Dr.Dan May, 1854

Dear Diary,                                                                                                                      May 29, 1854


My family is having trouble getting into the daily routine of the trail. First you must wake up at about 6 am to start getting ready. Then you have to go eat breakfast with non palatable food, and non potable drinks. We also have to go far out into the prairie to try and find trees, and signs of civilization. If we cannot find sings of civilization, or trees we usually ask our wagon master what to do next and he usually says, "we shall move forward". The members on our wagon train are getting along very nicely, for now. You never know when something bad could turn up, and all of the people on our wagon trail would never get along again! For now all is well. We have already made the decision of leafing Nate Page, and his son go of on to the burial grounds trail. On their own! I thought they must have gone mad. I thought for a moment that, what if he had become a radical? This thought made me shiver, because the thought of radicals were so hard to think of. They were just insane! With all of their crazy stunts, and tricks. They must have to gone mad.

The prairie was beautiful last night, with the sunset. It just makes me wonder what that sunset would be like at home. Now our home is here, but now our home is in the West. I will still miss my old home dearly, but now it's time to move on to a new life. Anyway the prairie today on the other hand, was like an old sand box. Abandoned. Nothing, I mean nothing was there only us. I did spot one tree from a far distance I got everyone so happy, but then as we came closer to the tree it was dead. We were all so disappointed. Our one, and only tree dead. There were also a few patches of prairie grass, but not much. At least it is enough for our animals to fead on. We could not find water any ware today, and yesterday. So our animals are weaker than ever before, and we are also weaker than ever before! It is awful. I hope we will reach the West grounds that we are looking for. It would be a dream come true for me, and my family, and my whole wagon trail.

We have had many fates bestowed on our wagon trail. One was that Ruby Bryant had to wright a paragraph about how to heel her burnt hands! Then we had a prairie fire, it was awful. We also had to spend multiple hours searching for fire wood. My wife was very mad at me for not bringing our fire wood. Then I had to write a paragraph about how to heel a rattle snake bite. The rattle snake bit hurt so much. My wife, and daughter got very worried. I assured them that I would be fine, but they did not believe me. They were still there by my side for the whole day. I would change the time that we made that trail decision about splitting up our wagon train. We should have left our wagon train together. I am worried about Nate Pages safety with his son James. I hope they make it threw the burial grounds trail. After all of this my family is happy to be on this trail, but at times it can be ruff. We are beginning to become more adventurous, and loyal. I hope we can stay like this forever.