Since the time of Columbus, explorers dreamed of a water passage across the North American continent. President Thomas Jefferson shared this dream. He conceived the Corps of Discovery to travel up the Missouri River to the Rocky Mountains and westward along possible river routes to the Pacific Ocean. Meriwether Lewis and William Clark led this expedition of 1804–6. Along the way they filled hundreds of notebook pages with observations of the geography, Indian tribes, and natural history of the trans-Mississippi West.

This complete set of the celebrated Nebraska edition incorporates the journals along with a wide range of new scholarship dealing with all aspects of the expedition, including geography, Indian languages, plants, and animals, in order to recreate the expedition within its historical context.

Gary E. Moulton is Thomas C. Sorensen Professor of American History at the University of Nebraska and recipient of the J. Franklin Jameson Award of the American Historical Association for the editing of these journals.

"The University of Nebraska Press has become the pre-eminent publisher of Lewis and Clark titles, including what is now considered the definitive edition of the journals edited by Nebraska history professor Gary Moulton."—John Marshall, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

"Moulton not only edited the transcriptions of the journal entries; he also provided a detailed index and oversaw a team of consultants who provided expert annotations on botany, zoology, astronomy, archaeology, linguists and medicine. As a result, readers can understand the expedition in its full context. It's no wonder that the series has received many plaudits."—Omaha World Herald

"[This edition] stands as one of the great accomplishments of American scholarship and scholarly publishing alike. The work of historian Gary Moulton and a team of some three dozen specialists working through the University of Nebraska's Center for Great Plains Studies with the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities, the 13-volume Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition was published by the University of Nebraska Press from 1983 to 2001."—Gregory McNamee, Washington Post Book World

"In all ways this is a class act!"—Western Historical Quarterly

"The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition [are] now at last available in a superbly edited, easily read edition. . . . For almost two hundred years [Lewis and Clark's] strong words waited, there but not there, printed but not read: our silent epic. But words can wait: now the captains' writings have at last spilled out, and fully, in this regal edition."—Larry McMurtry, New York Review of Books

"The complete set of journals, fully indexed and annotated by historian Moulton, represents the definitive account of this unprecedented journey of discovery in America's West."—Natural History

"Each volume of Moulton's edition renews the Journals' status as the American epic text."—Virginia Quarterly Review

"The ultimate source—the only books with detailed notes about the Northland—is The Definitive Journals of Lewis and Clark, a 13-volume edition published by the University of Nebraska Press. Editor Gary E. Moulton's landmark work includes all known writing on the journey and wonderfully informative footnotes."—Bill Graham, Kansas City Star

“There are several condensed versions of the journals, but the most complete and authoritative account has been compiled by Gary Moulton. The University of Nebraska historian spent more than 20 years compiling and editing every journal, map and field note that survived the two-year journey.”—The Statesman Journal

“The expedition’s army men and civilians were a diverse group, as can be seen in the deeply researched biographies in multi-volume ‘The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition’”—Yankton Daily Press & Dakotan