Report on the Exploration of the Yellowstone River. Communicated by the Secretary of War, in Compliance with a Resolution of Senate, February 13, 1866
Author: William Franklin Raynolds (1820-1894)
Year: 1868
Publisher: Government Printing Office
Place: Washington, DC
Description:
[2]+174 pages with large folding map in back (26½" x 41"). Royal octavo (9¼" x 5¾") bound in original gilt-lettered green cloth. (Howes R88) First Edition.
William Franklin Raynolds was an American explorer, engineer and U.S. army officer who served in the Mexican–American War and American Civil War. He is best known for leading the 1859–60 Raynolds Expedition while serving as a member of the U.S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers.
In early 1859, Raynolds was charged with leading an expedition into the Yellowstone region of Montana and Wyoming to determine, "as far as practicable, everything relating to . the Indians of the country, its agricultural and mineralogical resources . the navigability of its streams, its topographical features, and the facilities or obstacles which the latter present to the construction of rail or common roads ." Though the Raynolds Expedition was unsuccessful in exploring the region that later became Yellowstone National Park, it was the first federally funded party to enter Jackson Hole and observe the Teton Range. The expedition covered over 2,500 miles (4,000 km) and explored an area of nearly 250,000 square miles. Research data and botanical specimens, as well as fossils and geological items that had been collected during the expedition, were sent to the Smithsonian Institution but were not studied in detail until after the war. Much of the artwork created by Hutton and especially Schönborn was lost, though several of Schönborn's chromolithographs appeared in Ferdinand V. Hayden's 1883 report that was submitted after later expeditions.
Condition: Boards rubbed, minor discoloration to front panel; light toning, book plate to front pastedown, few chips and closed tears to map else very good.
