Emigrant Trail in Wyoming

North Platte River

In the eastern plains the Emigrant Trail follows the North Platte River upstream into Wyoming, reaching Fort Laramie, a prominent military and trading post. Before 1850 the river's northern side was considered impassable beyond the fort, forcing wagon trains on that side to make a dangerous crossing there; those on the southern side had to cross again 100 miles upstream. In 1850 several trains successfully blazed a northern route, sometimes called Child's Route after Andrew Child's 1852 guidebook, reducing the risk and expense of two crossings.

This route passes through present-day Douglas and near the site of Fort Fetterman, built in 1867, where the Bozeman Trail turned north to Montana's gold fields. The southern route follows the river along the Laramie Mountains toward Casper and Glenrock. In 1847 Brigham Young established Mormon Ferry near present-day Casper; it moved downriver in 1848, was free for Latter-day Saints but tolled others, and operated each summer until 1852. John Baptiste Richard built a toll bridge near the ferry site in 1853, eventually ending all North Platte ferries.

Louis Guinard built the Platte Bridge near the original ferry in 1859, with a trading post that became Fort Caspar. Landmarks along the southern route include Ayres Natural Bridge and Register Cliff, where settlers carved their names.

Sweetwater River

The trail continues west along the Sweetwater River, crossing it nine times, including three times within a two-mile canyon in the Rattlesnake Hills. Before the sixth crossing lies Ice Slough, where a peat-like vegetation layer insulates a small stream that freezes in winter and does not thaw until early summer, providing ice to settlers enduring July temperatures over 90°F. After three more crossings the trail meets Rocky Ridge, a barren, rocky section nearly 12 miles long considered a major obstacle.

In November 1856 the same storm that disabled the Martin Handcart Company stranded the Willie Handcart Company east of the ridge; 21 people died before rescuers arrived. The trail descends to the ninth and final crossing at Burnt Ranch. In 1853 the Seminoe Cutoff, named after trapper Basil LaJeunesse (called Seminoe by the Shoshone), split from the main trail at the sixth crossing and rejoined at Burnt Ranch, bypassing Rocky Ridge and four river crossings—an advantage during high spring runoff. It was used extensively in the 1850s, especially by Mormon companies.

Sublette-Greenwood Cutoff

Opened in 1844 by the Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party led by mountain men Caleb Greenwood and Isaac Hitchcock, the Sublette-Greenwood Cutoff went due west from the Little Sandy across 40 miles of desert to the Green River, then over a ridge into the Bear River Valley, bypassing Fort Bridger and Bear River Ridge entirely. The route saved about 85 miles and seven days but required crossing nearly 45 waterless miles before reaching the Green River, forcing settlers to choose between time and livestock health.

It reached peak popularity during the California Gold Rush of the 1850s. Joseph Ware named it the Sublette Cutoff in his 1849 guidebook after Solomon Sublette, youngest brother of William Sublette, who told him about the route; most scholars today call it the Sublette-Greenwood Cutoff after its discoverer. Several ferries operated where the cutoff crossed the Green River near present-day La Barge: the Names Hill Ford (barely passable at low water), the Names Hill Ferry, the Mormon Ferry a mile upstream, and the Mountain Man Ferry during the Gold Rush.

West of the ford is Names Hill, a prominent emigrant recording area with carvings including 'James Bridger, 1844, Trapper'—though its authenticity is unclear since Bridger was reportedly illiterate—and Native American pictographs. The Slate Creek or Kinney Cutoff breaks from the main trail near the Lombard Ferry on the Green River and meets the Sublette Cutoff on Slate Creek Ridge at Emigrant Springs, offering only 10 waterless miles instead of 45.

Lander Cutoff

The Lander Road was a federally funded route built in 1858 under Frederick W. Lander, making it one of the earliest government-sponsored roads in the West. Its official name was the Fort Kearney, South Pass and Honey Lake Road, and it cut about 85 miles off the journey to Fort Hall by avoiding Fort Bridger. The road started at Burnt Ranch, followed the Sweetwater River farther north than the main trail, curved around the Wind River Range, and crossed the continental divide north of South Pass.

It then crossed the Green River near what is now Big Piney, Wyoming, went over Thompson Pass in the Wyoming Range, and crossed another high pass in the Salt River Range before dropping into Star Valley. From there it ran north about 20 miles down Star Valley, then turned west at Stump Creek near present-day Auburn, Wyoming, and entered Idaho through Stump Creek valley over the Caribou Range. That section is now only a Forest Service path. After the Caribou Range, the road split: one branch went southwest to Soda Springs, Idaho, and the other went due west, passing south of Grays Lake, to Fort Hall.

The route had good grass, water, wood, and fishing, but was high, rough, and steep in many places. After 1869, it was mostly used by ranchers moving livestock to and from summer grazing.