![]() There were horses, mules, and sometimes even stranger forms of transport. That said, not everyone took oxen on the trail. "Your oxen would eat anything, and nobody was tempted to steal them. "Oxen are more durable and cheaper to purchase than a horse or mule," McNeese says. ![]() The reality: On the actual Oregon Trail, oxen were the best choice for traveling, and they were quite common in 1848, when the video game was set. The game: At the start of Oregon Trail (the game), most people stocked up on yokes because traveling with a team of oxen was the only option. Here are nine myths you learned because of the way you played the game: 1) Not everyone used oxen. But other strategies - like hunting for thousands of pounds of buffalo - would have been far more dangerous than the game suggested. Some of the more popular Oregon Trail strategies we all loved as kids - like starting out as a banker or stocking up on oxen - would have worked out well on the real Oregon Trail. ![]() Their verdict? In a lot of ways, the way you played the game was surprisingly accurate. To find out, I called up two historians: Tim McNeese, chair of the history department at York College and author of Oregon Trail: Pathway to the West and Laura Woodworth-Ney, provost at Idaho State University and author of Women in the American West. It was a joy (and you can play the game online here).īut how much did that game resemble the real-life Oregon Trail, which took as many as 400,000 settlers to the West from the 1830s to late 1860s? They stocked up on oxen, hunted for buffalo, and watched their most beloved family members die of dysentery. ![]() Millions of kids grew up playing Oregon Trail on their computers. ![]()
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