Franklin Graves lay dying. On Christmas Day, 1846, he called his 19-year-old daughter, Mary, to his side. “You have to do whatever you can to stay alive,” he told her. “Think of your mother and brothers and sisters …. If you don’t make it to Sutter’s Fort, and send help, everyone at the lake will die…. Use my flesh to stay alive.” Mary and the rest of the Donner Party did what they had to do. Ultimately, 48 of the 87 original members of the most ill-fated emigrant group in Am


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