Botanical Profile Representing the Forest Trees…from Fort Smith to San Pedro

Visual compilation of the trees encountered along one of the Pacific Railroad survey routes.

This spectacular botanical profile uses a series of over 40 symbols to identify the various types of trees encountered by botanist J.M. Bigelow between Fort Smith, Arkansas and San Pedro (Los Angeles), California. A wide variety of pine, cacti, and deciduous species are noted. Bigelow was a party of the surveying team led by Amiel Weeks Whipple that scouted the route along the 35th parallel for a possible transcontinental railroad.

From the Museum of Natural History website;

“Expedition botanist John M. Bigelow kept the purpose of the Whipple expedition—finding a railroad route from the Mississippi to the Pacific—in the forefront of his mind while examining plants. He documented how different species could be an asset to the creation of the railroad, noting that Douglas spruce (Abies douglasii) was plentiful, and could be used to make railroad ties, “equal, if not superior, to those of any other wood in the West.”

The expedition was one of six major expeditions that traversed through different parts of the country in search of a promising railroad route. Twelve scientists, including Bigelow, traveled with the expedition party along the 35th parallel through modern-day Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. Spencer Baird, assistant-secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, recommended Bigelow for the position of botanist on the expedition.”

Source.