The Story of the Pony Express | Page 9

Glenn D. Bradley
stage over the Southern route. The pony had clipped ten full
days from the schedule of its predecessor, and shown that it could keep
its schedule - which was as follows:
From St. Joseph to Salt Lake City - 124 hours.
From Salt Lake City to Carson City - 218 hours, from starting point.
From Carson City to Sacramento - 232 hours, from starting point.
From Sacramento to San Francisco - 240 hours, from starting point.
From the very first trip, expressions of genuine appreciation of the new
service were shown all along the line. The first express which reached
Salt Lake City eastbound on the night of April 7, led the Deseret News,
the leading paper of that town to say that: "Although a telegraph is very
desirable, we feel well-satisfied with this achievement for, the present."
Two days later, the first west-bound express bound from St. Joseph
reached the Mormon capital. Oddly enough this rider carried news of
an act to amend a bill just proposed in the United States Senate,
providing that Utah be organized into Nevada Territory under the name
and leadership of the latter[6]. Many of the Mormons, like numerous
persons in California, had at first believed the Pony Express an
impossibility, but now that it had been demonstrated wholly feasible,
they were delighted with its success, whether it brought them good
news or bad; for it had brought Utah within six days of the Missouri
River and within seven days of Washington City. Prior to this, under
the old stage coach régime, the people of that territory had been
accustomed to receive their news of the world from six weeks to three
months old.
Probably no greater demonstrations were ever held in California cities
than when the first incoming express arrived. Its schedule having been

announced in the daily papers a week ahead, the people were ready
with their welcome. At Sacramento, as when the pony mail had first
come up from San Francisco, practically the whole town turned out.
Stores were closed and business everywhere suspended. State officials
and other citizens of prominence addressed great crowds in
commemoration of the wonderful achievement. Patriotic airs were
played and sung and no attempt was made to check the merry-making
of the populace. After a hurried stop to deliver local mail, the pouch
was rushed aboard the fast sailing steamer Antelope, and the trip down
the stream begun. Although San Francisco was not reached until the
dead of night, the arrival of the express mail was the signal for a
hilarious reception. Whistles were blown, bells jangled, and the
California Band turned out. The city fire department, suddenly aroused
by the uproar, rushed into the street, expecting to find a conflagration,
but on recalling the true state of affairs, the firemen joined in with spirit.
The express courier was then formally escorted by a huge procession
from the steamship dock to the office of the Alta Telegraph, the official
Western terminal, and the momentous trip had ended.
The first Pony Express from St. Joseph brought a message of
congratulation from President Buchanan to Governor Downey of
California, which was first telegraphed to the Missouri River town. It
also brought one or two official government communications, some
New York, Chicago, and St. Louis newspapers, a few bank drafts, and
some business letters addressed to banks and commercial houses in San
Francisco - about eighty-five pieces of mail in all[7]. And it had
brought news from the East only nine days on the road.
At the outset, the Express reduced the time for letters from New York
to the Coast from twenty-three days to about ten days. Before the line
had been placed in operation, a telegraph wire, allusion to which has
been made, had been strung two hundred and fifty miles Eastward from
San Francisco through Sacramento to Carson City, Nevada. Important
official business from Washington was therefore wired to St. Joseph,
then forwarded by pony rider to Carson City where it was again
telegraphed to Sacramento or San Francisco as the case required, thus
saving twelve or fifteen hours in transmission on the last lap of the
journey. The usual schedule for getting dispatches from the Missouri
River to the Coast was eight days, and for letters, ten days.

After the triumphant first trip, when it was fully evident that the Pony
Express[8] was a really established enterprise, the St. Joseph Free
Democrat broke into the following panegyric:
Take down your map and trace the footprints of our quadrupedantic
animal: From St. Joseph on the Missouri to San Francisco, on the
Golden Horn - two thousand miles - more than half the distance across
our boundless continent; through Kansas, through Nebraska, by Fort
Kearney, along the Platte, by Fort Laramie, past the Buttes, over the
Rocky Mountains, through
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