April 22, 2025 • 13 mins
A historical series that narrates the significant events and figures that shaped the nation's past, offering educational and engaging stories. The episodes highlight the spirit of exploration and perseverance.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The American Trail. The American Trail blazed in Blood, Defended
in Blood, Chapter four. The Lewis and Clark Expedition eighteen
(00:39):
hundred three. The newly acquired Louisiana territory, several times larger
than the United States, was a vast, uncharted wilderness. For years,
Thomas Jefferson had dreamed of an expedition that would glory. Now,
(01:01):
as president, he had the power to commission an expedition.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
To head it.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
He chose his private secretary, Captain Meriwether Lewis.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Merriwether, you can't imagine my feelings at this moment. I
think I can, sir. I believe I've always pictured myself
taking this trip. I know, to see for the first
time country no other American has ever seen, to look
upon strange animals. There must be many curious animals in
that wilderness, prehistoric ones. Maybe they could be, sir. Yes, well,
(01:37):
now who will you take with you? I have a
couple of men in mind. There's Billy Clark, Lieutenant Clark,
I mean Clark.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Yes, he sounds like a good choice. He understands astronomy,
and he's worked on maps.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
Merriwether, I see this more than just the exploration of Louisiana.
I see it as a first attempt to map a
route across this entire continent, all the way to the
Pacific Ocean.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
It may take years, sir, but.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
I suppose one would have to follow the Missouri River.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
A year later, Lewis Clark, thirty volunteer soldiers, and a
famous scout and Indian fighter, a man named Wessel, moved
up the Missouri into the unknown.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Cathluid fresh. There were rapids, there were Indians, there was sickness.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
The going became harder as they fought their way up
the mighty Missouri.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
And then Lieutenant Clark, Yes, mister Wetsell, I reckon, you
can kill Captain norf I'm going back. Going back.
Speaker 4 (03:03):
Frady means a Meriwether, a man like that, turning back
spared for the soldiers, and I can most of them
feel like turning back too. There's no turning back for
any of us. Billy, with or without Wessel, we go on.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
By October they had traveled some twelve hundred miles up
the Missouri to the Dakota country. Lewis decided to winter there,
and the soldiers built a fort, Fort Mandan one day,
as Lieutenant Clark worked on the map he was making
up the Dakota country.
Speaker 4 (03:38):
Lieutenant Clark, I have a visitor. Well for the This
is Madame Charbonel Pleasure.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Madame Isasnisklaw. She's married to a frenchman up here.
Speaker 5 (03:48):
Oh my name sacer Jauillac.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Saka Jauia. Oh. Yes, of course she and her husband
want to come along with us when we leave here.
Come of this?
Speaker 5 (04:01):
Why I speak Indian tongues. I know country. You need guides?
Speaker 6 (04:06):
Yes, I suppose we do worlds sacage where we'll talk
about it.
Speaker 5 (04:11):
Yes, you talk, I come back.
Speaker 6 (04:16):
You don't seem to like the idea, believe any Whether
we're carrying a small fortune with us and rifles, ammunition supplies.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I hadn't thought about that. She and this husband of
hers may may have some idea of leading us into
a trap, but.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
They needed someone who spoke the Indian languages, and it
was agreed the Indian girl would go along. So another
spring came and the expedition pushed on. It was a
big country. It was often terrifying day after day, week
(04:54):
in week out. As far as I.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Could see, an endless wilderness that swam at buffalo. You're
a long way from your own people. So like that
you aware? Yes? Why is that?
Speaker 5 (05:09):
When I small child, enemy of my people take me away?
Speaker 2 (05:13):
You were stolen?
Speaker 5 (05:14):
Yes, a white man flee me, a white man my husband?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
How long have you been away from your own people?
Five years? Five years? Eh?
Speaker 5 (05:26):
Maybe we find my people?
Speaker 2 (05:28):
Oh, hello, Billy, I reckon. I was listening. Jannie my
name nor Jenny Jennie to me. I can't pronounce the
other one. What sort of people are your tribe?
Speaker 5 (05:39):
They're Indians? They hunt pieces?
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Are they friendly?
Speaker 5 (05:44):
Sometimes?
Speaker 2 (05:45):
Suppose we run into them?
Speaker 5 (05:46):
If I'm with you, they're no key. I go, I
help my husband.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
Merry Weather.
Speaker 6 (05:53):
I'm not so sure about her, and I don't like
her husband either. Oh, you're foot bothering.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Really, I'm all right.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Clark suffered. They all did. Hardship was taking its toll.
The men were sick, Medicine ran low. Progress became slower.
