Ed Vebell (American, 1921 - 2018) "Santa Fe Trail" Signed lower right. Original Acrylic painting on Illustration Board.

Provenance: Collection of James A. Helzer (1946-2008), Founder of Unicover Corporation.

This artwork was originally published on the Fleetwood Commemorative Cover for Epic Events in American History series issued in 1985.

The first of the great trails West was the Santa Fe. As early as 1619, Spain had made the little mission town of Santa Fe the capital of New Mexico, and zealously guarded it against intrusion by Americans. Then in 1821, Mexico won independence from Spain, all was changed: the new government welcomed American traders -- and textiles, tools, weapons and money -- in exchange for silver, furs and wool. It was an early explorer, William Becknell, who first marked out one of the several trails to Santa Fe, from Independence, Missouri to the Great Bend of the Arkansas, then to the Rockies and south across the Cimarron Desert to Santa Fe. Not until the acquisition of New Mexico by the United States did trade with Santa Fe become important. Scores of traders, muleteers and "bullwackers" wound their way across the plains and into the country of the Indians. The discovery of gold in California gave new life to the Santa Fe Trail, for it was an alternate route to the Pacific. The trail reached its greatest days in the 1860s when over 2,500 wagons, with over three thousand men and women and almost thirty thousand oxen made the venture in one season. It came to an end in 1880 when the Santa Fe Railroad was completed. Perhaps, in the long run, its greatest contribution was to the American imagination and American literature.

Image Size: 20 x 21.25 in.
Overall Size: 26.5 x 27.5 in.
Unframed.
(B06710)

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