Geographic Report on the Bird-Truax Trail

Contributed by Steve F. Russell

This paper documents the history and geographical location of the Bird-Truax Trail surveyed in 1866 which was the mountainous segment of the planned Virginia City and Lewiston Wagon Road that was never built. This wagon road was a federally-funded project in 1866 and was proposed to be built from Lewiston in Idaho Territory to Virginia City in Montana Territory. It failed because of the high cost of materials and labor in the newly-discovered gold country and because the terrain through the Bitter Root mountains was so severe. This trail is now historically called the Lalo Trail although its predecessor, the Northern Nez Perce Trail, was known by the gold miners as the Lou Lou Trail.

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