page_title: Pony Express
section_title: Pony Express route
hierarchical_section_title: Pony Express / Pony Express route
caption_attribution_description: English: Pony Express map, by William Henry Jackson; likely from The Pony Express Goes Through (1935)
context_page_description: The Pony Express was a mail service delivering messages, newspapers, and mail using relays of horse-mounted riders that operated from April 3, 1860, to October 24, 1861, between Missouri and California in the United States of America.
  Operated by Central Overland California and Pikes Peak Express Company, the Pony Express was a great financial investment to the U.S. During its 18 months of operation, it reduced the time for messages to travel between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to about 10 days. Many people used the Pony Express as a communication link. It also encouraged catalogs to be created, allowing people to buy goods and have them brought by horse to the customers. It became the West's most direct means of east-west communication before the transcontinental telegraph was established, and was vital for tying the new U.S. state of California with the rest of the United States.
  Despite a heavy subsidy, the Pony Express was not a financial success and went bankrupt in 18 months, when faster telegraph service was established. Nevertheless, it demonstrated that a unified transcontinental system of communications could be established and operated year-round.
context_section_description: The approximately 1,900-mile-long (3,100 km) route roughly followed the Oregon and California Trails to Fort Bridger in Wyoming, and then the Mormon Trail (known as the Hastings Cutoff) to Salt Lake City, Utah. From there, it followed the Central Nevada Route to Carson City, Nevada Territory, before passing over the Sierra into Sacramento, California.
  The route started at St. Joseph, Missouri, on the Missouri River, and then followed what is modern-day U.S. Highway 36 (the Pony Express Highway) to Marysville, Kansas, where it turned northwest following Little Blue River to Fort Kearny in Nebraska. Through Nebraska, it followed the Great Platte River Road, cutting through Gothenburg, Nebraska, clipping the edge of Colorado at Julesburg, Colorado, and passing Courthouse Rock, Chimney Rock, and Scotts Bluff, before arriving first at Fort Laramie and then Fort Caspar (Platte Bridge Station) in Wyoming.  From there, it followed the Sweetwater River, passing Independence Rock, Devil's Gate, and Split Rock, through South Pass to Fort Bridger and then south to Salt Lake City.  From Salt Lake City, it generally followed the Central Nevada Route blazed by Captain James H. Simpson of the Corps of Topographical Engineers in 1859. This route roughly follows today's US 50 across Nevada and Utah. It crossed the Great Basin, the Utah-Nevada Desert, and the Sierra Nevada near Lake Tahoe before arriving in Sacramento. Mail was then sent by steamer down the Sacramento River to San Francisco. On a few instances when the steamer was missed, riders took the mail by horseback to Oakland, California.
caption: Illustrated Map of Pony Express Route in 1860
  by William Henry Jackson
  ~ Courtesy the Library of Congress ~
  The Pony Express mail route, April 3, 1860 – October 24, 1861; reproduction of Jackson illustration issued to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Pony Express founding on April 3, 1960. Reproduction of Jackson's map issued by the Union Pacific Railroad Company.
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "8902", "Image ImageLength": "3028", "Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Image Compression": "Uncompressed", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "2", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image PlanarConfiguration": "1", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CC (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2013:08:10 09:34:53", "Image ExifOffset": "256", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "406", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4303", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "8902", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3028"}