A Weekend Event In Casper Celebrates Wyoming’s Furry History

I've been watching a History series called "The Men Who Built America: The Frontiersman," and I find it fascinating. The struggles they went through to help shape this country are crazy.

The first episode was about Daniel Boone's fight to help spread and shape the frontier. The first group to travel over the mountains and settle in what is now known as Kentucky lived off the land.

They hunted, trapped, built, and used whatever resources were available to them to get the job done. Boone was one of the trailblazing pioneers who inspired Lewis and Clark's expedition to head west, which obviously changed the world.

During their travels, the Lewis and Clark expedition discovered fur, and lots of it, which then began the western mountain man era when John Colter left the expedition to trap.

This led Colter to explore the West, where he eventually became the first frontiersman to explore modern-day Wyoming and discover what would become Yellowstone National Park.

Colter's adventures eventually inspired others to move West; the Oregon Trail was developed, and about 80 years later, Wyoming would become the 44th State. Fast forward 136 years, and we're still celebrating and learning from the skills, drive, determination, and intuition those pioneers brought to Wyoming.

Yes, that's been rumbling around in my head since I started watching that series, but seeing that the National Historic Trails Interpretive Center is hosting a living history event this weekend focused on the Western fur trade reignited that flame.

I understand that kids are just now getting back into the swing of things at school and may not want to do much learning on the weekend, but opportunities like this are a great way to help them learn how important the mountain man life is, was, and always will be a part of what helped to build not only America, but Wyoming.