Retired history professor Don Buck has spent his retirement answering some nagging questions about the emigrants who came West nearly two centuries ago in the wagon trains. As member of the group Trails West, he has studied pioneer diaries, traveled over thousands of miles of trail — and made some major discoveries. He has found some of the exact routes they traveled from the Missouri River, West to Oregon and California. In our special “Voices of Americana,” we’ll let Don tell the story.

Again and again, Hollywood has refused to let us forget about the imagery and stories of the old wagon trains, that sent hundreds of thousands of emigrants west toward California and Oregon. Nearly two centuries later, parts of the trails are still there — you just have to know how to look and where to look.

“A moment in their life they’ll never forget.”

Don Buck, Trails West Historian

Since the early 1980’s, Don has been laser focused on one mystery — where are the trails. Now in his 90’s he’s the historian for Trails West, which along with the Oregon-California Trails Association, researches the trails and helps preserve key spots. His research and others,  has resulted in more than 700 trail markers all over the west.

And the source of his information is the diaries written by the emigrants themselves. On Voices of Americana, we meet one of the true experts of the old trails who unlocked so many mysteries about our histor