Mountain Station on the Overland Mail

Before the Civil War, this mountain pass in Indian Territory was a working waypoint on one of the most ambitious mail routes in American history. The Overland Mail, operating from eighteen fifty-eight to eighteen sixty-one, ran from Memphis and Saint Louis all the way to San Francisco, covering nearly two thousand eight hundred miles in about twenty-five days.

At Mountain Station, the stage company built a stand where tired horses were swapped for fresh ones. Drivers and passengers could rest under Choctaw law, which governed this road as a toll route. The station changed hands as the Civil War severed the southern mail route, ending the Overland's run in eighteen sixty-one.

A stage stand is said to have been reestablished here after the war on the old Fort Smith to Boggy Depot road, keeping this pass in use as an overland corridor into Texas. The Oklahoma Historical Society later marked the site.