prairie schooner

A covered wagon, drawn by horses or oxen, that was used by pioneers in crossing the North American prairies and plains.

Prairie Schooner, a wagon used for long-distance travel and freight transport in the nineteenth century. The wagon was made with six or seven arching wooden bows supporting a canvas cover. Seen from a distance, the vehicle so resembled a ship at sea as to suggest the name. Mormons, California gold-seekers, emigrants to Oregon, freighters operating on the Great Plains, and settlers seeking homesteads all used the schooner after it was brought into common use in the Santa Fe trade soon after 1821. It was not only the chief means for the transportation of goods, but it also provided a home for pioneer families as they journeyed west in search of land.

Bibliography

Dunbar, Seymour. History of Travel in America. Indianapolis, Ind.: Bobbs-Merrill, 1915.

Winther, Oscar Osborn. The Transportation Frontier: Trans-Mississippi West, 1865–1890. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: a large wagon with broad wheels and an arched canvas top; used by the United States pioneers to cross the prairies in the 19th century
  Synonyms: covered wagon, Conestoga wagon, Conestoga, prairie wagon