Organization and Movement
Overland emigrants discovered that smaller groups of twenty to forty wagons were more manageable than larger ones. Membership in wagon trains was generally fluid and wagons frequently joined or left trains depending on the needs and wishes of their owners. An accident or illness, for instance, might force someone to fall behind and wait for the next train, or an emigrant might "whip up" to overtake a forward train after a quarrel.
Although "train" suggests a line of wagons, when the terrain permitted the wagons would often fan out and travel abreast to minimize the amount of dust each wagon encountered.
At night, wagon trains were often formed into a circle (a "laager") for shelter from wind or weather and corral the emigrants' animals in the center to prevent them from running away or being stolen by Native Americans. While Native Americans might attempt to raid horses under cover of darkness, they rarely attacked a train; wagons were seldom circled defensively, contrary to popular belief.
Although wagon trains are associated with the Old West, the Trekboers of South Africa also traveled in caravans of covered wagons. Today, covered wagon trains are used to give an authentic experience for those desiring to explore the West as it was in the days of the pioneers and other groups traveling before modern vehicles were invented.
Read more about this topic: Wagon Train
Famous quotes containing the words and movement, organization and/or movement:
“I invented the colors of the vowels!—A black, E white, I red, O blue, U green—I made rules for the form and movement of each consonant, and, and with instinctive rhythms, I flattered myself that I had created a poetic language accessible, some day, to all the senses.”
—Arthur Rimbaud (1854–1891)
“The methods by which a trade union can alone act, are necessarily destructive; its organization is necessarily tyrannical.”
—Henry George (1839–1897)
“So close is the bond between man and woman that you can not raise one without lifting the other. The world can not move ahead without woman’s sharing in the movement, and to help give a right impetus to that movement is woman’s highest privilege.”
—Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825–1911)