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Two young brothers chronicle their 1852 wagon train journey to California, capturing hardships, discoveries, and enduring legacies.
In Journal Across the Plains, 1852: The Brothers Verdenal, Missouri to California, pre-teen brothers John and Dominique Verdenal document the day-to-day events of the El Dorado wagon train traveling between St. Louis, Missouri and Placerville, California in 1852.
The brothers endure hardships including being trapped under a wagon by a fierce hail storm that sends cattle and horses scrambling for cover and leaves birds, rabbits and fish dead in its wake. After finding the wolf-chewed remains of a murderer, they uncover his story.
Disappointment and disillusion divide their party, reducing the number of wagons in their train by more than half. The trip was not just bland food, adversarial weather and near impassable rivers and mountains. Natural wonders including the colossal Independence Rock and the stone cleft of Devil’s Gate broke the monotony of the plains. Rest days allowed for horse races, swimming, and practical jokes, while holidays inspired bonfires, speeches, and violins.
Detailed footnotes as well as numerous illustrations and maps deepen the reader’s cross-country experience. An index of fellow travelers and those met on the trail supports genealogical research.
Bringing the past to the present, the book follows the brothers and their descendants as they build new lives in California and into the twenty-first century.
Jo M. Haraf has been published in the California Writers Club Literary Review, Flash Fiction Magazine, and Ragnarok. She edited and co-authored Journal Across the Plains, 1852 (Fonthill, 2020), a history of the Verdenal family's 1852 journey from Missouri to California. Jo earned her M.F.A. in Creative Writing at Pacific University. She is a proud member of the Historical Novel Society and the Biographers International Organization. After residing in Marin, California, for a quarter of a century, she retired to Florida's Suncoast with her husband and a scruffy terrier whose adoration sustains her through revisions and rejections. Learn more at www.JoHaraf.com
