Rocky Mountain high: after a canoe capsizes, the first sight of the mountainous "Snowey barrier" lifts the corps' spirits.(LEWIS AND CLARK: 200 YEARS AGO THIS MONTH)

Publication: Smithsonian

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In may 1805, the corps crossed from North Dakota into present-day Montana. While the expedition was traveling upriver, one of the canoes capsized; Sacagawea, on board with her infant son, single-handedly saved much of the canoe's contents, including journals and medicines. A grateful Meriwether Lewis named a river after her. Later that month, Lewis and Clark first saw the Rocky Mountain chain, which they would have to cross to reach the Pacific.

May 14, 1805 [Capt. Meriwether Lewis]

We had been halted by an occurrence, which I have now to recappitulate, and which altho' happily passed without ruinous injury, I cannot recollect but with the utmost trepidation and horror; this is the upseting and narrow escape of the white perogue...

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