USA > California > Glenn County > History of Colusa and Glenn counties, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the counties who have been identified with their growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 10
USA > California > Colusa County > History of Colusa and Glenn counties, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the counties who have been identified with their growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 10
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It was in 1876 that this county saw its first iron horse. The Northern Railway, now the Southern Pacific, was building a line from Davis up the west side of the valley; and on May 15 of that year the rails were laid across the southern boundary line and the first locomotive entered the county. Ten days later the road reached Arbuckle, and that town held a celebration in honor of the event; and on June 23, 1876, Williams held a celebration in honor of the completion of the road to that town. Williams was the terminus of the road till 1878, when it was continued to Willows.
The people of Colusa at once began to plan for a connection between their town and the new road. They had been offered the main line itself, on condition that they grant some concessions as a reimbursement to the railroad for building its line across the Trough; but some of the most influential of the town's people felt sure that the road would come through Colusa anyway, and so they refused to grant the concessions-and the road kept on its way up the almost uninhabited plains west of the Trough, leaving Colusa isolated, and up against the problem of getting a rail con- nection with the new line. In 1876 a bill passed the Assembly authorizing Colusa to issue bonds for a railroad to connect the town with the Northern Railway; but nothing of practical value was done for ten years. In June, 1885, subscription papers were circulated in Colusa to raise money to build the connecting road. The business men of the town subscribed so liberally that the road was assured, and the subscribers met and elected E. A. Harring-
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ton, W. P. Harrington, E. W. Jones, J. B. Cooke, and W. D. Dean directors, and B. H. Burton treasurer. They also tendered a vote of thanks to E. A. Harrington for his work in promoting the road. There were one hundred fifty stockholders, with subscriptions aggregating $41,200; and on July 17, 1885, articles of incorpora- tion of the Colusa Railroad Company were filed.
Work was started on the road at once. At first it was in- tended to connect with the Northern Railway at Williams; but the citizens of that town did not "come through" with the finan- cial assistance the promoters of the road expected, and they deter- mined to take it to a point due west of Colusa, where J. W. Potts had donated a tract of forty acres of land for a town site. The location of the road was partially determined by the fact that, a few years before, the town had built directly west a grade for a wagon road, which it donated to the new railroad, thus obviating the necessity of much grading.
On April 30, 1886, the first passenger train was run between Colusa and Colusa Junction; and Colusa County had her second railroad. The event was marked by a free excursion and a big celebration. On June 8, 1886, the name of the company was changed from Colusa Railroad Company to Colusa & Lake Railroad Com- pany, and steps were taken to continue the road to Sites, which was accomplished on September 29 of that year.
The road was a narrow-gauge, and on November 30, 1885, a barge arrived in Colusa carrying the first locomotive for the service, and the first locomotive ever seen in Colusa. George Ogden, a native of the county, was the first engineer employed by the company. The first superintendent was E. A. Harring- ton, who served till his death and was succeeded, on December 1, 1903, by M. E. Burrows. Mr. Burrows served as superin- tendent till May 21, 1915, the day the road made its last freight l'un, passenger service having been discontinued on Angust 5, 1914. It had been operated for over twenty-nine years, and in all that time had missed only one run, and had never killed or seriously injured a passenger. The coming of the Northern Electric and the eneroachiments of the automobile finally took away so much of its traffic that it had to quit. It served its purpose well, but was never a paying enterprise financially; for the company never paid a dividend, although the fare was eighty cents between Colusa and the Junction, a distance of less than ten miles.
The end of the nineteenth century witnessed a great develop- ment in interurban electric roads in California. Among the roads promoted about this time was the Northern Electric, connecting Sacramento, Marysville and Chico. In 1906 agents for the North-
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1
ern Electric came quietly into Colusa and bought a block or two of land for terminal purposes; and as soon as this became known, there were many rumors of an immediate construction of the road. On December 3 of that year the main line was finished, and trains were started on a regular schedule from Chico and Oroville to Marysville; and it was announced that eighty per cent. of the road from Marysville to Sacramento was finished. On that same day, December 3, officials of the company appeared before the town trustees of Colusa and asked for a franchise for the road for the full length of Market Street. Three days later the franchise was granted, and there was a great deal of quiet excitement and elation in the town. manifested chiefly in a perceptible quickening of real estate values.
