This Is What The Lieutenant Was Looking For In 1806.

by Bijan Pirnia

Title

This Is What The Lieutenant Was Looking For In 1806.

Artist

Bijan Pirnia

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Photograph - Photography

Description

The headwaters of the Arkansas River between Sahwatch and Mosquito Mountains of central Colorado in San Isabel National Forest.
This area is what lieutenant Pike was looking for in the early 1800s.
It was in July of 1806 that lieutenant Zebulon Montgomery Pike, an army officer and explorer, began his westward expedition from Fort Bellefontain in Saint Louis, Missouri to locate the source of the Arkansas River. Bellefontaine is French for beautiful fountain. In November of the same year, he became the first American of the European descent to see the mountain that now bears his name. He and a small group of his men attempted to climb it, but failed due to a snowstorm and the lack of proper equipment. They returned to the camp in waist-deep snow. He later wrote in his journal that "The mountain is unclimable, and that it may never be climbed, and no man could've reached its pinnacle." Little did he know that less than a century after he wrote those words an auto road as well as a railway would be constructed all the way to the summit. Little did he know that there would come a time when each year well over half a million people from around the globe would step onto the summit of this world-famous mountain after driving 19 miles up the toll road, taking the cog train, or hiking 14 miles up Barr Trail, named after Fred Barr, who around 1918 supplemented his income by providing Burro rides 6 miles up the trail to an area now known as Barr Camp located in Pike National Forest. Even though Pikes Peak is named after lieutenant Pike he never climbed it. Edwin James, a botanist, and Julia Archibald Holmes were the first Americans of the European descent to scale the summit in 1820 and 1858, respectively.
DSC 3755, D7000

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May 15th, 2016

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