01Summary
The 'Queen City of the Trails', on the Missouri River. Most emigrants outfitted here in April or early May, waiting for the prairie grass to green up enough to feed the oxen.
02History
Founded in 1827 as the seat of Jackson County, Missouri, Independence sat on a high bluff above the Missouri River, the last major town reached by steamboat from St. Louis. Its position made it the natural gateway to the West.
Each spring from the early 1840s into the 1860s, between 1,000 and 5,000 emigrants gathered here to outfit. The town's livery stables, blacksmiths, gun shops, and dry-goods stores sold an entire prairie-bound household's worth of supplies in a few weeks of frantic trade. Prices doubled in May and crashed in June.
The town also served as the eastern hub for the Mormon migration of 1846 and 1847 and for the 1849 California Gold Rush. By 1850 it had been overtaken in volume by the rival jumping-off towns of St. Joseph and Westport, but it never lost its reputation as the trail's traditional starting line.
03Today
Today the Independence Square Historic District preserves several mid-19th-century outfitter buildings. The National Frontier Trails Museum occupies a restored Waggoner-Gates flour-mill complex from the 1850s, on the trail's first mile.
04People connected here
05Stops nearby
The Oregon Trail ran roughly 2,170 miles from Independence, Missouri to Oregon City. The stops immediately before and after this one are linked below; show Independence on the interactive map for the full route.