One hundred and seventy-four years ago, the first rescue crew arrived at Donner Lake, encountering a scene of carnage that still shocks all this time later.
Eighty-seven men, women and children entered the Sierra Nevada Mountains in October 1846. Known as the Donner Party, led by George Donner and James F. Reed, they were victims of bad luck and bad leadership.
Their biggest mistake was taking a new "shortcut" called the Hastings Cutoff, which led them through Utah and across the Great Salt Lake. Crossing the blistering Great Salt Lake took its toll on the cattle and the people; the party was three weeks behind schedule and low on supplies as they approached the Sierra Nevada Mountains. (A fascinating historical aside here: Lansford Hastings, the man who invented and promoted the shortcut without even trying it first, later died while trying to colonize Brazil with Confederate sympathizers.)
