Deer, buffalo and elk, kindred and hostile beasts of early America, made the trails of the later "Overland." They crossed the gaps in the Pineridge, and in the Scotts Bluff- Wildcat range; they meandered up and down the valleys, and made worn thoroughfares over the South Pass, long before the American Indian found the heart of the new world.

We can go back only a relatively short period in our stories of events along the old trails, for only the smooth surfaces of stones, only silent fossils of giant things, only echoes from a disintegrating atmosphere, and the dumb silent zodiac, furnish the meagre information as to what happened here, before the halfsavage French or Spanish trapper and adventurer penetrated the vast wilderness of the new continent.

It has been a delight to find a bit of unusual or remote history that has a local significance, and any motive behind human action is always interesting. There are but vague references to the first trails of Europeans in this land, and they are so conflicting that it leaves a question mark in the mind. Fortunately, I have found in my rambles, stories that I shall give here, and leave the reader to determine their historic value. They may find incredulous minds, but to me they have become fixed as signal fires along the horizon of the past, indicating the mark of the first white.man's foot in all of Nebraska. The opening trail of civilization in the mighty west.

The first story dates back to about the time of Coronado's search for Quivera, the wonderful city of gold, which brought about the discovery of the great plains and the buffalo. It was following Coronado's futile attempt that the Padres were inspired to attempt to plant religion among the Indians of the great plains.