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Jim Bridger

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The remaining three expeditions were guided by James Bridger, who in 1843 had set up Fort Bridger on Black’s Fork of Green River, to cater to the emigrants who were beginning to follow the Oregon Trail. James Gemmell claims to have been among those present in 1846 when Bridger led “a trading expedition to the Crows and Sioux,” north up the Green River through Jackson’s Hole to West 78Thumb, making a tour of the “wonderful spouting springs” and other scenic features before continuing down the Yellowstone. E. S. Topping states that in 1850 Jim Bridger, Kit Carson, and twenty-two others on a prospecting trip out of St. Louis “crossed the mountains to the Yellowstone and down it to the lake and the falls; then across the Divide to the Madison River. They saw the geysers of the lower basin and named the river that drains them the Fire Hole.... The report of this party made quite a stir in St. Louis.”