Show 19 on he 1 AW I ak JU A una C aw UP ed va 7 4 0 wa 4 pa n 1 by t A f al off MR FIX k M 7 X 31 m AM W A 4 i A 4 4 9 R 10 1 0 i VA bb wn 1 J YF from ta 3 bg V 0 C darlein Darle ij I 1 7 ap by ELMO SCOTT WATSON WAGON centennial which Is being celebrated at various places along the route of the old oregon trail this year hns has again focused public attention of upon a type of vehicle which once Z traversed that ILI historic highway and has lemed bened to fix more firmly in the minds of most americans the prairie schooner as the one out safe SZ fe standing symbol of that epic migra tion which anon on the trans SIPPI west appropriate 1 though hough the prairie schooner may he be as symbol of that era in our history it was not the original covered wagon that distinction belongs to another vehicle which antedated the prairie schooner by at least a century but which like its successor played an important role in the westward march of the american people even though it did it amid the rich rolling farmlands the fertile valleys and tile the wooded slopes of the appalachians in the east rather than across across the broad plains of the great west for the conestoga wagon of lancaster county pennsylvania was the original covered wagon even though that name conestoga wagon means nothing to thousands of americans in whose minds a very definite picture forms when you speak the words prairie schooner one hundred years ago was at Us its height find on the conestoga Cou estoga trail the road from to pittsburgh which was the gateway to the ohio country viere fleets of great white milte topped wagons there were said to be three thousand dally daily on this road alone some carried six sit or eight ton loads of provisions and necessaries for the western country and back loaded with furs arid and skins flour and wheat from the west for the eastern markets others carried families who were going to the new country to make it their homes and all of their household goods of contemporary records of all this activity there are few and no stress is laid upon the wagons or their heavy six horse borse bell teams they were so much a part of every day that they are simply taken for granted historians who wrote just after their era was past mention them only casually they were nere still such a commonplace as ag indigenous to the pennsylvania countryside as its farms and orchards or its hills themselves today a conestoga wagon Is a rarity even in a the land of its origin tomorrow it will be found only in museums but fortunately for all those who cherish the tradition of things typically and essentially american the conestoga wagon has had its historian who has collected in one volume all the available information about this instrument of empire building before it was too late ile he Is john now a resident of cincinnati when john was a boy in pennsylvania his uncle wesley koons operated a big farm near greencastle Green castle in franklin county in the cumberland i alley after the civil war he was one of the few who kept their conestoga bell teams to be brought brou glit to town on election day and on other public occasions one of young Om Orn wakes ambitions was to some day own and drive as fine a team as uncle wesley koons that boyhood wish was never fulfilled but the next best thing was to write a book about this unique bit of pennsyl early life and the result was the hook book the conestoga six clorse bell teams of eastern pennsylvania 17 which mr recently printed for private distribution in the preface to his book mr air says to most of us today a conestoga wagon means rather vaguely a guely just any covered wagon cut but it the conestoga wagon was a perfect vehicle for existing conditions and the highest type of a commodious freight carrier that has ever been known it started as a farm wagon and grew with tile country it rumbled farther and farther from its houie home farm to the mill to the market and beneath its ponderous wheels trails widened and became roads fords became ferries and then bridges horizons broadened and tile the conestoga wagon was the ibe carrier between the east and the west whose need george washington had foreseen although the first of these e vb leles we were e it owl english covered farm wagons which came AA fl 11 b atis 7 UPS e ca date n conestoga wagon built in 1513 1 I 1 C A D 13 q LL fm f M A KORSE BEIL TEAMS laso ay ae qs JOHN From Vale un iyer sity bells into use in new england and other places on the atlantic seaboard early in the col colonial days local conditions in pennsylvania Penn silvania notably the greater distances between the producer and his market which made it it essential that the pennsylvania farm wagon hold twice as much as the new england farm arm wagon where distances were shorter hence the sturdier built and heavier wagon requiring from four to eight horses to pull it quickly resulted in the development of a distinctive type of wagon for this aliis region gradually the excellence ot of the wagons made by the wheelwrights wheel wrights of the conestoga 0 valley of lancaster county caused them to become famous throughout the aie country and conestoga wagon became a sort of trademark for this type of freight carrier they differed from the english wagons from which they sprang in that the bed was longer and deeper and had considerable sag in tile the middle both lengthwise and crosswise there was a very good goad reason for this if while the wagon was pursuing its way