EWING YOUNG AND His ESTATE 187
ward to its eastward course across the state, where now stands the metropolitan center, Kansas City. Then two outfitting stations marked its now widely extended site. They were known as Independence and Westport. The caravans setting out, whether destined for the northwest or southwest, held for a short stretch to a common course. Then those taking the Oregon trail branch penetrated a wilderness year by year to a more and more remote objective until early in the thirties Wyeth pressed on in a continuous journey to meet the tidal waves of the Pacific. The Oregon trail was thus fully opened and reached the Oregon shore of the Pacific. On the other hand the Santa Fe trail as its name indicates led to a long established community the inhabitants of which, however, were of a quite contrasted type of the white race to that of those who were opening this trade route to them.
The incoming traffic on the Oregon trail naturally was exclusively of furs secured in exchange for supplies for the mountain trappers and for Indian trading goods taken out. While the returning caravans on the Santa Fe trail also brought fur packs from the Colorado mountains and, from the streams in the then provinces of northern Mexico, specie extracted from the mines in the interior of Mexico, and mules secured from California soon became the more valuable imports. These cargoes were obtained mainly through funds from the sale of the dry goods of cotton and silk, and articles of hardware, taken out. With the isolated dwellers on the upper Rio Grande such staples were naturally in great demand. Along each route similar dangers of attack by fierce tribes were to be guarded against as they resented this invasion of their hunting grounds and more the highhanded ruthlessness of the unworthy of the white men.
Opportunities for profit and adventure were thus being opened in these two theatres for trade. A spirit having the audacity and resourcefulness of Ewing Young was naturally challenged by them. St. Louis papers would bring accounts
