Moominmama and the Pony Express

 

Wherein Moominmama watches Rick and Lola ride off with the Pony Express mailbag and enjoys learning the history of Casper, Wyoming...

Hee-yah! Moominmama arrived in Casper, Wyoming just in time to catch the annual re-enactment of the Pony Express as it made its way from Missouri to California. 

Turns out theses states and those in between each have National Pony Express Association chapters, and each year they coordinate a 10-day run of 1,966 miles between St. Joseph, Missouri and Sacramento, providing volunteer riders, horses and associated logistics. The Pony Express rides west in even years and east in odd years.

While Moominmama has been to the Pony Express museum in Gothenburg, Nebraska, she'd never seen the mail delivery service in operation. Here's Rick and his horse Lola as they waited for their turn to ride. They've done this route before. 

He, like the other riders, go a two-to-two-and-a-half-mile stretch (considerably shorter than the original riders would have done) carrying a special mailbag, or mochila (Spanish for knapsack), switching it between horses at each stop.

In Casper, the mochila and rider, accompanied by a second rider carrying a flag from the Casper VFW, arrived up a grassy hillside at the National Historic Trails Interpretive Center on Friday afternoon.

For a mail delivery system that lasted only 18 months, (April of 1860 to October of 1861 before it lost out to the telegraph) it sure captured the national imagination.

The idea that 700+ riders would volunteer to repeat this route annually since 1980 boggles the mind. The riders come through three points in Casper: the Sinclair oil refinery, the National Historic Trails Interpretive Center and on the west end, Fort Caspar (a museum). 

Docents at Fort Caspar recommended the trails center to Moominmama as the best location to watch. From atop a grassy knoll, Moominmama and about 60 other watchers got to see two riders approach from the distance and observe the transfer of the mailbag with its four locked pouches, onto the next horse, Lola. 

Moominmama also overheard several young people ask what was involved in becoming a Pony Express rider, eager to participate! I don't know if there are any young riders on the re-enactment. The riders Moominmama met were all grizzled long-time aficionados and repeat riders. But the impulse to keep this going appears to persist through generations!

The National Pony Express Association also allows fans to send commemorative letters for $5, or a personal letter for $10, so the pouches on the mochila do contain postmarked U.S. mail.

Here the mochila is positioned over the saddle and Rick is mounting his horse. Not all of his ride is across grassland and sagebrush. He'll have roads to cross with modern-day traffic. 

Believe it or not, the riders continue on through the night, just as the original Pony Express did. But in the dark, they'll have some help from accompanying riders and even the local constabulary, to ensure they can get to their stop safely.

That doesn't mean accidents don't happen, but nothing fatal so far, I'm told. One rider got thrown this year after his horse stepped in a hole and lost his balance. So I wish Rick and Lola the best as they head to Fort Caspar -- at least they have daylight on their side. 

So you may be thinking that I misspelled Fort Caspar, a typo. But the typo is actually in the name of the city. The community was named after Caspar Collins, a young first lieutenant at the fort who was killed in 1865 by Cheyenne and Arapaho, who were (understandably) incensed by the murder of their women and children in the Sand Creek Massacre in nearby Colorado. 

In 1888, when the town coalesced around the new railroad east of the fort, it named itself after the Army solider but inadvertently misspelled his name. It's been Casper, Wyoming ever since then, while the fort, Fort Caspar, maintains the correct spelling. 

Fort Caspar when Moominmama visited was also undergoing renovations, but it was still possible to see the buildings from outside and to walk to the river crossing that marked the start of this community. 

Apparently, the Mormons sought to cross the river at this spot and were forced to build a raft from materials at hand to get wagons and people over. Having successfully ferried their party across, Brigham Young ordered 10 men to stay behind and to operate the raft for those who came after, charging $3 for non-Mormons and raising money for their church.

The wild west fort and community that started along this North Platte River crossing, and later around the railroad depot would eventually become a mecca for oil. Casper is down to one oil refinery (from three) now, but it's reportedly a highly modern operation run by the Sinclair Corporation processing 30,000 barrels a day from supplies generated in this region. Among others, the Teapot Dome oil field, of historic scandal fame, is nearby.

One of the nicest features in this community, however, is the mountain range immediately to the south of the city, including Casper Mountain. Rising 3,000 feet above the city, it offers a downhill ski area, multiple campgrounds, numerous trails for hiking and biking as well as nordic skiing in winter, much of the land owned and managed by the county.

And in the foothills, with trails thanks to a Rotary park, is this waterfall. So Moominmama has enjoyed wooded hikes as well as some city living all in close proximity.

Casper, with a population around 58,000, is the second-largest city in Wyoming but still smaller than Grand Junction. Looking at it from high points in the mountains, you can see it spread out along the North Platte River and yet surrounded by rolling hills of grassland and sagebrush that extend to the horizon.

This may be the biggest city I visit for some time now as I head north to the Bighorn National Forest, Devil's Tower and then into the Dakotas. So I leave you with a photo of the downtown central library in Casper -- civilization at its finest!