Then one morning, as the soldiers broke camp beside the river,
Lewis climbed a hill.
Speaker 7 (06:24):
Lieutenant Floor, yay, come up here.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
What's the trouble? Merryweather? Look as far to the west
as you can see, Madam. I never saw the likes
of that before. They must be the mountains that hold
up the sky.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
So one year after starting out, Lewis and Clark sighted
the Rocky Mountains as the Missouri River grew stronger and stronger.
And then one day the expedition, exhausted to the point
of collapse, camped deep from the Rocky Mountain wilderness.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
The Missouri had ended.
Speaker 6 (07:23):
We must have come along Waverley, according to my reckoning,
more than two thousand miles.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Do you think we'll ever see the Pacific Ocean? If
we don't, we'll just die out here somewhere to Lewis,
smoke signal, smoke signal? Where sergeant over there? Sir on
that Hell? Oh, yes, we've been seen, very much seen.
Speaker 6 (07:47):
Look coming out of the valley over there, Indians, And
I think I know who's responsible.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
So cut your wheel. Yes, I don't see her around,
not her husband. Men, heat the cover of the rocks.
Speaker 4 (08:01):
Don't open fire until I get the order, and pick
your target carefully before firing.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
That's all. Good luck, give you order, Merry Weather. Wait,
who's that running out of the rocks? Sack that you're weird?
Where's you're going? Zaca?
Speaker 8 (08:17):
You're weird?
Speaker 7 (08:18):
Come back here, come back, Henny, come back, hold your fireman,
hold it.
Speaker 2 (08:23):
She's crazy.
Speaker 6 (08:24):
That girl.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Does she know them? She seems too. She's talking to them.
She's coming back, very weather. I still don't like it.
Speaker 5 (08:40):
Oh come these my people, they so Sonny, Indian chief.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
My brother. There was great rejoicing at Saka Jowia's return
to her people. A feast was prepared, but there was
something about the manner of the Indians that none of
the white men liked. And when the feast began, they
(09:16):
stayed close together. You posted guards over our supplies.
Speaker 8 (09:23):
Billy, yes, second, Joe's big brother had designed him and
our guns too careful.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
He's watching us and watching him. They're getting a little wild.
Speaker 8 (09:32):
Merriweather, I have a strong feeling that if any of
us go to sleep, we'll wake up without our scouts.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
The Indian village finally slept, or seemed to in a wigwam.
Billy Clark and Meriwether Lewis waited and listened. It's almost dawn.
If by coming, they'll come soon.
Speaker 8 (10:09):
I was just thinking, here we are, you need the
rest of us waiting to be massacred by a tribe
of savages.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Why we knew what to expect, billy, but we came.
Why maybe the instinct and nobility that causes some of
us to risk life and limb just to make things
easier for those who come after us. Merry weather, you
make me feel real, noble.
Speaker 6 (10:33):
Quite listen, I'm outside, Jamie.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Saka jaweir? What is come?
Speaker 7 (10:42):
We leave?
Speaker 5 (10:43):
I go with you, But we leave now.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
I got horses waiting. Come we go, saka Jawa? What
happened back at the village?
Speaker 5 (10:57):
My brother want to kill you all?
Speaker 2 (11:00):
What changed his mind?
Speaker 5 (11:02):
I tell him? White soldiers coming.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
Oh west of the rocky mountains, on the gray tree
covered slopes.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Icy winds drove through the forest, The flies ran low.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Some of the men looked like living skeletons as they
follow the Columbia River.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
At least we escaped massacre in order to freeze to death.
Speaker 5 (11:28):
Were high ground, not so cold soon?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
How far have we comeberly? Eight thousand miles? I reckon
and been gone? How long is it? Eighteen months? Eighteen years?
It seems like I hear something listening, yes, but catchair?
Do you hear anything?
Speaker 5 (11:52):
The great water?
Speaker 7 (11:54):
Look man, look at that, Come on, it's the ocean,
the Pacific.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
So Cacha. We are come here. Look at that ocean.
Speaker 7 (12:16):
Look very weather.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
We've done it. We've reached the Pacific. It's beautiful, it's us.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
There is sparkled under the morning sun, the blue Pacific,
the surf thundering. A challenge to all those who might
dare to follow the trail blazed by this little bed
and the brave men.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
But people did follow.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
Soon the covered wagons rolled west of the rocky mountains
to the very shores of the Pacific Ocean. To the
eternal memory of Meriwether Lewis and Billy Talk. This has
(13:17):
been the fourth chapter of the Story of the American Nation,
brought to you by the Ladies Auxiliary to the veterans
of Foreign Wars. Next week, another story to make you
(13:37):
proud of this great country of ours, as we follow
the American Trail.
