5/22/13 Fort Robinson, NE

Today was a travel day, but there was one more stop we wanted to make before we left the area. Twenty miles to the west of Chadron is Fort Robinson State Park. What we were particularly interested in was the Trailside Museum of Natural History. This is another museum sponsored by the University of Nebraska. The main display is the skeletal remains of two giant mammoths lying as they have since the Ice Age—tragically locked together in combat. These mammoths were about the same age and size, both with one full tusk and a shorter one that was presumed to have been broken off in a previous struggle. The longer tusks were locked together and around each other’s heads. They eventually died of starvation where they fell. The remains of these mammoths were found not too far from the Toadstool grounds where we were yesterday.

Fort Robinson State Park has had an interesting history. Built to protect the first settlers in the area from the Indians, it was an Army Calvary unit. Chief Crazy Horse was captured by the Calvary, and returned to the fort, where he was later stabbed and died while resisting his guards. The Buffalo Soldiers were assigned here for a time during the Indian Wars and at one time the Fort housed over 13,000 Lakota Indians. The fort was also used as a breeding center for the Army’s Calvary horses, the veterinary hospital is open to visitor’s, as are the stables. During WWII over 3000 German POW’s were interned at the Fort, along with several hundred military guards, interpreters and other camp personnel. Camp Robinson remains one of the country’s best preserved prisoner of war camp sites.

After a quick bite to eat, we hit the road, travelling north on Highway 385 into South Dakota. As soon as we crossed into SD, we started to climb in altitude, the rolling hills of north west Nebraska started getting higher peaks and we began to see Antelope grazing in the pastures. We passed through the quaint town of Hot Springs, SD (which we hope to explore more in the next week). We passed through Wind Cave National Park where Buffalo herds have free roaming rights, in fact two of the very large animals crossed the road right in front of us. The landscape is quickly becoming the rugged rocky formations the area is famous for. By the time we reached our campground, Custer’s Crazy Horse Campground, we had reached an altitude of about 5500’. The campground, which is in the town of Custer, will be our headquarters during our exploration of this area for the next week.