The pioneers who crossed the Appalachian Mountains depended on trees and forests for food and shelter.
Imagine starting over in a place with almost no trees. Plus, there were blizzards in the winter and swarms of grasshoppers in the summer. For some pioneers, the hardest part of life was getting to their new home. But for the settlers of the Great Plains, known as sodbusters, getting there was easy compared to what came next.
