Disaster at the Colorado : Beale's wagon road and the first emigrant party
"Across North-Central New Mexico and Arizona along the line of Route 66, now Interstate 40, there first ran a little-known wagon trail called Beale's Wagon Road, after Edward F. Beale, who surveyed it for the War Department in 1857. This survey is perhaps best known for its introduction and use of camels in the American West. Not so well known is the fate of the first emigrants who the next year attempted to follow the surveying party's tracks. The government considered the 1857 exploration a success and the road it opened a promising alternative route to California, but Beale and the government considered such improvements as military posts and developed water supplies to be needed before it was ready for regular emigrant travel
Print Book, English, ©2002
Utah State University Press, Logan, ©2002