The Pony Express was a pioneering mail delivery system that used a relay of horseback riders. Operating for just 18 months between 1860 and 1861, riders sped across nearly 2,000 miles of rugged terrain between Missouri and California. It was a reliable process with letters being delivered in about 10 days.
A statue located in This Is the Place Heritage Park in Salt Lake City commemorates the city’s crucial role as a major hub for the Pony Express, supplying vital mail routes across the wilderness. Designed by sculptor Avard Fairbanks and titled “Changing Horses,” the piece depicts the frenzied, ten-second process of a rider transferring mailbags to a fresh horse before taking off again. I can’t even take my socks off that quickly.
As my husband read the adjacent plaque to me and described the monument, I noticed that cars were driving by without stopping. When it comes to history, I think we can often easily jump to the conclusion that it has nothing to do with us.
Pulling out of the park onto the road a short while later, an Amazon truck was now in front of us. It clicked with me that without the Pony Express there would be no US Postal Service, no UPS, no FedEx and – hold on to your cowboy hat – no Amazon.
So you see, it really isn’t difficult to quickly find a connection to the past if you give it just a bit of thought, say as long as it took a Pony Express rider to change horses.
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