The excitement was certainly pardonable, for the Northern Electric wasn't the only road that had been flirting with the town that year. An electric road called the "Shasta Southern" had been promoted earlier in the year, and on March 19 had dug up Main Street, between Fifth and Sixth, and laid a couple of rails to hold a franchise. It had also laid some rails in Princeton for a similar purpose. The Shasta Southern was to connect Hamilton City with Colusa, Grimes, Woodland and the Bay; and the Pacific Sugar Construction Company had guaranteed that it would be built at once as far as Colnsa, provided that fifteen hundred acres of sugar beets were pledged between Colusa and Princeton. Its chief purpose was to supply the sugar factory at Hamilton City with beets. In December of 1906 it established offices in Colusa, and had a force of fourteen men running lines between Colusa and Princeton. With two electric lines knocking at the door, Colusa's excitement was only natural, especially as Southern Pacific representatives were looking over the ground with a view to running a road from the main line, in the vicinity of Arbuckle or Harrington, through Colusa and on up to Hamilton. On the last day of 1906, Northern Electric surveyors started running lines in town for their road; and four days later the Shasta Southern engineers reached the borders of the town with their line. Colusa considered itself a very busy railroad center just then; but not long after that rumors began to fly that, owing to inability to get rails and ties, the Shasta Southern would be delayed for a year- and that was the last of the Shasta Southern.
On January 7, 1907, the Northern Electric applied to the trustees of Colusa for an exclusive franchise along the river front, and thus precipitated a discussion that crowded out all other topics for a time. The trustees didn't want to make the franchise exclu- sive, to the detriment of any other road that might come along; but the Northern Electric insisted that it be exclusive, and many of the 5
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citizens feared that the road wouldn't come at all if its request were not granted. The following verses are part of a poem that was written by Mrs. R. M. Liening and published as part of the disenssion :
"O Town Trustees! O City Dads! This whole round world is full of fads, And old Colus' hain't had her share; Therefore we hope you'll do and dare,
"And give us these electric roads, To run on down by Jimmy Goad's, And way on out to everywhere. O Town Trustees, do make a dare!
"Oh! do run down our streets them keers, If every horse in town it skeers; If one is now and then killed off, You know there still will be enough.
"Oh, how we'll love to see 'em go! We've been so used to travelin' slow, The people will come flockin' roun' To see them keers come into town.
"I s'pose no woman'll wash a dish, Or care much whether meat or fish Gets fried a bit too much that day, For every man will be away.
"The 'lectric will bring some things in That we have hankered for like sin; And some things that we do not like Will get a move on them and hike
"To other fields and pastures new. We're sure we do not care. Do you? I tell you it will just be grand When City Dads take such a stand.
" Oh, don't you hear that big bell ring? Oh, don't you hear them children sing? Oh, don't you hear the big brass band ? Oh, can't you see the big glad hand ?
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" "Tis stretched to you from East and West. Of all the lands, we love this best, Where we have lived for many a year, Where we have many a friend, and dear,
"And where we know we sure will die. O Town Trustees, again we ery, Do let old Colus' have her share. O City Dads, do make a dare!"
The town trustees finally granted the water front franchise, but did not make it exclusive; and during the subsequent delay in the coming of the road they were subjected to much unfair and unjust criticism for not acceding to the wishes of the railroad people.
