We speak of the Oregon Trail, but it means little to us today; nor will any mere generalities ever make it mean much to us.

But what did it mean to the men and women of that day?
What and who were those men and women?
What did it mean to take the Overland Trail in the great adventure of abandoning forever the known and the safe and setting out for Oregon or California at a time when everything in the far West was new and unknown?
How did those good folk travel?
Why and whither did they travel?
There is a book done by C.F.McGlashan, a resident of Truckee, California, known as "The History of the Donner Party," holding a great deal of actual history.

McGlashan, living close to Donner Lake, wrote in 1879, describing scenes with which he was perfectly familiar, and recounting facts which he had from direct association with participants in the ill-fated Donner Party.

He chronicles events which happened in 1846--a date before the discovery of gold in California.

The Donner Party was one of the typical American caravans of homeseekers who started for the Pacific Slope with no other purpose than that of founding homes there, and with no expectation of sudden wealth to be gained in the mines.