Pony Express Route April 3, 1860- October 24, 1861

“One of the most stirring chapters to the history of America’s making” (Driggs).

First issue, without the additional legend printed in red beneath Driggs’ text. Includes text by Howard R. Driggs: “Over this historic route daring young Americans on fleet horses sped night and day while other courageous men kept and supplied the stations along the far-flung, dangerous line. This pioneer fast mail service, maintained despite serious loss to its patriotic promoters, made a notable contribution tour national welfare. The Pony Express, following the direct northern route, brought our far west much closer to our east, thereby helping to hold our frontier territory with its treasures of gold in our Union. It blazed the way for the overland stage to California, hastened the building of the first transcontinental railroad and telegraph and added one of the most stirring chapters to the history of America’s making”.

The vignettes are of “Court House Rock, Chimney Rock, Old Fort Kearny, Buffalo in the Valley of the Platte, Old Fort Laramie, Relay station near Utah Desert, Sacramento - passing Old Fort Sutter, etc. Route covers 1,600 miles with total of 190 stations every twenty miles from California, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas and Missouri. Each of these stations was staffed and equipped to provide a fresh horse for each of the eighty riders who made a 120-mile ride before handing the mail off to the next man. In this manner, the mail could be delivered between St. Joseph, Missouri, across the Great Plains, over the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada to Sacramento, California, in just 10 days” (Rumsey).