A Writer Tackled The Oregon Trail (He Did Not Die Of Dysentery)

Ross Reynolds interviews Rinker Buck about his new book,“The Oregon Trail: A New American Journey.” Buck and his brother took a mule-drawn wagon more than 2,000 miles over the path of the trail that brought the first mass migration of white settlers to the Pacific Northwest.

The wagon had a sign on the back which said, “We are sorry for the delay but we want to see America slowly."

The book recounts stories of the original pioneers (did you know they were terrible litter bugs?), a masterful account of the geography of the West and a thoughtful consideration how it’s changed since the Oregon Trail brought people here in the mid-19th century.

Photo credit: "Along the Oregon Trail in Nebraska," by Kent Kanouse on Flickr (CC BY NC 2.0)