In the late 1700s and early 1800s, as a great wave of settlers moved west, most people took the Wilderness Road in winter so they could be ready to plant crops on the new frontier in spring. Travelers faced severe hardship on a route called the worst on the continent even in the best weather, with hundreds crossing while men, women, and children, almost naked, went barefoot and bare-legged along the road or labored up rocky hills, and even those best off had only one horse for two or three children to ride at once. In 1775, William Calk recorded coming to a terrible mountain that nearly tried the party to death, lodging under a great mountain, roasting a fat turkey for supper and eating it without bread, then starting early to cross more very bad mountains as snow fell hard in bitter cold; while staying in the rough mountains, they hunted, killed game, and after Eanock Abram and he got lost during a snowstorm, he used a pocket compass and fired guns until the others heard and came in by the report.