Smith, Jedediah Strong (1799-1831), was an American trader and explorer. He traveled widely and provided many other pioneers with valuable information about the American West.
Smith was born on Jan. 6, 1799, in Bainbridge, New York. As a young man, he went to Missouri and entered the fur trade. He set out in 1826 to find trade routes to California and the Northwest. From the Great Salt Lake, he crossed the territories of the Native American Ute and Paiute people, the Mojave Desert, and the High Sierra, until he reached southern California. He then started north to find a pass across the Sierra Nevada. While returning to California the next year, Native Americans killed 10 members of his party. In 1828, he led an expedition to Fort Vancouver (now Vancouver, Washington), but a Native American attack along the way wiped out most of his party. On May 27, 1831, Smith himself was killed by Native Americans on the Santa Fe Trail.
