blackfoot-valley

what is now southeastern Washington. Construction began from Walla Walla in 1858 and reached Fort Benton in 1860. The Mullan Road was the first artery that made possible widespread travel to the Oregon Country and, as Merrill G. Burlingame put it, “was probably the largest factor leading to the subsequent boom in Montana since some of the early discoveries were made by men who were attracted to the region by the easy access which the road gave to the West Coast, which was their goal.” The first major use of the Mullan Road was to transfer 300 soldiers west from Fort Benton who had ascended the Missouri from St. Louis. They reached Walla Walla after a 60-day march over the 600-odd miles, thus aver- aging a bit over ten miles a day. After improvements during 1861-1863 that completed five years of construction, Mullan measured it as 624 miles of road “Fort Benton, 1860” by John Ford Clymer 30 feet wide, noting that this included 120 miles through dense forest, 150 miles through open pines, and 30 miles of excavation in earth and rock. The other half of its length ran mostly through open grassland. The Mullan route bypassed the Nevada Valley to its north but came reasonably close to it, the distance between its route (at the future Avon) and Helmville being about 30 miles with no physical barriers to speak of other than small stream crossings. Mullen Road, Montana Thus the way was opened, or at least considerably eased for prospec- tors and potential settlers to look into the valley for diggings or for land to graze or farm. 71