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Jefferson’s Inspiration

Inspiration can come so many ways – at any time, and from just about anywhere and anyone. And who can measure how many lives have been affected by a powerful idea?

For example, May 9, 1792: Alexander Mackenzie, a Scotsmen by birth and a Canadian fur trader and explorer, packed a 25 foot canoe at Fort Fork along the Peace River in Canada. He was determined to find a route to the Western Sea – to the Pacific. Guided by Native Americans, he arrived on the Pacific Coast July 22, 1793 – the first European to cross the continent north of Mexico.

On a rock he boldly wrote these words, “Alexander Mackenzie from Canada, by land, the 22nd of July one thousand seven hundred and ninety three.” Thereby Mackenzie secured Great Britain’s claim on that land. And you know, those words on that rock are still there today. The expedition had logged an incredible 2,811 miles, but Mackenzie failed to find an inland waterway running from the Pacific to the Atlantic. Nonetheless, he returned and wrote a book entitled, Voyages from Montreal… to the Pacific. Well, that book gained him wide recognition, even knighthood in 1802. In the book he urged Great Britain to secure the American northwest, and the Columbia River especially, and thereby effect a monopoly on the American fur trade.

Well, that book received wide recognition in the United States. One man, a voracious reader with an expansive mind and a far-reaching imagination, heard of the book and immediately ordered a copy. It was in the summer of 1802 when he finally received it. He spent all that summer with a friend at a place called Monticello devouring the book. Both men were shocked, emboldened, and inspired by its contents! Together they envisioned another passage to the Pacific Ocean farther to the south, and this one navigable. Taking Mackenzie’s words as a challenge, an expedition was put together to explore the American Northwest – and well, the rest is history.

It is nearly impossible to gage the impact of that moment of powerful inspiration from a single book. That man who bought the book was U.S. President Thomas Jefferson. And his companion who read it with him was none other than his secretary, Meriweather Lewis of Lewis and Clark.

Source: Stephen Ambrose, Undaunted Courage: Meriweather Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West