Goodale North Trail

Emigrants included Many Non-Miners

Only a few people, relatively impermanent, went to the Weiser River area as early1864-65. Within a few years, while the Crane Creek variant of the “Tim Goodale road” was in use, about 1867 in larger numbers, many ranches and towns people began to populate the area from Middle Valley west, east, and north to above the Council valley. From that time mixed-occupation residents helped towns develop there, and the preponderance of the evidence proves that those emigrants who came from the east through Boise followed this central Crane Creek route. We know that Brownlee left his Ferry in 1864, but …

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Brownlee Ferry

Goodale North Trail

The writing of this paper required the inclusion of many before unpublished accumulated facts, and a complicated weaving together of the information was necessary for the complete picture to be painted. Therefore it is well documented, very detailed, and somewhat deductively presented in some places. The historical facts are clear, but in places one must also have an innate sense of trail history and trail thinking to understand, and maybe to interpret some informational blanks. It is not quickly readable like an entertaining novel. It is intended to present all facts possible, and sometimes to follow the routes of the …

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Joining of Trains at Champagne Meadows

The collection of this information together does generate some possibilities to think about that have before been little considered. The joining together of several trains at Champagne Meadow to cross the southern Jeffrey-Goodale Cutoff, and the several divisions of the same in the Boise Valley and along the Boise River does complicate the matter. It appears that the divisions back on the Oregon Trail were not always according to the original make up of each prior train. The division of the early Goodale Train, some to go on the new route through central Idaho and some down the old Oregon …

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Goodale Train Divided

The Goodale Train no doubt divided from the Curtis and Slater occupied train near the Boise crossing. But that western-bound train did not necessarily plan to cross there, probably thinking that they would cross at the normal crossing at Caldwell. This they were not allowed to do when they got to that point because of the high water. Then at some vague location downriver from there when Mr. Curtis was the first to try to cross he was drowned. The consideration mentioned above that by only a remote possibility Dunham Wright may have witnessed the drowning of Mr. Curtis, is …

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Tim Goodale’s Knowledge of Idaho

The Oregon Trail related Cutoff from near the crossing of the Snake River at the Fort Hall site and through south-central Idaho to Ditto Creek, near Mountain Home, for some time commonly known as “Goodale’s Cutoff,” has by 2005 been extensively researched, documented, and mapped. The evidence indicates that it should be more appropriately called the “Jeffrey-Goodale Cutoff,” because of John Jeffrey’s influence in getting emigrants to follow that route 10 years earlier than Tim Goodale’s Wagon Train reopened the trail. And, indeed, the name “Jeffrey’s Road” was used on some earlier maps and records before someone substituted the name …

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North Part Weiser—Salubria Route

Goodale Hired to Lead the Train Across New Areas

As stated in the first section of this paper, and inferred in the facts about his life, there is little question that Tim Goodale knew much about the old trails in the Northwest, which predated early white men’s travels in their mass migration west and which migration turned many of the Indian trails into emigrant roads. Sufficient information about Goodale’s life has been published to indicate that he was a mountain man and explorer, and was married to an Indian wife. He had for years traveled much of the west, and no doubt knew most of the trail routes across …

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Goodale's Northern Cutoff

Goodale’s Contributions to Idaho

The northern Goodale Cutoff differs from the Jeffrey-Goodale Cutoff in that Goodale did not need to share the credit with another man! Some white men had no doubt before traveled the routes north without wagons. Miners and others followed Goodale’s lead to soon open the central variant route. The total route of that central variant (Maps, pp. 4 & 13) went north of the later Emmett, near and across Haw Creek, crossed Willow Creek, went over the Fourmile grade, down South Crane Creek, up near Hog Creek, NW near Dixie Creek to the Weiser River, and met the Goodale Train …

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Addendum One, Facts to Consider

The first fact considered is that from all the information we have available it seems that the long train that had followed Goodale from Champagne Meadow in Butte County began to divide back down into several smaller trains, some even before reaching the area of Boise. And it follows then that there were different routes decided upon by the different trains, even three separate routes to the Oregon border! This will be discussed later. Part of the train that followed Goodale to Salubria/Cambridge area wanted to stay in Idaho and go to the Florence area, and part was headed for …

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Many Emigrants Were Miners

As stated in the introduction, we hope to amend the concept that the only true emigrants on the Oregon Trail system, had to go on to Oregon or at least to the Northwest beyond Idaho. When one hears in discussions about the Goodale North route that most travelers north of Boise were “only miners with pack trains, not emigrants with wagons” (as we will see not an overall accurate assessment), a concept seems to be implied that miners were not really emigrants! We will examine the evidence. One primary and dependable record from 1863 seems to be appropriate here, which …

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Emigrant’s Information

The foregoing information has been presented to help dispel the doubts that the Goodale North variant through Crane Creek-called “Tim Goodale road” by some writers in informational road accounts and being used by pack trains in fall of 1862, only weeks after Goodale’s Train-soon became a wagon/emigrant train traveled road for many years, first to Boise Basin. We will look at some of the travel accounts found. Though they are somewhat sparse, compared to numbers of journals and accounts left behind by travelers on other trail routes, they do illustrate well the movement of emigrants for several years along the …

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