Rachel Franklin Weekley is a historian with the National Park Service.

Articles Authored

1. This watercolor portrait of Henry Dodge was painted by George Catlin during the Dodge-Leavenworth Expedition of 1834. [Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, 1962-192-0001]
Henry Dodge (1782–1867)

Henry Dodge served his nation in a long and prosperous life on the nineteenth-century…

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This 1778 map of the Illinois Country by Thomas Hutchins depicts the region as it appeared during Israel Dodge’s lifetime. [Courtesy of the David Rumsey Historical Map Collection, Image 5045002]
Israel Dodge (1760–1806)

Israel Dodge exemplified the adventurous spirit of a young, expanding United States at the turn of the…

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This depiction of colonial Ste. Genevieve by artist Oscar Berninghaus is among the murals in the Missouri State Capitol. [State Historical Society of Missouri, color transparency in Ralph Walker Photographs Collection, P0108-017298-1]
Augustin Charles Frémon De Laurière (dates unknown)

The French Revolution induced many royalists to emigrate to the Louisiana Territory in the late eighteenth…

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Alexander Majors. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Kansas City Research Center]
Alexander Majors (1814–1900)

Those familiar with the Pony Express recognize Russell, Majors, and Waddell as the…

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François Saucier (1740–1821)

Known as “the pioneer of St. Charles,” François Saucier was born in 1740 in…

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