The first franchise granted the Northern Electric provided that work must be begun within ninety days. When the ninety days were up, no work had been done, and the railroad people appeared and asked for an extension of one hundred eighty days, which was granted. When this time had expired, they asked for ninety days more; and finally it was announced that there would be no road to Colusa in 1907, because the bridge couldn't be finished. Interest in the road then died out, and was not renewed till 1911, when the railroad people offered to spend $1,250,000 to bring the road from Marysville to Colnsa if the people on the west side of the river would buy bonds to the amount of $200,000. In August of that year, J. F. Campbell and Robert D. Hunter were sent out to place the bonds with the people of Colusa County; and although the response was anything but hearty, such progress was made that articles of incorporation of the Marysville-Colusa Branch of the Northern Electric Railway were filed on November 14, 1911. Just a week later, representatives of the company bought from J. W. Goad fifty acres of land adjoining Colusa on the east, thus giving the road easy access to the town with its right of way.
From that time on, progress on the new road was rapid. On January 3, 1912, the officials of the road and the county super- visors took up the matter of building a joint bridge across the river at Meridian, the expense to be borne in equal shares by the railroad company, Colusa County, and Sutter County. The details of the bridge were settled on January 11, and the contract was signed on February 4, by which the railroad company was to build the bridge for $240,000. The railroad tracks were to be in the middle of the bridge, and a wagon road on each side. The contract for the grading from Marysville to Colusa was let to Maney Brothers on
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March 13, 1912, and they at once sublet the different portions of it, Harlan Brothers, of Williams, getting the contract for that part of the road lying in Colusa County. The work of laying the tracks on the streets of Colusa began on December 9, 1912, and at once there arose an animated discussion among the people of the town as to whether the poles for the trolley wires should be in the middle of the street or along the eurb. The original franchise had provided that they be in the middle of the street, but public senti- ment had so changed that when they were finally set they were placed along the curb.
Work on the track and on the Meridian bridge proceeded rapidly; and on April 1, 1913, at 5:30 o'clock in the evening, the first car crossed the bridge into Colusa County. On May 14 the first train, a work train, came into Colusa, and just a week later the first carload of freight went out. It consisted of three trans- formers from the Pacific Gas & Electric Company's substation. On May 30 Colusa received its first carload of incoming freight, a carload of ice for the Union Ice Company. A two-day carnival celebration was held on June 13 and 14, 1913, to celebrate the advent of the road; and the first passenger train into Colusa was. an excursion train to the carnival. It arrived on Friday, June 13, 1913, a fortuitous combination that may or may not be respon- sible for the fact that the road was, not long after, forced to sus- pend operations into Colusa for many months. Regular passenger service began on Monday, June 16, 1913, and consisted of nine trains each way daily. Colusa County then had her third railroad, and to the people it served it was extremely satisfactory. This satisfaction lasted, however, only a little over a year and a half; for on February 3, 1915, the worst floods in the history of the valley washed away a concrete pier and the west approach to the Meridian bridge, together with a mile of roadbed and track be- tween Colusa and Meridian, the result being that traffic to Colusa over the Northern Electric was completely suspended till October 15, 1915. On that date it was resumed, however, and has been uninterrupted ever since. This break in the service of the North- ern Electric was the most inconvenient interruption of traffic that Colusa had suffered since 1894, when a strike on the Southern Pacific had shut the county off from mail for two weeks.
