Poster – Frozen Feet at Grape Creek
$29.95
Retired Disney artist, Ed French, draws you in, through color and the emotion of his visual story telling. Do you feel the cold creeping in around your collar and up into your feet? Soon your toes will become numb. A bad sign, in the wilderness, when all you have is your feet to carry you to the next destination.
Description
The Art
Created on 4/16/18, this beautiful depiction of Horn Peak, Grape Creek, and the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, really captures “What Pike Saw” and the agony they suffered January 17 – 26 1807. 10 of 17 of Pike’s men suffered frostbite in the Wet Mountain Valley, Colorado, while crossing Grape Creek. Three had frostbitten toes so bad that they were unable to continue with the others over Medano Pass. They were rescued later. The triangular mountain is Horn Peak. The creek flowing east to west beside the men caring for each other is Grape Creek.
- Medium: Ink
- Surface: Card Stock
- Size: 11″ x 14″
- 1 poster
The Artist
Ed French is a retired Disney artist, who has brought his enormous talent to depict extraordinary moments in American history, through the eyes of Zebulon Pike.
The Setting
Pike’s Journal – Saturday, January 17, 1807 “… and the woods appeared to be no great distance, I thought proper to march for it; in the middle of said prairie, crossed the creek (Grape Creek), which then bore east. Here we all got our feet wet. The night commenced extremely cold. When we halted at the woods 8 o’clock, for encampment; after getting fires made. We discovered the feet of nine of our men were frozen, and add to the misfortune, of both of those whom we called hunters among the number. This night you had no provision. Reaumer’s thermometer stood at 18 1-2 below 0 (12 below Fahrenheit).”
Pike and 17 of his men were now at the foot of Horn Peak in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, southwest of present-day Silver Cliff / Westcliffe, Colorado.
January 22nd: “We parted, but not without tears. We pursued our march, taking merely sufficient provisions for one meal in order to leave as much as possible for the two poor fellows.”
