The overland journey from Utah to California

by Edward Leo Lyman

"The wagon trail between Salt Lake City and Los Angeles is one of the most important and least-known elements of nineteenth-century Western migration. Known as the Southern Route, it included the western half of the Old Spanish Trail and was favored because it could be used for travel and freighting year-round. It was, however, arguably the most difficult route that pioneers traveled with any consistency in the entire history of the country. Following not rivers but leading from one - sometimes dubious - desert watering place to the next and offering few havens for the sick, weary, or unfortunate." "Historian Edward Leo Lyman has provided the first history of the complete Southern Route, and of the people who developed and used it. Based on extensive research in primary sources - including many early travelers accounts - and on Lyman's own investigation of the route and its branches, the book discusses the exploration and development of the Old Spanish Trail. Its horse thieves and trad