The Northern Electric did not have the undivided attention of the public, by any means, during the time that it was building into Colusa County. At least two other roads, besides the Shasta Southern, were headed this way at that time. One was the Colusa & Hamilton, or "Beet Line," as it was called, and the other was the Sacramento Valley West Side Electric. They were both pro-
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moted in 1911, stimulated, no doubt, by the activities of the North- ern Electric. A prerequisite for the beet road was a pledge that at least three thousand acres of sugar beets would be raised along its line in Colusa County; and on January 31, 1911, repre- sentatives of the Sacramento Valley Sugar Company met with some of the leading Colusa County landowners and business men, to take steps to have the farmers pledge this acreage. The South- ern Pacific officials had said that they would build from Hamilton to Colusa as soon as this acreage was pledged, and would probably build later to a point on the main line in the vicinity of Arbuckle. The result of the above-mentioned meeting was that in June the announcement was made that the road would be built as far as Colusa ; surveys for the line were begun in August ; and in October the announcement was made that the road would be continued through Colusa, Grimes, and College City, striking the main line at Harrington, and that it would be 60.5 miles long. With the beginning of 1912, work on the road was being actively pushed, five grading camps being established and in operation between Colusa and Princeton in February. But after grading and track- laying were finished, the road lay for many months unballasted, the reason given being that Orland gravel was to be used, and it could not be obtained conveniently till the Glenn condemnation suit was settled and the road was pushed through to its northern terminus. The first, and to date the last, passenger train came over the road to Colusa on August 10, 1913. It was a baseball excursion from Woodland, and had to run very slowly because the road had not been ballasted and was very rough. A regular freight service as far north as Princeton was put on September 1, 1914. The flood of February, 1915, washed out a great deal of the grade between College City and Grimes, between Grimes and Colusa, and between Colusa and Princeton, and for many months the road lay unused. In the summer of 1916, however, a twice-a-week freight service was resumed between Harrington and Princeton, and this summer (1917) it was increased to a daily service ; but as yet no passenger service has been established, although there are occasional rumors that there will soon be a regular passenger schedule on Colnsa County's fourth railroad.
The freight service was really put on before the road was ready for it, the idea being to give the farmers along the route a chance to market their grain. The rates fixed on grain to Port Costa were: From Grimes, $2.00 per ton; points from Grimes to and including Colusa, $2.25 per ton ; points to and including Prince- ton, $2.50 per ton; points north of Princeton, $2.75 per ton.
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The West Side Electric, whose lines have yet to be built into the county, had its beginnings, so far as Colusa County is con- cerned, in a meeting held at Willows on March 27, 1911, at which Charles L. Donohoe explained that for $1,000,000 an electric road could be built down the west side of the valley from Redding to Woodland, and that each of the counties interested should raise $5,000 by voluntary subscription for preliminary work upon the road. J. F. Campbell J. H. Balsdon, J. W. Forgeus, and J. M. Stovall were appointed at the meeting as a committee to raise the preliminary expense fund; and they were given power to add to the committee a member from Arbuckle. The $5,000 was raised and the surveys were made, and about eleven miles of the road were actually built between Dixon and a point on the Oak- land, Antioch & Eastern; but the road got into financial difficul- ties and never reached Colusa County. It was to have crossed the county from north to south, keeping west of Arbuckle, Williams and Maxwell.
The West Side Electric wasn't the only road that almost reached the county. All of his life that king of boosters, W. S. Green, had been advocating a railroad connecting Colusa and Chico; and on March 17, 1875, he and Col. L. F. Moulton began the survey for such a road. After running the lines, they were more enthusiastic than ever; but capital was shy, and the scheme had to be abandoned for the time being. In 1900, however, when the electric power line was being built across the country into Colusa, these men tried to interest the power company in an electric road, but to no avail; and so the road was never built. So much for the railroads of the county.
Highways
We now come to the highways as a means of transportation. The highway system of Colusa County had its beginning in 1851, when Will S. Green dragged a brush across the plains to mark out a road over which to haul lumber from Dogtown, now Magalia, to Colusa. That road, of course, never became a permanent one, nor did any of the early roads on the plains; for when the county was laid off into townships and sections, the roads were made to follow the section lines, as a usual thing, a practice that is responsible for many miles of extra travel. Of the early roads there is little to say. They were of dirt, very dusty in the summer and absolutely bottomless in the winter. On many of them no attempt was made to travel during the worst part of the season; yet it must be said that the people as a whole made no great
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efforts to improve them, despite the constant agitation of the matter by Mr. Green and others. Then came the era of gravel roads, an era that is not yet passed, although the dawn of the concrete era seems to be at hand.
Away back in the early days the practice of hauling gravel upon the roads began; and although they were of a more or less temporary character, it was not a bad practice. In 1868 a bond issue of $50,000 was voted for roads and bridges, the roads made being all of gravel. There have been, and are, in Colusa County, some very fine roads made of gravel; but the quality of the roads could have been very materially improved if care had been taken to use only coarse, screened gravel. The chief trouble with the gravel roads of this county, however, was that most of the gravel was sand, and the surface did not hold up during the wet season. As a result, the roads were sometimes fearful to contemplate. No historian will ever be able to tell the trouble, labor, isolation, expense and general dreariness that have been caused by bad roads in this county, although this county is no worse in that regard than the average.