over some rough trail or down a steep mountainside the load would shift settle toward the center and not throw its bulk against the end gates unlike the bows which held the white cover of the english wa wagon on which were vertical the bows of the conestoga followed the line of the ends of the body and slanted outward ou tard thus keeping out rain and dust the whole appearance of the conestoga was that of a boat and ns as mr air says it Is easy to see why this his wagon should have been called the ship of inland commerce as it cruised with ith its great white top between the green pennsylvania hills even had it not been for its striking contour he be continues tile the conestoga wagon have been imposing because of its sheer bulk tile the top of the front hoop was eleven feet from the ground the white homespun cover was two dozen feet long the top ends of the wagon bed were sixteen feet apart and the rear wheels five or six feet high when the six horse team was pulling the team and wagon stretched to sixty feet tile the wagoner was selected because of hla his ability and dependability and when anyone interfered with his charge he knew liow flow to defend his rights there were many things to quarrel about and the wagoner in the popular mind became a dashing daredevil who was to the pennsylvania countryside what the cowboy was as to the west these great wagons which carried such large loads of freight required sturdy horses to draw them and gradually there evolved a breed of draught animals known as conestoga horses which were as dIstin distinctive clive as tile the wagons themselves they were the product of english or flemish draught horses and virginia mares and were viere a race of large patient animals with choit arched necks full manes good legs sleek flook round bodies and weighing around fourteen hundred pounds or more just as the conestoga wagons and horses were distinctive so were tile the various pieces of equip ment which helped to make up the whole in ing outfit the most striking of these were the beus bells which gave tile diffie of sli six horse borse hell bell teams at first these adl belli ls were very nece necessary wary for the roads were narrow and winkling winding and it was desirable that other traffic be given warning 0 of the approach of one of these heavy outfits but later these bells survived as a sort of a trademark they varied in size number shape and arrangement but the early day traveler on a pennsylvania syl vanla road could not mistake the sound of their tinkling approach then there were distinctive features in the tool boxes the feed boxes the tar buckets and a dozen other things the iron work on these wagons was especially interesting revealing as it did the artistic aspirations of the blacksmiths who collaborated with wheelwrights wheel wrights in making the conestoga wagons usually the blacksmith put somewhere on the wagon tile the date in iron and the figure one as it invariably appeared on the conestoga wagon and nowhere else Is interesting it Is a double I 1 crossed and according to mr it menns meant jahr herr jesu or the year of our lord jesus then there wore were other details which gave to the wagon a picturesque and imp impressive ve appearance its wheels and removable sideboards were painted a bright vermilion while the running gear nas mas a soft blue and white cover gleamed in the sunshine a brave sight cruising between the green fields and tile wooded hills 1 I think the painting of the conestoga wagons was the result of conditions rather than any esthetic preference although the amish today have a decided liking for light blue pink and cherry red the conestoga wagon came into existence just in time alme mohave a part in making american wo tory As early as 1745 benjamin franklin was vs issuing a broadside urging to enlist with their wagons and teams in the kings service against the french and indians ten years later ilien general braddock set out upon his ill fated expedition it was very necessary that lie he have adequate transport for liis his provisions during his march into the wilderness securing this was only one of the many difficulties of that harassed leader and it was not until benjamin franklin came to his old aid and persuaded the pennsylvania to enlist that the expedition was able to make any progress westward stward ic conestoga also accompanied gen john probes on his march three years later to accomplish what braddock had failed to do the capture of the french fort at the forks of the ohio the conestoga wagons played their part too in the struggle for liberty it was these vehicles which carried supplies to the american army during that terrible winter at valley forge and in the spring of 1778 a sturdy conestoga wagon drawn by tour four horses and with a full company of continental tin soldiers as a guard brought in silver the loan of the french government from portsmouth N H to the government treasury at york pa where the continental congress was wag then inee tinz but it was in the period after the revolution that the conestoga rose to its full glory as the carrier of freight back and forth to the west and as the vehicle of the emigrants into the kentucky and ohio country it also served once more as a weapon of 0 war during the war of 1812 1810 aben Cou conestoga estoga wagons carried powder from hie brandywine mills to lake erie bric there to 6 lie be used in perrys brilliant victory at put ln in day Q by western newspaper union 0 |