Wagons Ho!

On Wednesday, July 16, I attended the layover day of a 4H Wagon Train that was rolling for a week down the Old Santiam Wagon Road through Sisters Country. I covered the event for The Nugget Newspaper, and thought I’d share the story here:

Dozens of people, from infants to elders, reached out to touch the past for a week this month as the 2025 4-H Wagon Train rolled down the Old Santiam Wagon Road through Sisters Country.

The wagon wheels have been rolling every summer since 1982 in a living history experience that allows youth and adults alike to get a hands-in-the-dirt, boots-on-the-ground sense of what life was like for pioneers who braved the Oregon Trail and other trails across the West. In recent years, the Wagon Train has invited elders from the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs to join the trekkers to tell stories and share cultural perspectives from the native experience.

Last Wednesday, the Wagon Train rolled into the flats near the old toll station a little southeast of Suttle Lake to make camp for a layover day. Many guests — including The Nugget — visited, enjoying wagon rides, native dancing, storytelling and a camp dinner.

For many trekkers, the Wagon Train has been an annual pilgrimage for decades. Lynda Claypool has been on the Wagon Train almost every year since 2008. This year, she had her knee in a brace from an injury, but she wasn’t going to let that stop her.

She recalled that she loved horses and camping as a kid, but realized as an adult that keeping horses was not in the cards for her. She participated in a Wagon Train trek in 2008 and met a man named Larry White. He had mules.

“Mules are a whole lot less maintenance — and there as an interesting man attached to them,” she said with a grin.

She was hooked — and the Wagon Train extended into an entire way of life for her.

She loves to see the impact the trek has on youth — many of whom come back year after year and then become adult leaders.

The participants develop an “appreciation of history and how things were done without the tech load,” she said. “These are skills that should be preserved — even if things don’t go terribly wrong and we need them again. It’s good to be able to do for yourself.”

She has been gratified over the years to see young people thrive through the Wagon Train experience, watching kids develop the confidence and skills to be able to drive a mule- or horse-drawn wagon.

“It’s somewhere along the line of amazing what you see in the kids,” Claypool said.

They gain confidence, develop skills — from managing livestock to leadership; they gain an enthusiasm for the outdoors; and they build resilience in an environment that will inevitably challenge their comfort zones.

Gideon Lerner is one of the youth that caught on with the Wagon Train and stayed with it to become a key “pioneer.” In fact, this year, he was named a 4-H Wagon Train Lifetime Pioneer. He connects with the youth involved, and has worked as a swamper and scout, participated in innumerable work parties, brought families into the program, and connected them with native traditions to the benefit of all.

“Gideon was one of those kids who would get involved with everything he could,” Claypool said. “This was something that resonated with him, and he jumped in with both feet.”

“I was 14 when I started,” Lerner told The Nugget. “I was useless. I knew nothing about horses and mules.”

Lerner found a mentor in Wayne Beckwith, who has been driving wagons with mule teams for years. He was a high school teacher in Salem when he was approached to participate in the Wagon Train. He didn’t think he could commit to the multi-day excursion.

“My wife Kathy told me, you really just need to go,” he recalled. “And I did. And I got hooked.”

Beckwith’s team this year was comprised of three mules — Kerala, age 25, Tufa, age 23, and Samuel, age 25. They are all “three-bell mules.” Bells are shaved into the tail of mules to indicate their capabilities — a kind of rating. Three-bell mules can be ridden, they can pack, and they can drive.

Mules were by far the most common wagon-pullers on the 2025 trek.

Beckwith, too, finds the impact of the trek on youth to be profound. The program likes to have parents or grandparents along, but Beckwith recalled one time when a pari of 12 or 13-year-old boys were simply dropped off by a parent. They didn’t really want to be there, and one kid went home early. The other, though, thrived.

The work the kids undertake on the trail and in camp is real and serious. They are taking care of animals and each other, and what they do matters. That can be a first-time experience for some kids, and it often resonates powerfully.

“All of a sudden we were doing real stuff,” Beckwith said. “That experience of falling together, learning together for a week — it’s an amazing experience.” 

The Wagon Train is organized based on the roles assigned to person in historical wagon trains. There is a wagon boss, teamsters, a cook, wranglers, swampers, scouts, a camp boss, and — in a nod to modern safety considerations — medical personnel. For each adult role, there is a youth counterpart.

Wagon Boss Jeannie Rosenbalm said she got the job because she missed a meeting — but the role clearly suits her, because she has been doing it for eight years. Dressed in pioneer style, including a sunbonnet, she keeps the train rolling on the trail. She, too, manages mules. And she, too, has seen tremendous impact on kids — including her own.

“My kids — I’ve seen them grow and be able to to do things I didn’t think they’d be able to do,” she said.

Adults thrive, too.

“There are lifelong friendships that are made,” she said.

Deanie Johnson, Lois Squiemphen and Myra Johnson were on hand to share history, folklore and dancing from the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. They brought a contingent of dancers — many of them very young — and described each dance. For most of them, campers were invited to participate, which they did with great enthusiasm.

“Each dance has a meaning behind it,” Deanie Johnson said. “They’re old, old dances, handed down for generations.”

Many of the dances have animal representation, as the Warm Springs people have a strong connection to them. This includes the Bear Dance, which was conducted with the leader wearing a bear skin. The dancers imitate the bear and express his power.

While the Wagon Train runs for a week, the work that goes into preparing it is considerable. Todd Williver of Sisters is 4-H Positive Youth Development Outdoor Recreation/Education Program Manager. He noted that the program worked with the Sisters Ranger District and Ranger Ian Reid to handle permitting, and expressed appreciation of the work the Forest Service put in to make the process smooth. Reid and several Sisters Ranger District personnel attended the Wednesday lay-over encampment, and several were seen making miniature tule mats with instruction from 4-H and OSU Extension instructors.

The event combined education, adventure, camaraderie and creativity in a manner that honored history and encouraged contemporary engagement with old and valuable skills. The dust from the wagon wheels has settled along the Old Santiam Road, with memories made and dozens of trekkers already looking forward to next summer’s adventure.