You can now discover and explore more of your pioneer heritage on the newly redesigned Mormon Pioneer Overland Travel website. The redesigned website also includes information about previously unknown pioneers. In addition to discovering your pioneer ancestors, you can read your ancestors’ personal journals, see photos, and learn details about major events in your ancestors’ lives.

Since the site was first launched, an influx of pioneer documentation has allowed historians to reconcile and expand their understanding of the trek west. The site now includes information about more than 57,000 individuals in 370 pioneer companies, with thousands of original trail excerpts that are authoritatively documented.

You can also submit family photographs of pioneers and to link to digital copies of sources on the Internet. There are also new articles, including humorous stories from the trail.

If you access the site through FamilySearch.org/pioneers, then your personal FamilySearch family tree will be polled for matches in the updated pioneer database. For example, I learned that when he was 24, my great-great-grandfather, Franklin Neff, came across the plains with the Brigham Young Company in 1848.

You can also just go to history.lds.org/overlandtravels (without logging in) and explore known pioneers and companies and lots of other interesting information about this exciting period of Mormon and Western history.

Millions of people continue to be inspired by the courage, faith, and triumphs of the Mormon pioneers. Many of us are unknowingly modern pioneers, whose courage, achievements, and faith will be equally inspiring to future posterity and generations.

This updated site is featured in the international #IAmAPioneer social media campaign that encourages you to see yourself as a modern-day pioneer and recognize the need to record your stories online for future generations. Learn more about this initiative at FamilySearch.org/iamapioneer.

• You can read stories of pioneers worldwide by visiting the Church History Department’s website, history.lds.org/section/pioneers.
• Also read “5 Things We Learn from Database of Mormon Pioneers.”