Jedediah Smith family papers, 1814-1953.

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Jedediah Smith family papers, 1814-1953.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/86132509

Originals and photocopies of documents relating to the family of Jedediah Strong Smith (1799-1831), one of the most remarkable figures of the Western fur trade era; an explorer in the Rocky Mountains, the Great Basin, California, and the Pacific Northwest, before his death on the Santa Fe Trail in 1831. Most of the papers in these collections relate to Jedediah S. Smith in his lifetime and are photocopies of originals in various depositories. The Bancroft Library has some original Smith documents in the Vallejo papers (C-B 29) and the Samuel Parkman papers (M-B 10). Copies of others made for H.H. Bancroft from the California Archives prior to the destruction of the originals in the San Francisco fire of 1906 are in C-A 27, C-A 47-48, C-A 56, and C-C 3. See also under Cremer (P-N 134). Original manuscripts given to the Bancroft Library by members of this far-flung family reflect the life of the senior Jedediah Smith (1767-1831) as a farmer and tailor in the Western Reserve of Ohio, and of his other children in various parts of the West and Midwest; two younger sons, Peter and Ira, were active in the Santa Fe trade in the 1830's and lived in California later, as did some of their nephews and nieces.

California Digital Library

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SNAC Resource ID: 8342462

California Digital Library

Related Entities

There are 2 Entities related to this resource.

Smith, Jedediah, 1767-1849.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6514r0b (person)

Smith, Jedediah Strong, 1799-1831

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w69z9gvp (person)

Jedediah Strong Smith was born June 24, 1799 in Bainbridge, Chenango County, New York. He was the son of Jedediah Smith of New Hampshire and was the eldest of fourteen children. Jedediah's early childhood was spent in Ohio where he received and English and Latin education. At thirteen he became a clerk on a Lake Erie freighter where he learned business methods and met traders returning from the Far West. Jedediah became ambitious for an adventure to the wilderness and he went to St. Louis around...