APR 27 1993; Just 100 years ago this month traffic on the gold rush trail of 1849 to the booming wes

APR 27 1993; Just 100 years ago this month traffic on the gold rush trail of 1849 to the booming west coast reached its peak. Streams of covered wagons crawled across the prairies and wound through mountain passes as a nation pushed its frontier westward. The trial those pioneering fortune seekers of '49 took across Wyoming still is plainly marked in places. In the photos above, taken near Guernsey, Wyo., deep ruts are worn in the sandstone at several places. Here the hills approached the North Platte river closely and the wagons stretched out single file, wearing an axle-deep rut which has lasted for a full century. Similar ruts 100 years ago in the rush to California and Oregon, have been found also near Kemmerer in; western Wyoming.; (Photo By The Denver Post via Getty Images)