They honored the Clarks and the Fremonts, as the men who won the west,
With never a thought for the settler, who gave all of his humble best;

Man who met the test of the prairies, they finished their work and died;
Unsigned and soon forgotten, when they passed over the great divide.

There may have done little of romance, In the furrows they turned in the sod;
But they built the state everlasting, with their hardships, privations and toil.

When they lifted their heads from the furrow, they saw cities over topping the plain,
As merchant, mechanic and artesian, kept pace with the vanguard of grain.

The west was not won by the soldier, or the picturesque voyager brigade;
It was won by the grit of the settler and the unyeilding fight that he made;

Against odds that were often heartbreaking, in the battle with the virgin soil;
And we of the soft generation, are reaping the fruits of his toil.

Author Unknown