Now and Then

Lewis

Linda Burton posting from Helena, Montana – You can’t throw a rock around here without hitting something named Lewis and Clark. Helena is the county seat of Lewis and Clark County; the Lewis and Clark National Forest is all around. It’s no wonder their names are everywhere, because Meriwether Lewis and William Clark had quite an impact on this part of the country. And this part of the country had an impact on them, as we can read in their journals. We have the Missouri River to thank for their visit; one might say that in travel and exploration, mountains are walls and rivers are the roads through them. The Missouri River road brought Lewis and Clark (and Sacajawea) here; between July 16, 1805 and July 24 to be exact; their Journal entries tell us what they saw, what they did, and how they felt about it all. Lewis writes that they killed a buffalo near the river on July 16, and dined on it for breakfast. On the 17^th he notes the sunflowers blooming abundantly in the river bottom. The next day he writes of his eagerness to meet up with the Shoshone as he hopes to get information from them. But it’s the entry of July 19 that stirs excitement for me today, as I head for the “gates of the mountains,” to see what Captain Lewis described in his journal. » read more