Wyoming chronology
1840s Texas longhorns are driven to Independence, Westport, and Kansas City to meet needs of Oregon Trail emigrants.
1843 Spanish and American mountain men Louis Vasquez and Jim Bridger establish Fort Bridger at Black’s Fork, in Mexican territory.
1848 Southwestern Wyoming cedes to the United States from Mexico, with the eastern half becoming part of the Texas republic and the western half becoming part of the Utah territory.
1850 Mexican laborers contracted from Taos, New Mexico, carry on farming and herding operations at Fort Laramie.
1853 U.S. frontiersmen Kit Carson and Lucien Bonaparte Maxwell drive and deliver over 10,000 head of sheep from Santa Fe to Fort Laramie and on to California along the Overland Trail.
1855 Spanish American Louis Vasquez sells his share of Fort Bridger in the Utah territory to Mormons.
1867-1868 Construction of the Union Pacific Railroad across southern Wyoming opens up permanent settlement of state and expands economic development in the mining, livestock, and tourism industries.
1868 The Goodnight-Loving Cattle Trail, the historic cattle train, reaches Cheyenne from Texas.
The Wyoming Territory is organized out of lands from the Dakota, Idaho, and Utah territories.
1890 Wyoming enters the Union as the 44th state on July 10.
1910s Heavy recruitment of Mexican and Mexican American workers for labor in sugar beet fields begins.
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