Doing some research by googling some family names to see what was already out there on the Internet and came across a portion of the LDS Church website devoted to the Mormon pioneer travels. See this website where you can look up names of ancestors that crossed the plains and the company that they traveled with. You can read about their travels from the excerpts of various deseret news articles and travel journals.
http://history.lds.org/overlandtravels/home
On the Ruesch side we have quite a few pioneer stories, I think the most famous one is Annie Hicks Free. Grandma Marilyn wrote a book with beautiful art work about her journey to the Salt Lake Valley with the Martin Handcart Company (I'll have to do another blog post on that at a later date).
After reading a few of these travel journals from some of the Companies, what impressed me was that so many different companies came (passing each other and traveling within miles of each other at times) and their experiences so vastly different. Where one company could have a relatively "easy" journey, and another could have a very rough journey fraught with danger and death.
Here are a few of the companies that I've verified that our ancestors were part of:
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Company: Brigham Young Company
Departure: 5 June 1848
Arrival: 20-24 September 1848
Related Pioneers: Absalom Pennington Free
Direct Line: Bryonny Van Camp-->Paula Schneider-->Marilyn Ruesch-->Lenore McFarlane-->Gertrude Tan Rock-->Louesa Free-->Absalom Pennington Free
LINK: http://history.lds.org/overlandtravels/companyDetail?lang=eng&companyId=192
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Company: Edward Martin Company
Departure: 28 July 1856
Arrival: 30 November 1856
Related Pioneers: Annie Hicks
Direct Line: Bryonny Van Camp-->Paula Schneider-->Marilyn Ruesch-->Lenore McFarlane-->Gertrude Tan Rock-->Louesa Free-->Annie Hicks
LINK: http://history.lds.org/overlandtravels/companyDetail?lang=eng&companyId=192
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Company: James D. Ross Company
Departure: 14-17 June 1860
Arrival: 3 September 1860
Related Pioneers: Valentine & Harriet Rock, Also Jacob Nephi Rock traveling as a child
Direct Line: Bryonny Van Camp-->Paula Schneider-->Marilyn Ruesch-->Lenore McFarlane-->Gertrude Tan Rock-->Jacob Nephi Rock--> Valentine and Harriet Rock
Also note that some of Harriet's family (the Smiths) traveled with Valentine and Harriet Rock
LINK: http://history.lds.org/overlandtravels/companyDetail?lang=eng&companyId=256
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Company: Issac A Canfield Company
Departure: 30 July 1862
Arrival: 16-17 October 1862
Related Pioneers: Peter and Mary Clark McFarlane, Also James McFarlane as a teenager
Direct Line: Bryonny Van Camp-->Paula Schneider-->Marilyn Ruesch-->Lenore McFarlane-->Arthur McFarlane-->James McFarlane--> Peter and Mary Clark McFarlane
LINK: http://history.lds.org/overlandtravels/companyDetail?companyId=83
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Company: John D. Holladay
Departure: 16-18 July 1866
Arrival: 25 September 1866
Related Pioneers: Martha Ann Smuin (18yrs old)
Direct Line: Bryonny Van Camp-->Paula Schneider-->Marilyn Ruesch-->Lenore McFarlane-->Arthur McFarlane-->Martha Ann Smuin
LINK: http://history.lds.org/overlandtravels/companyPioneers?lang=eng&companyId=21
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