The Oregon Trail

The 1849 George P. Putnam edition titled 'The California and Oregon Trail' is the true first in book form. The narrative first appeared serially in the Knickerbocker Magazine (21 installments, 1847-49) as 'The Oregon Trail; or, A Summer's Journey Out of Bounds' — so 'Oregon Trail' was in fact the ORIGINAL title, and Putnam prepended 'California' for the book to exploit the 1849 Gold Rush. The familiar short title was restored only with the revised 1872 (Little, Brown) edition; that 1872 revision and the celebrated Frederic Remington-illustrated edition (Little, Brown, 1892) are both 'first thus,' not the 1849 first.