Monticello/Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Inc.

James L. Dick copy of 1805 Rembrandt Peale portrait of Jefferson.

Departing St. Louis on May 14, 1804, the Corps of Discovery began its journey in earnest. That spring day marked the culmination of years of hope, desire, and planning that had both inspired and tormented Thomas Jefferson. The innate curiosity that drove Jefferson’s interest in a many subjects – among them agriculture, archaeology, horticulture, languages, law, mathematics, music, natural history, and philosophy – also fueled his curiosity about the West. For more than twenty years before the Corps of Discovery, Jefferson had been trying to mount an exploration of the West.

Although the Corps of Discovery fulfilled Jefferson’s dream of western exploration, theirs was Jefferson’s fourth attempt. In 1783, while still a member of Congress, Jefferson asked General George Rogers Clark to lead an exploration of the lands west of the Mississippi River. General Clark’s business affairs prevented his accepting the offer and the plan went no further. Only a few years later, however, Jefferson persuaded John Ledyard to attempt a trek from Moscow, across the Bering Strait, and, continuing east, across the North American continent. Ledyard’s arrest while still in Russia quickly ended this endeavor. During Jefferson’s term as Secretary of State he won support of the American Philosophical Society to fund an expedition “to find the shortest & most convenient route of communication between the U.S. & the Pacific ocean, within the temperate latitudes.” In 1793, Jefferson selected French botantist André Michaux to lead this expedition. After the revelation that Michaux was a secret agent of the French Republic, this project also came to an sudden end.  

That spring morning in 1804 marked the beginning of the fulfillment of Thomas Jefferson's decades long dream of western exploration.

More information about Thomas Jefferson is available in the following books and web sites.

Books
Lewis & Clark’s Transcontinental Exploration:1804 – 1806
Written by Roy E. Appleman and published by Jefferson National Parks Association.

Lewis & Clark: Pioneering Naturalists
Written by Paul Russell Cutright and published by the University of Illinois Press.

Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition with Related Documents, 1783 – 1854.
Written by Donald D. Jackson and published by the University of Illinois Press, 1978.

Thomas Jefferson and the Rocky Mountains: Exploring the West from Monticello.
Written by Donald D. Jackson and published by the University of Oklahoma Press.

Web sites
Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson, web site

Exhibit about Thomas Jefferson at the Library of Congress web site