Corps of Discovery Hats 20 What Did the Explorers Really Wear on Their Heads? by Bob Moore
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Chinook Point Decision Columbia Gorge John Ordway White House Ceremony The Official Publication of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, Inc. May 2001 Volume 27, No. 2 C ORPS OF DISCOVERY HATS What did Lewis & Clark and their men really wear on their heads? ROW 4/C AD The Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, Inc. P.O. Box 3434, Great Falls, Montana 59403 Ph: 406-454-1234 or 1-888-701-3434 Fax: 406-771-9237 www.lewisandclark.org Mission Statement The mission of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, Inc. is to stimulate public appreciation of the Lewis and Clark Expedition’s contributions to America’s heritage and to support education, research, development, and preservation of the Lewis and Clark experience. Officers Active Past Presidents Directors at large President David Borlaug Beverly Hinds Cindy Orlando Washburn, North Dakota Sioux City, Iowa 1849 “C” St., N.W. Washington, DC 20240 Robert K. Doerk, Jr. James Holmberg Fort Benton, Montana Louisville, Kentucky President-Elect Barbara Kubik James R. Fazio Ron Laycock 10808 N.E. 27th Court Moscow, Idaho Benson, Minnesota Vancouver, WA 98686 Robert E. Gatten, Jr. Larry Epstein Vice-President Greensboro, North Carolina Cut Bank, Montana Jane Henley 1564 Heathrow Drive H. John Montague Dark Rain Thom Keswick, VA 22947 Portland, Oregon Bloomington, Indiana Secretary Clyde G. “Sid” Huggins Joe Mussulman Ludd Trozpek Covington, Louisiana Lolo, Montana 4141 Via Padova Claremont, CA 91711 Donald F. Nell Robert Shattuck Bozeman, Montana Grass Valley, California Treasurer Jerry Garrett James M. Peterson Jane SchmoyerWeber 10174 Sakura Drive Vermillion, South Dakota Great Falls, Montana St. Louis, MO 65128 William P. Sherman Frank Muhly Immediate Past President Portland, Oregon Philadelphia, Pennsylvania David Borlaug Washburn, ND 58577 L. Edwin Wang Minneapolis, Minnesota Executive Director Sammye Meadows Wilbur P. Werner Mesa, Arizona Stuart E. Knapp Bozeman, Montana Incorporated in 1969 under Missouri General Not-For-Profit Corporation Act. IRS Exemption Certificate No. 501(c)3, ldentification No. 510187715. February 2000 We Proceeded On 2 Contents Letters: Gass portrait; Ordway’s signature; bars; Sgt. Floyd 2 From the Directors: Keepers of the story, stewards of the trail 3 Bicentennial Report: “Sentral to the Nation” 4 Trail Notes: Rehabilitating fire-damaged forests 5 From the Library: Silent auction 5 Passages: Jack Ritter 5 North Dakota campaign tops $2 million 5 The “Stupendious” Columbia Gorge 6 A landscape born of lava and ice-age floods Columbia Gorge, p. 6 By Glen Kirkpatrick Decision at Chinook Point 13 What about that “vote” on where to winter? By Martin Plamondon II Corps of Discovery Hats 20 What did the explorers really wear on their heads? By Bob Moore Dependable John Ordway 28 L&C’s top sergeant left scant record of his later life By Larry E. Morris Hats, p. 20 Reviews: Jenkinson on Lewis 34 L&C Roundup: Brief items and chapter news 36 Bulletin Board: Call for candidates and papers 38 Dispatches: White House ceremony 40 On the cover This painting by Missouri artist Michael Haynes depicts Joseph and Reubin Field, George Drouillard, and Meriwether Lewis and William Clark at the mouth of the Moreau River on June 3, 1804. The Field brothers are wearing round hats, while Drouillard sports a bandanna and Lewis a chapeau de bras. For more on the Corps of Discovery’s headgear, see pages 20-27. Meriwether Lewis, p. 34 May 2001 We Proceeded On 1 Letters Another Gass portrait May 2001 • Volume 27, Number 2 our first festival inspired an enormous We Proceeded On is the official publication of amount of interest along this stretch of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Founda- the Lewis and Clark Trail. tion, Inc. Its name derives from a phrase that Elk Point invites other Corps of Dis- appears repeatedly in the collective journals covery descendants to reenact the roles of the expedition. 2001. of their ancestors during this year’s Heri- E. G. Chuinard, M.D., Founder tage Days Festival, to be held August 18- ISSN 02275-6706 19. Those interested should contact Alice Editor Murphy or Linda McKay at 605-356- J. I. Merritt 2164/2310 or send e-mail to elkpoint@sd. 51 N. Main Street value.net. Pennington, NJ 08534 STEVE MARTIN 609-818-0168 City Administrator [email protected] Elk Point, S.D. Art Direction Margaret Davis Design Princeton, New Jersey Printed by Advanced Litho Printing Ordway’s signature Great Falls, Montana In Jeffrey Olson’s Trail Notes column in the November WPO he states, “Burned Editorial Board acres of the trail will recover in a few de- Gary E. Moulton, Leader I enjoyed reading “A ‘New’ Portrait of cades, but there looms a more serious, Lincoln, Nebraska Patrick Gass” in the November 2000 WPO. long-term threat to the only