The American Trail. The American Trail blazed in Blood, Defended
in Blood, Chapter four. The Lewis and Clark Expedition eighteen
(00:39):
hundred three. The newly acquired Louisiana territory, several times larger
than the United States, was a vast, uncharted wilderness. For years,
Thomas Jefferson had dreamed of an expedition that would glory. Now,
(01:01):
as president, he had the power to commission an expedition.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
To head it.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
He chose his private secretary, Captain Meriwether Lewis.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Merriwether, you can't imagine my feelings at this moment. I
think I can, sir. I believe I've always pictured myself
taking this trip. I know, to see for the first
time country no other American has ever seen, to look
upon strange animals. There must be many curious animals in
that wilderness, prehistoric ones. Maybe they could be, sir. Yes, well,
(01:37):
now who will you take with you? I have a
couple of men in mind. There's Billy Clark, Lieutenant Clark,
I mean Clark.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Yes, he sounds like a good choice. He understands astronomy,
and he's worked on maps.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
Merriwether, I see this more than just the exploration of Louisiana.
I see it as a first attempt to map a
route across this entire continent, all the way to the
Pacific Ocean.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
It may take years, sir, but.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
I suppose one would have to follow the Missouri River.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
A year later, Lewis Clark, thirty volunteer soldiers, and a
famous scout and Indian fighter, a man named Wessel, moved
up the Missouri into the unknown.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Cathluid fresh. There were rapids, there were Indians, there was sickness.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
The going became harder as they fought their way up
the mighty Missouri.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
And then Lieutenant Clark, Yes, mister Wetsell, I reckon, you
can kill Captain norf I'm going back. Going back.
Speaker 4 (03:03):
Frady means a Meriwether, a man like that, turning back
spared for the soldiers, and I can most of them
feel like turning back too. There's no turning back for
any of us. Billy, with or without Wessel, we go on.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
By October they had traveled some twelve hundred miles up
the Missouri to the Dakota country. Lewis decided to winter there,
and the soldiers built a fort, Fort Mandan one day,
as Lieutenant Clark worked on the map he was making
up the Dakota country.
Speaker 4 (03:38):
Lieutenant Clark, I have a visitor. Well for the This
is Madame Charbonel Pleasure.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Madame Isasnisklaw. She's married to a frenchman up here.
Speaker 5 (03:48):
Oh my name sacer Jauillac.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Saka Jauia. Oh. Yes, of course she and her husband
want to come along with us when we leave here.
Come of this?
Speaker 5 (04:01):
Why I speak Indian tongues. I know country. You need guides?
Speaker 6 (04:06):
Yes, I suppose we do worlds sacage where we'll talk
about it.
Speaker 5 (04:11):
Yes, you talk, I come back.
Speaker 6 (04:16):
You don't seem to like the idea, believe any Whether
we're carrying a small fortune with us and rifles, ammunition supplies.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I hadn't thought about that. She and this husband of
hers may may have some idea of leading us into
a trap, but.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
They needed someone who spoke the Indian languages, and it
was agreed the Indian girl would go along. So another
spring came and the expedition pushed on. It was a
big country. It was often terrifying day after day, week
(04:54):
in week out. As far as I.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Could see, an endless wilderness that swam at buffalo. You're
a long way from your own people. So like that
you aware? Yes? Why is that?
Speaker 5 (05:09):
When I small child, enemy of my people take me away?
Speaker 2 (05:13):
You were stolen?
Speaker 5 (05:14):
Yes, a white man flee me, a white man my husband?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
How long have you been away from your own people?
Five years? Five years? Eh?
Speaker 5 (05:26):
Maybe we find my people?
Speaker 2 (05:28):
Oh, hello, Billy, I reckon. I was listening. Jannie my
name nor Jenny Jennie to me. I can't pronounce the
other one. What sort of people are your tribe?
Speaker 5 (05:39):
They're Indians? They hunt pieces?
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Are they friendly?
Speaker 5 (05:44):
Sometimes?
Speaker 2 (05:45):
Suppose we run into them?
Speaker 5 (05:46):
If I'm with you, they're no key. I go, I
help my husband.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
Merry Weather.
Speaker 6 (05:53):
I'm not so sure about her, and I don't like
her husband either. Oh, you're foot bothering.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Really, I'm all right.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Clark suffered. They all did. Hardship was taking its toll.
The men were sick, Medicine ran low. Progress became slower.
Then one morning, as the soldiers broke camp beside the river,
Lewis climbed a hill.
