Just ran across Manly's book on the web which includes a map of the various routes of the Lost '49ers. Manly wasn't a Jayhawker but travelled with them part of the journey and wrote about them. The map shows what is believed by some to be the Jayhawker route. Here's the URL: http://www.wickiup.com/wickiup/manly/index.html The trunk found by Jerry Freeman will be on "History's Mysteries" on the History Channel, April 25. Don't know the exact time. Rex

>From the Stark County news, Friday, 1 February 1901 "The Jayhawkers," a party of gold seekers from this section of Illinois, who came together in Galesburg in 1849 and started overland for the gold fields of California, will soon hold a reunion in San Jose, California. The late John W. Plummer, of Toulon, father of Mrs. James Nowland was one of the original party. During the last few years of his life he was never so happy as when telling of the adventures that befell the party in their memorable trip across the plains, and during the few years he spent in the gold fields. To Salt Lake, Utah, the trip was made without adventure, except those that befell all travelers in those early days. There, against the advice of all trained mountaineers and scouts, they decided to make a short cut across Death Valley, a route that General Fremont and the best scouts he could find, including Kit Carson, had tried and had to abandon. For more than a month, the party wandered, half starved and suffering from thirst. For weeks they lived on the raw flesh and blood of their cattle. For days they were wholly witout food or water, and while on the point of starvation the few survivors of the band emerged into the green fields of an old Spanish mission in California and were saved. It was one of the most remarkable adventures of the early days in the West. The survivors have been meeting in a reunion for several years on February 4, the anniversary of the day they emerged from the parched dessert to the green fields and running streams of the old mission. There are only eight survivors of the party left and it is expected that six of them will be present at the reunion. Pat Thomas Post Office Box 885 Winona, Minnesota 55987-0885 1-507-452-8290 mailto:ptthomas@hbci.com or if bouncing mailto:PThomas@NT1.Co.Winona.MN.US Knox County, Illinois USGENWEB Assistant CC http://www.rootsweb.com/~ilknox/knindex.htm