Conestoga wagon

American  

[kon-uh-stoh-guh, kon-] / ˈkɒn əˈstoʊ gə, ˌkɒn- /

noun

1. a large, heavy, broad-wheeled covered wagon, used especially for transporting pioneers and freight across North America during the early westward migration.

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Conestoga wagon British  

/ ˌkɒnɪˈstəʊɡə /

noun

1. a large heavy horse-drawn covered wagon used in the 19th century

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Etymology

Origin of Conestoga wagon

First recorded in 1690–1700; named after Conestoga, Pa., where it was first made

Compare meaning

How does conestoga-wagon compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• prairie schooner vs. Conestoga wagon

Example Sentences

The inauguration involves thousands of people, marching bands, horses, bomb-sniffing dogs and a Conestoga wagon, among other things.

From Washington Post • Jan. 18, 2017

Her father was a sign painter; her maternal grandparents had come west to Utah in a Conestoga wagon after the Civil War.

From New York Times • Jun. 6, 2013

Certainly, there is nothing intimate about this Menagerie, in which the supposedly fragile Wingfield family seems robust enough to set out for the frontier in a Conestoga wagon.

From Time Magazine Archive

In a Conestoga wagon, young Andrew Benton crosses the wild Alleghenies, gets into practically everything out there from the 1760s on, up to and including the last Indian war dance at Chicago in 1835.

From Time Magazine Archive

We might as well have been traveling in a Conestoga wagon.

From "The Glass Castle" by Jeannette Walls