Santa Fe Trail

Highway in NewMexico have a long history, especially the Santa Fe Trail. The Trail way was the one of the most important highway in New Mexico. It became America's first great international commercial highway in 1821, and for nearly sixty years after, the Santa Fe Trail became one of the nation's great routes of adventure and western expansion. It was an ancient passageway used by merchant-traders who took manufactured goods to Santa Fe in exchange for furs and other items available in Santa Fe. Also the Mexican traders provided caravans to go to western Missouri in this international trade.

Basically there are two kinds of route on the Santa Fe Trail. The first route is the Mountain Route. The mountain route(long route) of the Santa Fe was 230 miles of unprotected campsites between Fort Larned and Fort Lyon in Colorado. It followed the Arkansas River into Colorado before turning south. The second route is the Jornada Route. The Jornada Route is very dry and has less water.(desert route). It stretchs cuts southwest at Cimarron Crossing and other Arkansas River crossings. This route saved ten days and would carry75% of all future trade. And lots of traders went and back to used this route for trading their goods.

In 1821, William Becknell, the trader who came from Missouri, first to follow the route that later became known as the Santa Fe Trail. He used his mule train to pass through Morris County, later became known as Council Grove. The Santa Fe Trail was established to transport freight from Kansas City to Santa Fe, New Mexico and to trade with the spanish. Also in 1822, William Becknell found a good mode of transportation and a passable wagon route. So he started using wagons for take trade goods over the Santa Fe Trail, instead of mule train or horses. and when the time past. People start to call him as the Father of the Santa Fe Trail.

The Santa Fe Trail start heavily used when the Mexican War begin. Because of the large military supplies. it was transported from the Missouri River Towns to the Southwest. Santa Fe Trail was the main transportation route until 1872. When the Santa Fe Railroad became the Colorado border, the days of the Santa Fe Trail as a main transportation route were over.