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Once stagecoaches were the public transport to get across the United States. They were anything but comfy and one can still ride today.
Stagecoaches were once the main public transport to cross the growing United States. Despite the nostalgia now, they were anything but a comfy way to get around. The more comfy form of transport that replaced the stagecoach was the steam engine. Relive those days too on the Heber Valley Railroad in Utah.
Stagecoaches were a form of public transport coach that were used to carry paying passengers on journeys long enough to need a change of horses along the way. They were normally drawn by four horses or mules.
Stagecoaches And They Were Like
According to Desertusa.com, the stagecoaches were not drawn by three pairs of beautiful horses (like in the movies) but rather normally by two pairs of raw-boned mules.
Stagecoaches were widely used before steam-powered locomotives and other transportation. They made long and scheduled trips with stage stations or posts along the way where the horses would be replaced with fresh horses. If one was to actually take a real stagecoach journey across the nation, one is unlikely to ever complain about taking the Greyhound bus again.
- Staging: The Business of Running Stagecoaches or The Act of Journeying in Them
Stagecoaches have been popularized in film with images of the Royal Mail Coach or highwaymen holding up a stagecoach becoming popular images.
Passengers were squeezed into the back and middle row three abreast. One row faced forward, while the other faced rearward. Some passengers would have to ride with their knees dovetailed and all passengers rode with baggage on their laps and with mail pouches beneath their feet.
- Mail Pouches: By The Passenger’s Feet
These stagecoaches would travel relentlessly, day and night. There would only be brief moments at way stations without rest. Passengers would suffer from relentless jarring, dust, snow, heat, cold, and even Indians at some time periods and places.
One could expect to stop for 40 minutes twice a day. And then walk from time to time over the more difficult ground. One would sleep in the stagecoach in a sitting posture wedged in by fellow travelers and tightly filled mailbags.
John Butterfield’s Overland Mail Company Stagecoach Service
John Butterfield’s Overland Mail Company stagecoach service was the longest stage line in the world. It extended some 2,800 miles of which around 1,000 miles and crossed through the Chihuahuan, Sonoran, and Colorado deserts. It had two termini in the East – Memphis, Tennessee, and St. Louis, Missouri. In the west, it terminated at San Francisco.
- Longest Stage Line: Butterfield’s At 2,800 Miles
- Cost: Through Ticket $200
- Duration: 25 Days
- Operation: Between 1858 and 1861
To travel the fall length, a through passenger paid a whopping $200 – equivalent to thousands of dollars today. Crazy to think that even with masses of inflation since then, one can still fly across the USA for less today.
The journey would take some 25 days of ceaseless travel. One English cleric who traveled the full length of the Butterfield line in the summer of 1860 noted that a passenger he met worried just how much he would be able to endure the continuous ride.
He said there was “no absolute security against” Indian attack, “whilst murders and robberies were known to be of constant occurrence along the line…in the cases of solitary or incautious travellers...”
Today one can still travel by stagecoach on a number of tours around the country. These are much more pleasant affairs – if not unauthentic. But then again, few would actually ever really want an authentic perilous, sleepless, crammed, jarring, and dangerous 25-day journey across the USA.
Our Heritage Guest Ranch
If one would like a stagecoach journey Our Heritage Guest Ranch in the badlands of Nebraska offers tours in their M&M Overland Coach – an original 1860s Sidney-Lead-Deadwood stagecoach.
On the tour, one will explore the diverse and beautiful scenery as well as an expo on horse training. Guests can learn games as they did in the late 1800s. Food is cooked like in the days of the pioneers
Stagecoach journeys are available for groups of 50 or more. A three-day stagecoach ride costs $550 including lodging and breakfast.
- Cost: $75 Per Person (Meal Included)
MacDonald’s Ranch
If one would like a taste of what the old stagecoaches were like then consider MacDonald’s Ranch. They offer rather pricey 45-minute rides. These tours are great experiences for families and the ranch also offers horseback rides. On the moon tours, one can ride off into the sunset and experience the Sonoran Desert by moonlight.
- Duration: 45 Minute Tour
- Standard Ride Cost: $60 Adults (Tax and Gratuity Not Included)
- Moon Ride Cost: $95 Adults (Tax and Gratuity Not Included)
If one would like to visit an old abandoned Wild West town, consider visiting the old ghost town of Bodie in California.
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