The Journal of Jacob Fowler / Narrating an Adventure from Arkansas Through the Indian / Territory, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico, to / the Sources of Rio Grande del Norte, 1821-22

A field journal narrates an overland expedition across the trans‑Mississippi West, offering day‑to‑day entries that describe routes, river sources, camps, landscape features, and practical travel challenges. The manuscript blends geographic observations, measurements and route notes with personal reminiscences and descriptions of settlements and encounters along the way. Editorial material supplies an introduction, commentary on provenance and legibility, and facsimiles of manuscript pages, helping readers interpret the handwriting and place the episodic, largely pragmatic account of movement through varied frontier terrain into context.