The Powder River Country refers to an area of the Great Plains in northeastern Wyoming in the United States. The area is loosely defined between the Bighorn Mountains and the Black Hills, in the upper drainage areas of the Powder, Tongue, and Little Bighorn rivers.
During the late 1860s, the area was the scene of Red Cloud's War between the Lakota and the United States. The Lakota victory in the war resulted in the preservation of their control of the area for the next decade.
After control fell to the U.S. government in 1870s following the end of the Great Sioux War of 1876-77, the area was opened to white settlement, one of the last such areas opened for homesteading in the continental United States. In 1892, the area was the scene of the Johnson County War.
In the early 20th century, the discovery of petroleum in the area led to the development of the area's oil fields.
Famous quotes containing the words powder, river and/or country:
“We are powerless,
dust and powder fill our lungs
our bodies blunder
through doors twisted on hinges.”
—Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)
“At sundown, leaving the river road awhile for shortness, we went by way of Enfield, where we stopped for the night. This, like most of the localities bearing names on this road, was a place to name which, in the midst of the unnamed and unincorporated wilderness, was to make a distinction without a difference, it seemed to me.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The wealth and prosperity of the country are only the comeliness of the body, the fullness of the flesh and fat; but the spirit is independent of them; it requires only muscle, bone and nerve for the true exercise of its functions. We cannot lose our liberty, because we cannot cease to think.”
—Humphry, Sir Davy (1778–1829)