On or near this date, Lewis finishes loading Thomas Jefferson‘s fossils onto the barge (or other boat) at the Ohio River landing below Big Bone Lick. Fellow traveler Thomas Rodney was disappointed that Lewis had taken all the larger bones including a large tusk.[1]No known record provides the exact dates Lewis was at Big Bone Lick. We do know he was in Cincinnati on 3 October 1803, and that he had left Big Bone Lick before Thomas Rodney arrived there on 10 … Continue reading
Mastodon Herd
Charles R. Knight (1874–1953)
Image is in the public domain.
Many scientists in 1803 expected that live specimens of the animals found in the fossil record would also be found by the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Extinction was an emerging concept and unproven. See Thoughts on Extinction.
Lewis Takes the Best
Contemporary traveler Thomas Rodney arrived at the Big Bone Lick shortly after Lewis had left. Rodney reports that Lewis got the best specimens:
Captain Lewes [Lewis] had got the long tusk lately found and one or another has carried of[f] the larger bones; but the situation and circumstances of these licks shew that they have been long frequented and much more formerly than latterly. [I also got a small piece that had scaled off from the great tusk that Lewies had taken . . . .
—Thomas Rodney[2]10 October 1803. Dwight L. Smith and Ray Swick, ed., A Journey Through the West: Thomas Rodney’s 1803 Journal from Delaware to the Mississippi Territory (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1997), … Continue reading
Notes
| ↑1 | No known record provides the exact dates Lewis was at Big Bone Lick. We do know he was in Cincinnati on 3 October 1803, and that he had left Big Bone Lick before Thomas Rodney arrived there on 10 October. |
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| ↑2 | 10 October 1803. Dwight L. Smith and Ray Swick, ed., A Journey Through the West: Thomas Rodney’s 1803 Journal from Delaware to the Mississippi Territory (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1997), 111–112. |
Experience the Lewis and Clark Trail
The Lewis and Clark Trail Experience—our sister site at lewisandclark.travel—connects the world to people and places on the Lewis and Clark Trail.
Discover More
- The Lewis and Clark Expedition: Day by Day by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2018). The story in prose, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
- The Lewis and Clark Journals: An American Epic of Discovery (abridged) by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2003). Selected journal excerpts, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
- The Lewis and Clark Journals. by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 1983–2001). The complete story in 13 volumes.
This page was funded in part by the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail, U.S. National Park Service.
This site is provided as a public service by the
Lewis and Clark Trail Alliance
with cooperation and funding from the following organizations:
- Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail
- Montana Committee for the Humanities
- Idaho Governor's Lewis and Clark Trail Committee
- The Capital Gallery (Lewis and Clark Fort Mandan Foundation)
- Yellowstone Public Radio
Unless otherwise noted, journal excerpts are from The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, edited by Gary E. Moulton, 13 vols. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1983-2001).