zebulon pike

On This Day

November 15, 1806 – Approaching the Colorado foothills of the Rocky Mountains during his second exploratory expedition, Lieutenant Zebulon Pike spots a distant mountain peak that looks “like a small blue cloud.” The mountain was later named Pike’s Peak in his honor.

On This Day

July 15, 1806 – Lieutenant Zebulon Pike began his western expedition from Fort Belle Fountaine, near St. Louis, MO.

image

Along the way, in what is ‪Colorado‬ today, ‪Pike‬ discovered one of the largest ‪mountains‬ in the United States, Pike’s Peak.

Pike commented on the ‪beauty‬ of the region around Pike’s Peak in his journal, “The unbounded prairie was overhung with clouds, which appeared like an ocean in a storm; wave piled on wave and foaming, whilst the sky was perfectly clear where we were.”