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LIEUTENANT Zebulon Pike and the men of his exploration party gazed with uncontrolled awe at the majestic, 14,000-foot peak. They had seen many awe-inspiring sights as they travelled over the uncharted course into Indian country, but this was the greatest.
"We shall climb it!" Lieutenant Pike exclaimed suddenly. "From its sides we may be able to see passages which will save us much time." The men were enthusiastic about this idea.
The young army officer had been assigned the mission of travelling to the headwaters of the Arkansas and Red Rivers to begin peaceful negotiations with Indian tribes. Only a year before he had successfully searched for the source of the Mississippi River. Now, in 1806, the army had chosen him to learn more about the great area known as the Louisiana Purchase.
They had gone, on foot and on horseback, overland to Pawnee country, due west from St. Louis and up the Missouri and Osage Rivers. But. as yet, they had not found the headwaters of the Arkansas because the river became narrow and shallow as it wound through the Colorado Mountains. From the summit, which became known as Pike's Peak, they hoped to view the headwaters.
Greatly encouraged, they began the arduous and dangerous ascent. But, the mountains had deceived them. The peak they climbed looked as though it were part of the 14.000
HE NEVER CLIMBED IT!
by BARNEY SCHWARTZ
foot summit, inasmuch as it blended into it. Men have been fooled many times in the same way. When Pike and his party reached the high-point. Pike's Peak still loomed in the distance. They had climbed what is now known as Mount Cheyenne instead!
"Some day I'll return and climb it," Pike declared resolutely, seeking to hide his disappointment. "We must continue our search."
A bitter winter almost wrecked the brave exploration. Men and animals were near exhaustion. The food supply ran perilously low. Then, one day, they came to the banks of a frozen stream. "This," Pike said, in desperation, "must be the Red River!"
Again he was wrong, and he learned his mistake when Spanish cavalry rode up and took the entire group as prisoners. They had trespassed on Spanish territory and the stream was the winding Rio Grande. Pike and his men were held captive in Mexico for several months, and then released and deported through Texas.
Pike, himself, had been weakened by the rigors of the exploring and by the months in captivity. He died a short time after being returned to America.
His maps and charts, even though there were many errors in them, still were very valuable to those who followed the trails into the Louisiana Purchase.
Pike's Peak stands as a monument to his valiant efforts, but he didn't realize that one ambition. He never climbed it!