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dip as low as –20ºF (–29ºC). Also like
Kansas, Nebraska has a history of tor-
nadoes, floods, droughts, and dust
storms.
History
Gold is what brought the first
European explorers into the Plains
region in the 16th century, when tall
tales of treasure lured Coronado into
present-day Kansas. Gold is also what
brought the first large numbers of
European Americans into Nebraska
some 300 years later—gold in
California mines more than a thou-
sand miles away.
When the precious metal was dis-
covered in California in 1848, a rush
of prospectors trekked across the
country to seek their fortunes. Their
route passed through Nebraska, fol-
lowing the Platte River into the
foothills of the Rockies. This was part
of the eastern leg of the 2,000 mile
(3,200 km) Oregon-California Trail.
Wagons ferried tens of thousands of
people across Nebraska. Supplies and
freight moved up and down the Platte.
These migrants, however, were pri-
marily interested in Nebraska as a
transit route, not as a destination in its
own right. Although the United States
had acquired Nebraska from France
in 1803 through the Louisiana
Purchase, settlement was slow to get
off the ground. By the time of the
California Gold Rush, the area was
still largely unsettled.
Earlier in the century, the Missouri
Fur Company had begun setting up
trading posts along the Platte and
Missouri rivers to trade with the
Indians. In 1812, Spanish fur trapper
43
Lower Plains: Kansas, Nebraska
A pioneer family is photographed with their
wagon while traveling to their homestead in the
Loup Valley of Nebraska, circa 1886.