[applause] >thank you very much. next week, special primetime programming. glasgow, a debate over scottish independence. tuesday, issue spotlight on targeting of conservative groups. wednesday, a magnet school. thursday, the house budget committee hearing on federal, state, and local antipoverty programs. friday, it of american history. book tv in prime time next week. monday, a discussion about school choice. how the poor can save capitalism.

wednesday, in interview of the writer of a biography neil armstrong. friday, in-depth with former congressman ron paul. monday,can history tv, the reconstruction era and civil rights. tuesday, the end of world war ii. ofnesday, the anniversary the fall of the berlin wall. thursday, how attitudes of world war i changed for americans. friday, a nasa documentary about the moon landing. find our schedule one week at advance on c-span.org. let us know what you think of the programs. call us or find us on twitter. e-mail us. join the c-span conversation. like us on facebook. follow us on twitter. c-span is touring cities

across the country, exploring american history. a look at our visit to casper, wyoming. >> we are located in fort casper. it is a cavalry fort on the western emigrant trail quarter. or.coorid all these things located on the site. there was a lot of activity that happened here before the army showed up. the first occupation of this was 1847.

brigham young was moving west. to get across the north platte river. then, there were not five dams and you did not have a regulated channel. you have all the snow melt coming out of the what -- mountains. the river is as big as it will be all year. we are looking at a river almost 1000 feet across. they built a fairy. prior to that, you forded the the fairy operation became a safer way to cross. found their are a lot of we setnts on the trail

up a ferry operation. the first location was here to read it lasts for six years. there is a bridge built downriver. it puts the fairies out of business --ferries out of business. -- bridge built in 1859. . toll bridge purely commercial operation. in 1860, this is a pony express relay station. they had home stations and relay stations. this is a relay station where they would change horses. that lasted 19 months. pony express goes out of business. this is now a telegraph

station. the fort is located here because of the transcontinental telegraph. in 1862, early in the civil war, the north is not doing so well but keeping the communication open to the west coast to california, keeping that transcontinental telegraph going was important enough that the u.s. government sent u.s. soldiers out here to maintain the telegraph. what they did was not send have many of them. the units located here was the 11th ohio calvary. things started to change in 1865 as the war winds down back east. you see more military units come out here. they were reinforced by the 11th kansas calvary.

depending on the year, there were sometimes issues with the native tribes and sometimes they were more friendly, sometimes more hostile. this particular area was not settled. it was a pass through but it still created tension with some of the tribes. 1865 was a bad year for that. the previous winner in 1864, you had the massacre at sand creek. that was a colorado militia that road out of denver that attacked a village that was nonhostile, it was a friendly village. they massacred people. as a result of that, the summer after 1865, you had a lot of skirmishes and fights with the native tribes a direct result of the sand creek massacre.

one of the locations where is problems occurred was here. we had the battle of platte bridge. the goal of the tribes were to get rid of the bridge. the bridge was a visual symbol, a structure that could be attacked that represented all of the migration and the people moving out here. their goal was to get rid of this. so early in the morning we had the battle of platte bridge. there is a young lieutenant from the 11 ohio calvary named casper collins. he is passing through the fort on the day of the battle. he was to lead the 11th kansas calvary. they get across the bridge and not even a mile away and they

are ambushed by the cheyenne and the arapaho that are gathered together. they wheel around and race back to the fort. casper collins and four other soldiers are killed. amazingly, the other guys made it back. four hours later, the supply wagon shows up. this is called the battle of red butte. they fire a warning shot with their canon, the tribe sees them as well and they attack that wagon supply train. at that one it is led by amos custard. there were 25 guys with that group. there were five in an advanced guard. they get rid of the horses an three of them made it back to the fort.

the supply wagons were killed. shortly after that, because of the battles and because we have a young lieutenant called casper collins who was a son of the colonel, they changed the name of the fort. it was called platte bridge station. it is in 1865 that they changed the name of the fort to fort casper. once it becomes fort caspar in the fall of 1865 really only lasts two more years. they add a lot of buildings. there is a massive construction program in 1866 and 1867. this fort becomes as large as fort laramie. what happens is in 1867, the army determined they built it in the wrong place. so in the fall of 1867 they issue orders that they take all

salvageable materials and they haul it 45 miles east of here and use that to put up fort fetterman. >> fort caspar when they closed it there was nothing left here. even the early pioneers knew there used to be a fort here, which is how we end up with the town of casper named after fort caspar. >> find out where the local content vehicles are going next. you are watching american history tv. all weekend, every weekend.