physical evi- Robert C. Carriker Like Eugene Gass Painter, I too am a di- dence of the expedition, William Clark’s Spokane, Washington rect descendant of Gass—a great-great- signature at Pompey’s Pillar, on the Robert K. Doerk, Jr. great granddaughter. His fifth child, Yellowstone River not far from Billings, Fort Benton, Montana Annie Jane, was my great-great grand- Montana.” I disagree that Clark’s signa- Glen Lindeman mother. And like Eugene, I have a por- ture is the “only” physical evidence left Pullman, Washington trait of Gass [pictured]. It appeared in by the Corps of Discovery. Journal en- “Amazing Americans,” an advertising tries for May 23, 1804, mention the ex- insert about Lewis and Clark published plorers’ stopping at Tavern Cave at the Membership Information in a 1992 edition of Time magazine. The base of a cliff near St. Albans, Missouri. Membership in the Lewis and Clark Trail portrait bears an uncanny resemblance to Sergeant John Ordway etched “ORD Heritage Foundation, Inc. is open to the pub- my grandfather Clifford Taylor Gass. 1804” on the inside wall of the cave. I have lic. Information and applications are available DARLENE FASSLER seen the inscription, and it is still visible by writing Membership Coordinator; Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, Inc.; Great Falls, Mont. today. P.O. Box 3434; Great Falls, MT 59403. LUCIE HUGER EDITOR’S NOTE: The portrait is a variation St. Louis, Mo. We Proceeded On, the quarterly magazine of the Foundation, is mailed to current members of the one owned by Jeannette Taranik in February, May, August, and November. (discussed on page 29 of the article). Gass EDITOR’S NOTE: For more on Tavern Cave is posed somewhat differently (his left and the inscription, see Gerald S. Snyder, hand and cane are lower and more toward In the Footsteps of Lewis and Clark Annual Membership Categories the middle, and his right hand is show- (Washington, D.C.: National Geographic Student $20 ing), indicating that the photographer Society, 1970), pp. 37-39. Led by Mrs. Individual/Library/Nonprofit $30 took at least two pictures, and perhaps a Huger, the author visited the cave, where Family/International/Business $45 Heritage Club $50 series. Are there more out there? he found “on one wall three crudely Explorer Club $100 carved letters, ORD, followed by much Jefferson Club $250 less distinct scratchings, possibly the date Discovery Club $500 In 1999, when the late Ole Olsen founded 1804. No one knows for sure, of course, Expedition Club $1,000 the annual Elk Point reenactment of but perhaps the journal-keeping Sergeant Leadership Club $2,500 Patrick Gass’s election as sergeant, he and Ordway took time to leave his mark be- the other organizers knew little of Gass fore the expedition once again pressed The Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, Inc. or his descendants. Then Kelly Kruithoff, upstream.” The signature was discovered is a tax-exempt nonprofit corporation. Individual membership dues are not tax deductible. The por- the editor of our local newspaper, found in 1951 by Ralph P. Bieber, a professor of tion of premium dues over $30 is tax deductible. Eugene Gass Painter living in Avella, history at Washington University (Herb Pennsylvania. Eugene’s participation in Waeckerle, “Mystery Cave,” St. Louis 2 We Proceeded On May 2001 Globe-Democrat Tempo Magazine, June From the Directors 10, 1951). The cave is on private prop- erty and is not easily accessible, but Mrs. Huger said one of her children visited it in 1997 and reported that the signature is “Keepers of the story and stewards of the trail” still visible. am writing this as I listen to one scholars and storytellers together in a of my Corps of Discovery CDs. forum to share their knowledge of this I The music fills my office. If I sit extraordinary young woman. Mark Twain on bars quietly with my eyes closed, I can smell We look at our bookshelves and see Thanks for “Pomp’s Bier Was a Bar,” by the campfire smoke, hear the slap of the many well written, carefully researched Joseph Mussulman, in the November is- water against a canoe, and listen to the biographies of Meriwether Lewis. sue. In Chapter 15 of Mark Twain’s voices of the Corps of Discovery as its Where is the story of William Clark as Roughing It (1871) there is the following members work into the evening. Saca- well researched and accurately told? passage, which may further illustrate the gawea tends to her infant son, some of And where are the biographies of other author’s point: the men write in their journals, and members of the Corps of Discovery? “The climate of San Francisco is mild Cruzatte tunes his fiddle. This is an exciting time for all of us and singularly equitable. The thermom- Once again, I am struck by the im- who have been “keepers of the story eter stands at about seventy degrees the portance of the story that we keep and and stewards of the trail” for so many year round, It hardly changes at all.