Ken Alford, “On the Overland Trails with William Clark: A Teamster’s Utah War, 1857-1858”

Name: Ken Alford, “On the Overland Trails with William Clark: A Teamster’s Utah War, 1857-1858”
Start: 2025-11-11T19:00:00-07:00
End: 2025-11-11T20:00:00-07:00
Location: 550 N University Ave, Provo City Library, Rm 201, Provo, UT, United States, Utah 84601

Schedule

Tue Nov 11 2025 at 07:00 pm to 08:00 pm

UTC-07:00

Location

550 N University Ave, Provo City Library, Rm 201, Provo, UT, United States, Utah 84601 | Provo, UT

The Utah War remains an understudied but important moment in western history. There are few primary accounts from that war, but one of the best comes from William Clark, a young teamster hired by Russell, Majors and Waddell, the West’s greatest freighters. This presentation will share stories and anecdotes from this extraordinary account of a young man's travel across the Oregon and Mormon Trails from St. Louis to Salt Lake City (accompanying the U.S. Army's Utah Expedition as a civilian teamster and drover), his captivity in Salt Lake City by the Nauvoo Legion, and the continuation of his journey through Utah's southern settlements and across the Old Spanish Trail to San Bernardino. Clark's last leg of his cross-country journey took him across the killing field at Mountain Meadows in the immediate wake of the massacre. Come join us for an interesting evening!