The First Flag West of the Divide

This monument marks a small, human moment on the Lewis and Clark journey. On the thirteenth of August, eighteen oh five, just after crossing the Continental Divide into present-day Idaho, Captain Meriwether Lewis and a few men encountered two Shoshone women on the trail. To show they came in peace, Lewis unfurled an American flag.

A local researcher named Dave Ainsworth later concluded that this was the first time the American flag was ever unfurled west of the Continental Divide. The gesture mattered. The expedition desperately needed horses and a guide to cross the mountains, and these first contacts with the Shoshone, the people of Sacagawea, would soon make the difference between going forward and turning back.

The site sits in the Bitterroot country, marked today by a wayside along the historic trail.