Built 1844 Opened 1844 Added to NRHP 11 January 1976 | NRHP Reference # 76001962 Area 2 ha Nearest city Farson | |
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Similar Fort Hall, Devil's Gate, Oregon Trail Ruts, Fort Bridger, Independence Rock | ||
The Parting of the Ways is an historic site in Sweetwater County, Wyoming, United States, where the Oregon and California Trails fork from the original route to Fort Bridger to an alternative route, the Sublette-Greenwood Cutoff, across the Little Colorado Desert. Many wagon trains parted company, some preferring the shorter cutoff route, which involved fifty waterless miles, to the longer but better-watered main route.
The junction is marked by a small sandstone boulder about 15 inches (38 cm) high, placed by L.C. Bishop and Paul Henderson and inscribed with a left-pointing arrow with "F. Bridger" and aright-pointing arrow with "S. Cut Off." The route was not established by Sublette, but rather a mountain man named Greenwood. The error in attribution arose when Joseph E. Ware's Emigrant's Guide to California (1849) listed the alternate path as the "Sublette Cutoff."