About fifteen years ago the oiled-roads fad was on, and Colusa tried the then popular method of road-building, notably on the road leading from Colusa to Princeton. But time proved that oiled roads would not stand the heat of summer in this climate, and neither would they hold up through wet weather; so the road between Colusa and Princeton has since been graveled. About ten years ago some rather expensive machinery was bought, and a half mile of experimental macadamized road was built west of Williams; but it was so expensive that the machinery was laid away, and no more road was built.
It was in 1910 that modern road-building got its first boost, and it is chiefly of that period that this chapter is to tell. In 1910, and the years following, a great awakening or regeneration swept over California, a wave of moral and political reform that reached clear down to road-building. I do not want to deprive the automobile of its just share in bringing about better roads. It was undoubtedly an important factor; but the most important, it seems to me, was the spirit of improvement that swept over the people and resulted in the issue of $18,000,000 worth of bonds for concrete highways throughout the state. Colusa County people can't take any great amount of credit for the bond issue, because on February 8, 1910, they voted on an issue by the county of $600,000 worth of bonds for good roads, and it was defeated by a heavy majority. Nevertheless, when the state made first-class roads available, the people of this county took steps at once to
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get their share, even though it cost thousands of dollars. As soon as it was announced that one line of the state highway was to go up the Sacramento Valley, the people of Princeton, headed by W. A. Yerxa, inangnrated a movement to have it go up the river and through Princeton; and on February 2, 1912, they met with members of the Colnsa County Chamber of Commerce to further their plans. The state authorities decided, however, to have the highway go up along the Southern Pacific main line; and Princeton is yet without a highway, although in high hopes of one soon.
The state fixed the interest on the highway bonds at four per cent .; but when the time came to market the bonds, it was found that investors would not take them at less than five per cent. The state therefore issued notice that the counties which wanted highway would have to make up the difference between fonr and five per cent. on the amount of money that was to be spent in the county. On Jannary 19, 1914, the citizens of Colusa County held a mass meeting at Williams to consider the matter of making up this difference of one per cent. on the bonds that were to be used in building that part of the state highway which ran through this county. On March 7 another meeting was held in Colnsa, where several other bonding propositions were dis- cussed, and the result was that on March 17, 1914, the voters of the county carried a bond issue of $452,000, to be used for the following purposes: For a new Hall of Records, $60,000; for interest on the highway bonds, rights of way for the highway, and bridges and enlverts, $290,000; for Colnsa County's half of the cost of the Princeton river bridge, $57,000; for Colusa County's half of the Grimes river bridge, $45,000. That was a great day for the good-roads movement in Colusa County. The state high- way officials promptly got the work under way, and before the year was ont the county had several miles of concrete highway. The most important piece of highway to be built in the county, in the estimation of many people, was the lateral from Williams to Colusa; and as the preparations for this seemed to be lagging, a meeting was held in Colnsa on July 15, and Dr. F. Z. Pirkey, L. L. Hicok, J. C. Mogk, J. H. Balsdon, and M. J. Boggs were appointed a committee to see the highway commission at Sacra- mento and, if possible, have the lateral built at once. A week later a delegation of ahont fifty citizens of the county went to Sacra- mento to urge that the Colnsa-Williams lateral be built withont delay. The highway commission promised to do all it could in the matter; but it was 1915 before the work on the lateral was started, and 1916 before it was finished. In the meantime the
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main line had been completed through the county from north to south; so that, early in 1916, Colusa, Arbuckle, Williams and Maxwell were all connected by concrete highway-the beginning, it is earnestly hoped, of a system that will unite all sections of the county. Plans for an extension of the system, to connect Princeton, Grimes, and all the towns of the county, are even now under way.
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