Speaker 7 (06:24):
Lieutenant Floor, yay, come up here.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
What's the trouble? Merryweather? Look as far to the west
as you can see, Madam. I never saw the likes
of that before. They must be the mountains that hold
up the sky.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
So one year after starting out, Lewis and Clark sighted
the Rocky Mountains as the Missouri River grew stronger and stronger.
And then one day the expedition, exhausted to the point
of collapse, camped deep from the Rocky Mountain wilderness.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
The Missouri had ended.
Speaker 6 (07:23):
We must have come along Waverley, according to my reckoning,
more than two thousand miles.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Do you think we'll ever see the Pacific Ocean? If
we don't, we'll just die out here somewhere to Lewis,
smoke signal, smoke signal? Where sergeant over there? Sir on
that Hell? Oh, yes, we've been seen, very much seen.
Speaker 6 (07:47):
Look coming out of the valley over there, Indians, And
I think I know who's responsible.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
So cut your wheel. Yes, I don't see her around,
not her husband. Men, heat the cover of the rocks.
Speaker 4 (08:01):
Don't open fire until I get the order, and pick
your target carefully before firing.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
That's all. Good luck, give you order, Merry Weather. Wait,
who's that running out of the rocks? Sack that you're weird?
Where's you're going? Zaca?
Speaker 8 (08:17):
You're weird?
Speaker 7 (08:18):
Come back here, come back, Henny, come back, hold your fireman,
hold it.
Speaker 2 (08:23):
She's crazy.
Speaker 6 (08:24):
That girl.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Does she know them? She seems too. She's talking to them.
She's coming back, very weather. I still don't like it.
Speaker 5 (08:40):
Oh come these my people, they so Sonny, Indian chief.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
My brother. There was great rejoicing at Saka Jowia's return
to her people. A feast was prepared, but there was
something about the manner of the Indians that none of
the white men liked. And when the feast began, they
(09:16):
stayed close together. You posted guards over our supplies.
Speaker 8 (09:23):
Billy, yes, second, Joe's big brother had designed him and
our guns too careful.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
He's watching us and watching him. They're getting a little wild.
Speaker 8 (09:32):
Merriweather, I have a strong feeling that if any of
us go to sleep, we'll wake up without our scouts.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
The Indian village finally slept, or seemed to in a wigwam.
Billy Clark and Meriwether Lewis waited and listened. It's almost dawn.
If by coming, they'll come soon.
Speaker 8 (10:09):
I was just thinking, here we are, you need the
rest of us waiting to be massacred by a tribe
of savages.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Why we knew what to expect, billy, but we came.
Why maybe the instinct and nobility that causes some of
us to risk life and limb just to make things
easier for those who come after us. Merry weather, you
make me feel real, noble.
Speaker 6 (10:33):
Quite listen, I'm outside, Jamie.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Saka jaweir? What is come?
Speaker 7 (10:42):
We leave?
Speaker 5 (10:43):
I go with you, But we leave now.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
I got horses waiting. Come we go, saka Jawa? What
happened back at the village?
Speaker 5 (10:57):
My brother want to kill you all?
Speaker 2 (11:00):
What changed his mind?
Speaker 5 (11:02):
I tell him? White soldiers coming.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
Oh west of the rocky mountains, on the gray tree
covered slopes.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Icy winds drove through the forest, The flies ran low.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Some of the men looked like living skeletons as they
follow the Columbia River.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
At least we escaped massacre in order to freeze to death.
Speaker 5 (11:28):
Were high ground, not so cold soon?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
How far have we comeberly? Eight thousand miles? I reckon
and been gone? How long is it? Eighteen months? Eighteen years?
It seems like I hear something listening, yes, but catchair?
Do you hear anything?
Speaker 5 (11:52):
The great water?
Speaker 7 (11:54):
Look man, look at that, Come on, it's the ocean,
the Pacific.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
So Cacha. We are come here. Look at that ocean.
Speaker 7 (12:16):
Look very weather.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
We've done it. We've reached the Pacific. It's beautiful, it's us.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
There is sparkled under the morning sun, the blue Pacific,
the surf thundering. A challenge to all those who might
dare to follow the trail blazed by this little bed
and the brave men.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
But people did follow.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
Soon the covered wagons rolled west of the rocky mountains
to the very shores of the Pacific Ocean. To the
eternal memory of Meriwether Lewis and Billy Talk. This has
(13:17):
been the fourth chapter of the Story of the American Nation,
brought to you by the Ladies Auxiliary to the veterans
of Foreign Wars. Next week, another story to make you
(13:37):
proud of this great country of ours, as we follow
the American Trail.
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