Sweetwater rivers before crossing over South Pass to a fur trade rendezvous on the Green River near the future town of [[Big Piney, Wyoming|Big Piney]], Wyoming. He had a crew that dug out the gullies and river crossings and cleared the brush where needed. This established that the eastern part of most of the Oregon Trail was passable by wagons. In the late 1830s, the HBC instituted a policy intended to destroy or weaken the American fur trade companies. The HBC's annual collection and re-supply Snake River Expedition was transformed into a trading enterprise. Beginning in 1834, it visited the American Rendezvous to undersell the American traders—losing money but undercutting the American fur traders. By 1840 the fashion in Europe and Britain shifted away from the formerly very popular beaver felt hats and prices for furs rapidly declined and the trapping almost ceased.

[[File:Greenutrivermap.png|thumb|Map of the [[Green River (Colorado River)|Green River]] watershed]]

Fur traders tried to use the Platte River, the main route of the eastern Oregon Trail, for transport but soon gave up in frustration as its many channels and islands combined with its muddy waters were too shallow, crooked, and unpredictable to use for water transport. The Platte proved to be unnavigable. The Platte River and North Platte River Valley, however, became an easy roadway for wagons, with its nearly flat plain sloping easily up and heading almost due west.

Several U.S. government-sponsored explorers explored part of the Oregon Trail and wrote extensively about their explorations. Captain [[Benjamin Bonneville]] on his expedition of 1832 to 1834 explored much of the Oregon trail and brought wagons up the Platte, North Platte, Sweetwater route across South Pass to the Green River in Wyoming. He explored most of Idaho and the Oregon Trail to the Columbia. The account of his explorations in the West was published by [[Washington Irving]] in 1838.<ref>The Adventures of Captain Bonneville [[s: The Adventures of Captain Bonneville]]</ref> [[John C. Frémont]] of the [[Corps of Topographical Engineers|U.S. Army's Corps of Topographical Engineers]] and his guide Kit Carson led three expeditions from 1842 to 1846 over parts of California and Oregon. His explorations were written up by him and his wife [[Jessie Benton Frémont]] and were widely published. The first detailed maps of California and Oregon were drawn by Frémont and his [[Topography as the study of place|topographer]]s and [[Cartography|cartographers]] in about 1848.<ref>[http://www.davidrumsey.com/maps5489.html Frémont's Map of California and Oregon], Retrieved December 23, 2009</ref>