Alcove Spring

ABOVE: Alcove Spring. Note the wagons passing by on the left.

A week or so after crossing the Kansas River, the emigrants were rewarded by the beauty of a popular campsite known as Alcove Spring.

Emigrant Edwin Bryant:
"About three-fourths of a mile from our camp, we found a large spring of water, as cold and pure as if it had just been melted from ice. We named this Alcove Spring."

Many pioneers were impressed with the pastoral beauty of the area. Some were tempted to end the journey and begin farming.

Emigrant James Pritchard:
"The scenery was so inviting that it induced us to take a stroll. We found beautiful spots and romantic situations."

But James Pritchard kept moving, as did everyone else. It wasn't until the late 1850s that that the first settlement came to this region.