Yellowstone expedition
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This article is about the 1819 Yellowstone expedition. For the 1871 expedition, see Hayden Geological Survey of 1871. For the 1873 US Army expedition, see Yellowstone Expedition of 1873. For the expedition of Lewis and Clark, see Lewis and Clark Expedition.
The Yellowstone expedition was an expedition to the American frontier in 1819 and 1820 authorized by United States Secretary of War John C. Calhoun, with the goal of establishing a military fort or outpost at the mouth of the Yellowstone River in present-day North Dakota. Sometimes called the Atkinson–Long Expedition after its two principal leaders, Colonel Henry Atkinson and Major Stephen Harriman Long, it led to the creation of Fort Atkinson in present-day Nebraska, the first United States Army post established west of the Missouri River, but was otherwise a costly failure, stalling near Council Bluffs, Iowa.