Lupus
Gigas and Lupus Occidentalis
(Oregon Territory), Buffalo Wolf,
and the Common Wolf of North America
from
John Cassin's
United States Exploring Expedition. During the Years 1838-1842.
Under the Command of Charles Wilkes… Mammalogy and Ornithology.
Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1858.
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The
Wilkes expedition sailed from the Fiji Islands to the Hawaiian
Islands before exploring the Oregon Territory on the northwest
coast of North America. Oregon Territory comprised the northwest
portion of the United States in the area now defined by Oregon,
Washington and Idaho. The Lewis and Clark Expedition explored
parts of it, but it was not included in the Louisiana Purchase
of 1803. Treaties provided that it be shared by Britain and America,
but it was primarily under the influence of the English Hudson's
Bay Company, which had established trading posts all the way to
the west coast. The United States Exploring Expedition, arrived
at the mouth of the Columbia River in the spring of 1841, the
same year that the first official wagon train headed west for
the territory along the Oregon Trail. The American voyagers arrived
in Oregon via Hawaii! The expedition gave the United States a
strong claim on the territory.
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