Old Sacramento Attractions: The Pony Express Statue

Long before Facebook, sms, mobile phones, and 3G networks, the cutting edge communication technology was the Pony Express.  What was it?  People on fast horses running a relay as fast as possible.

The pony express was a wild west mail service that started operating in Old Sacramento in 1860. Messages were carried by riders on horseback through the high sierra and across Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, and Nebraska in a relay system with intervals (and fresh horses) about every 10 miles.

The Pony Express Statue
The Old Sacramento Scavenger hunt starts at the Pony Express Statue, located on Second Street. This statue was created by Thomas Holland and modeled after his own pony “Sundance”, his eleven year old nephew Tobin Holland, and a paragraph from Mark Twain’s Roughing It.

The Pony Express Route
The Pony Express route was about 1900 miles long.  The first trip left San Francisco in 1860 and of the 
original batch, only three letters are known to exist. 

The Pony Express Office
While you are walking up Second Street, be sure to pay a visit to the Old Sacramento Visitors Center.
The Visitors Center is located in the original Pony Express Office.


Learn More
-The National Postal Museum
-California State Parks Information about the Pony Express Statue