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Show Emery County Progress Castle Dale, Utah Tuesday August 31 , 2004 1 B the Past A cene from Group Retraces the Trail of the Railroad that Never Was :! By KEN LARSON Emery County Progress publisher t f Its one thing to read about history but it's a lot more exciting to trace history from the back of a horse. On one of the hottest days this summer a group of people decided to ride the grade under Cedar Mountain and trace the old railroad line that was proposed back in the ISSOs. Organized by the Pressett family, Sandy Sow ell of New Smyrna Beach, Fla and Denise Humes of Sacramento, Cal. and their children, Joni Bay les of Fort Walton Beach, Fla , Jason Porter and his friend Samantha Sacco, the group w as pro ided horses and grading sen ices by Tate Weber and Brooks Bolding, with the Castle Valley Ranch from Moore Sandy, Denise and Jason read up on the history of the railroad grade and Tate, who has worked as an outfitter and guide for several years in Emery County, spent the day pointing out signs and landmarks and pro iding information The ride covered about 2b miles, basically trailing the foot of Cedar Mountain just north of Buckhorn Draw. Much has been vv ritten about the Rio Grande narrow gauge railroad and its trek across Eastern Emerv Countv It's I j - ' JaaLfcj, 5 0 The old kiln, from the top, is believed to never have been used. 1fNm 4 . , & i t rMftic 'fill 1 'rfS dots the landscape near the railroad grade. An old kiln .. K S , A. v r f xlpW Summit into the state capital but vv asn't connected to the Denv er line until 1SS3 in a desolate spot west of Green River. But in 1SS0 one of Palmer's associates. William Bell, organized the Sev ier Valley Railroad Company and planned to . s ;t - ! T- - Cp?85i;;- xj'SV'T- J. v A , .5 I - - fjs.1 - Photos by Ken Larson The group led by Tate Weber visit the historic railroad grade. the old railroad grade was a blessing for the county at this time as the farmUnion Pacific incursion into Rio ers that vv orked on the grade could take their teams of horses and ork on the Grande territory. The grading for the railroad comgrade doing dirt or rock work or haulmenced in 1SS1 on the line from Green ing water. A man with a good team of River, through Cottonwood Wash and horses could earn S3 a day, vv hile a man onto Buckhorn Flat It was almost 50 vv ithout a team earned $2 a day. As we followed the grade we ran miles long and was an investment of across an interesting old kiln, w hich 8214,470 lor the Buckhorn route. However, the track was never laid on this appeared nev er to hav e been used. Afgrade. The Denver and Rio Grande ter the kiln, the grade followed the management changed their mind and mountain line with fills and cuts, still in existence that follow the grade. Rock decided on an alternativ e route by connecting to Los Angeles after going culverts were built in many of the fills y through Price Cany on and on to Provo for drainage. Towards the instead of going through Salina and one point of the grade, along the hills and in the wash, the remnants of rock shelto Los Angeles. The Pressett girls said that they may ters are visible that were inhabited by hav e figured out t hat it vv as less expen-si- v the Chinese that came to work on the e to go around by Prov o and pick up railroad grade. One site has just a chimgoods for trade than a separate line up ney standingwhere a house had been. It is believ ed that the roofs of the shelto Salt Lake City Another reason may hav e been the need for vv ater, coal and ters vv ere fashioned out of timber but wood to operate the steam engine of hav e since disappeared leaving only the trains These products for fuel vv ere portions of the walls standing. Off to often scarce out on the Buckhorn Flat. the side is an old watering trough for The railroad grade vv as intended to go the livestock fashioned from a large from Green Riv er to Clev eland, vv here pine tree that had been hollow ed out. The horses trotted and walked along there vv as going to be a big roundhouse, and then one spur to Price and the other the grade, ov erlooking areas that had been dammed up or washes div erted to one south through Salina Canyon. In Salina Canyon there are two tunkeep the grade running as straight as nels that were built in preparation for possible. Wildlife was plentiful that hot the railroad They are still visible and in use on the frontage road that runs Wednesday as rattlesnakes sunned alone between Fremont Junction themselv es on the rocks, coy otes, anteand Salina According to the guides, lope and rabbits ran across the grade tivity on the west slope of Salina Pass hose primary purpose vv as to prev ent vv vv Riders enjoy a hot day on the San Rafael learning about its history. always a good thing to remember that build a narrow gauge line south from border. at that time Emery County also in- Ogden to the Utah-Arizo- cluded vv hat is now Carbon County. In the earlier accounts of the railroad construction many of the reference landmarks that are familiar to Carbon County vv ere in Emery County The tree-fogauge railroad was in in 1S70 and Colorado incorporated intended to come from Texas and New Mexico through the Rocky Mountains. About 10 y ears later William Jackson Palmer, president of the line considered extending it into Utah. In July of 1SS1 he organized the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad to extend the narrow gauge into Utah One of the considerations was running the railroad through central Utah through Salina Canyon and then on towards California Another consideration as to run it up Price Canvon and into Salt Lake ot vv City The line was built lrom Soldier H I Sitting back on a horse hearing how the decisions were made over 120 years ago added flavor to the history lesson They explained that a branch of this line would be built east over Salina Pass, across Castle Valley to the Green Riv er and on to Colorado. Basically survey crews from each railroad company were looking at Emery County and when they met. somew here on the trail, the Denv er and Rio Grande Railvv ay company dropped their survey equipment and picked up digging tools and began scraping together a makeshift grade. In the process of survey work, an engineering party camped on the south of Cedar Mountain June 7, 1SS1 and inscribed their names and dates in the nearby sandstone. Over 120y ears later these names vv ere still readable. Thus began a period of railroad ac- - mid-wa- An old hollowed out tree was used for a water trough, in front of the people on horses. A side trip to the head of one of the Buckhorn draws gave the group a view of the canyon from the Cedar Mountain side. The desert area in Eastern Emery county still lacks water and shelter, and riding on a horse some 120 years later, one gets a whole new perspective of work and labor that went into preparing the line or grade for a railroad, something that never occurred. ' V I' V V j ffe tit Only the walls remain of the old houses. |