How To Use This Site




How To Use This Site


This blog was updated on a daily basis for about two years, with those daily entries ceasing on December 31, 2013. The blog is still active, however, and we hope that people stopping in, who find something lacking, will add to the daily entries.

The blog still receives new posts as well, but now it receives them on items of Wyoming history. That has always been a feature of the blog, but Wyoming's history is rich and there are many items that are not fully covered here, if covered at all. Over time, we hope to remedy that.

You can obtain an entire month's listings by hitting on the appropriate month below, or an individual day by hitting on that calendar date.
Use 2013 for the search date, as that's the day regular dates were established and fixed.

Alternatively, the months are listed immediately below, with the individual days appearing backwards (oldest first).

We hope you enjoy this site.

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

September 17

Today is U.S. Constitution Day.

1787.  The U.S Constitution completed and signed by a majority of delegates, nearly giving the US it's current constitutional form, and radically altering the form that had existed under the Articles of Confederation.  Concerns over the lack of limits on Federal power would shortly lead to the Bill of Rights, which were a series of early amendments to the Constitution.

1842  Mathew Caldwell Texas' forces defeated a Mexican force under Adrián Woll.

1842  A small Texas force under Captain Nicholas Dawson defeated by a large force of Mexican cavalry.

1843   John W. Meldrum, the first Commissioner of Yellowstone National Park, born in Celdonia New York.

1851  The Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851 was signed between United States treaty commissioners and representatives of the Cheyenne, Sioux, Arapaho, Crow, Shoshone, Assiniboine, Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara nations.  Of note, not all of these Tribes were typically at peace amongst themselves. The treaty sets forth traditional territorial claims of the tribes as among themselves, guaranteed safe passage for settlers on the Oregon Trail  and provided for return for an annuity in the amount of fifty thousand dollars for fifty years. It also provided for the establishment of roads and forts on Indian territory.

The United States Senate ratified the treaty but adjust compensation from fifty to ten years. Acceptance of the revisions was forthcoming from all the tribes except the Crow, who ironically were generally regarded as US allies but more accurately were Sioux enemies. was procured.

This treaty should properly be regarded as a failure.  Not all of the promised payments were forthcoming.  The payments, while not at all unsubstantial by 19th Century standards, were likely not well understood by the intended recipients.  The general acceptance of the Indian tribes was questionable to a degree, as the ability of any one group of delegates to ratify anything for an entire Tribe was questionable.  The United States failed to accurately gauge the degree of Western movement that would occur in the 1850s and 1860s, as it could not have predicted the impact of gold strikes in the West and then the mass emigration caused by the Civil War, so it was completely ineffectual in restricting emigration to the Oregon Trail.

1851  Ordinance Sgt Leodogar Schynder appointed Garrison Postmaster at Ft. Laramie.  Schnyder served more years at Ft. Laramie,  37 than any other enlisted soldier, during his 53 years in the Army.

1865   Sergeant Charles L. Thomas of Company E, 11th Ohio Cavalry. "Carried a message through a country infested with hostile Indians and saved the life of a comrade en route." which won him the Medal of Honor.  Thomas was with Gen. Connor's Powder River Expedition, in Wyoming, at the time.

What's missed in the official account is that Gen. Patrick Connor called for a volunteer "to go as a scout and find Cole or perish in the attempt."  Thomas volunteered.  Col. Cole, who was hoping for relief, was surrounded with his command the time, as a patrol had revealed.  Sgt. Thomas was to deliver a message back to him, traveling 201 miles alone over a 36 hour period.  Part of the time Thomas was under fire and he actually captured an Indian pony en route and took it along with his own.  He ended up delivering the Indian pony to a soldier of the 2nd Missouri he encountered en route, and took him along the remainder of the way to Cole's camp.

1916   Cheyenne State Leader for September 17, 1916. The Wyoming Guard to the border, and Villas raid on Chihuahua
 

The Wyoming National  Guard is ordered to the border.  On the same day, showing how initial news reports might not be fully accurate, the Villista raid on Chihuahua was reported as a defeat, when in reality, it was not.  A better question would have been how a force that had been down to 400 men just a few weeks prior now had many times that number.

1945  The first classes were held at Casper College.  The college occupied the top floor of Natrona County High School for the first years of its existence.

2001  The New York Stock Exchange reopens for trading after the September 11 Attacks, its longest closure since the Great Depression.

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