Travelers' Rest: The Only Lewis and Clark Site With Physical Proof

One mile south of Lolo, Montana, a small state park marks the campsite where Lewis and Clark rested twice: September ninth through eleventh, eighteen oh five, on the way west before crossing the Bitterroot Mountains, and again June thirtieth through July third, eighteen oh six, heading home. The Salish, Nez Perce, and Pend d'Oreille had used this spot as a gathering place for centuries before the Corps of Discovery arrived. Meriwether Lewis named it Travellers Rest on the first stop.

For decades the exact location was uncertain. Then in two thousand two, archaeologists found latrine sites with traces of mercury, which the expedition used medicinally, along with fire hearths matching the dates. It is the only confirmed physical evidence of Lewis and Clark's presence anywhere on the entire National Historic Trail.

In two thousand six the landmark boundary was corrected to capture the true site. The landmark was designated in nineteen sixty without a precise location, which makes it unusual among National Historic Landmarks. The latrine trench showed up in a magnetometer survey, and mercury turned up twenty-two to twenty-nine inches down in twenty-seven of two hundred fourteen soil samples.

It likely came from the pills Doctor Benjamin Rush called Thunderclappers, which Privates Goodrich and McNeal were given on the return trip. Lead found in a hearth was linked by isotope analysis to ore from Olive Hill, Kentucky. Today the site lies inside the fifty-one acre Travelers' Rest State Park.