USA > California > Placer County > History of Placer county, California > Part 64
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On the 9th of October, 1861, the Board of Direc- tors of the Central Pacific Railroad Company passed 1
the following resolution :-
Resolved, That Mr. T. D. Judah, the Chief' Engin- eer of this company, proceed to Washington, on the steamer of the 11th of October, instant, as the acered- ited agent of the Central Pacific Railroad Company of California, for the purpose of' procuring appropri- ations of land and United States bonds from Gov- ernment. to aid in the construction of this road.
RAILROAD BILL PASSED CONGRESS.
The mission was successfully accomplished, greatly through the aid of Gen. James A. MeDougal, Sen- ator from California, and the bill passed Congress and was approved in July, 1862. This bill granted a free right of way to the roads, of 100 feet over all Government lands on their route. The land on either side of the route was to be withdrawn from settlement, by pre-emption or otherwise, for a dis- tance of fifteen miles, until the final location of the road should be made and the United States surveys had determined the location of the section lines. This bill also provided for issuing to the company, as a loan, United States thirty-year six per cent. bonds, as each twenty-mile section of the road was com pleted, at the rate of $16,000 per mile for the line west of the western base of the Sierra Nevada- which was fixed by President Lincoln at seven miles from Sacramento-and at the rate of $48,000 per mile from the western to the eastern base. To secure the Government from loss and to insure the payment of the bonds. they were made a first lien on the road. This was subsequently modified by an Act passed July, 1864, allowing the company to issue first mort- gage bonds to the same amount as the Government bonds, the United States taking the position of ser- ond mortgagee. The land grant in the first bill was every alternate section for ten miles on each side of the track, but this was afterwards doubled, making it twenty sections per mile.
The company was now fully organized, grants made, and it given the possession of the route. Mr. Huntington visited New York. with the power of attorney of the company, in the endeavor to nego-
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tiate money on the company's bonds, but without sueeess, as the ability to prove them valuable by the construction of any part of the road was not yet shown. Subscriptions to the stock were sought in California, and a few gentlemen subscribed, among whom were Mr. Samuel Brannan, of San Francisco, Mr. Charles Holbrook, of Sacramento, and Mr. Charles Marsh, of Nevada. Private subscriptions furnished the means for the beginning of work. In 1862, the city of Sacramento granted the right of way along the city front, and also gave the company the tract of ground covered by Sutter Lake. In November, 1862, the first body of surveyors, under Douglas Judah, brother of the Chief Engineer, went out to locate the permanent line.
THE WORK COMMENCED.
The ceremonies attending the throwing of the first earth, or beginning the work of construction of the Pacific Railroad, took place at Sacramento on the 8th of January, 1863. The locality of the work was on the bank of the Sacramento River, at the foot of K Street, in Sacramento City. The Sacra- mento Union of January 9, 1863, says: "The skies smiled yesterday upon a ceremony of vast signifi- eance to Sacramento, California and the Union." The day was the anniversary of the Battle of New Orleans, which it had been customary to celebrate as a national holiday. The Legislature was in session, and in a body took part in the ceremony. Leland Stanford was Governor of the State and President of the Central Pacific Railroad Company. The Governor and State officers, the Members of the Legislature, members of the railroad company, and many citizens with music and banners, joined in pro- cession and marched through the city to the levee where the ceremonies were performed. Charles Crocker called the attention of the assemblage, and introduced Governor Stanford, who made a brief address. Rev. J. A. Benton asked the Divine bless- ing upon the enterprise, the Union, the company, and the people. After this Charles Crocker announced that the Governor of the State would now shovel the first earth for the great Pacific Railroad. Several addresses followed. Senator A. M. Crane, of Ala- meda County. delivered an eloquent oration, and speeches were made by Hon. J. Il. Warwiek, Mem- ber of Assembly from Sacramento; Rev. J. T. Peek; Hon. W. II. Sears, Member of Assembly from Nevada ; Ilon. Newton Booth, Senator from Sacramento; Dr. J. F. Morse. and Charles Crocker. The day was pleasant and everything auspicious of snecess in the beginning of the work for the construction of the great road which was to streteh across the continent.
The road was regarded as a publie work, to be con- structed by the people and for the people, in which it was the duty of all to assist, knowing that the incor- porators, as individuals, were comparatively withont means. They were, too, prominent Republicans; the great war of the Rebellion was raging; the polit- ieal feeling was intense; the railroad was thought a
military necessity as a protection to the Pacific Coast, and a grateful feeling was engendered toward the men who had taken the management of construc- tion. They were looked upon as patriots who had assumed a great burden for the public good, and whose acts it would be deemed mean to question as selfish, or to limit by legislation in any grants made to them. There was no thought but this confidence was reciprocal, and that the gratitude of the people would inspire gratitude in return. Those were days of innocence. The great fortunes so common now were then unknown to the Republic, and the rigor- ous power of money and of corporations had not been felt in California. The cunning "Credit Mobilier " had not been invented, nor the " Contract and Finance Company " conceived. All were ready to grant the railroad company unlimited power, and to vote the public funds without stint in aid of the work. Laws ! of an extraordinary character were enacted by the State Legislature of 1863 for this object. By these Acts the State donated $10,000 per mile for the first fifty miles of road completed, equalling 8500,000; also authorized Placer County to elect to subscribe for $250,000 of the stock; Nevada County. 8150,000; Sacramento, $300,000; and San Francisco, $600,000. Elections were held and the subscriptions ordered, - but the money was not speedily realized. San Fran- cisco subsequently compromised by donating $400,- 000, and taking no stock. The Legislature of 1864 passed an Act guaranteeing seven per cent. per annum interest on $1,500,000 of bonds of the Central Pacifie Railroad Company. The Attorney-General enjoined the payment of the interest, as a violation of the clause in the Constitution prohibiting the ercation of a State debt exceeding $300,000. excepting for the purpose of defense in time of war. The Supreme Court decided that the country was at war, that the railroad was for defensive purposes, and the debt constitutional.
PLACER COUNTY A STOCKHOLDER.
The Act approved by Governor Stanford April 2. 1863, ordered an election to be held in Placer C'ounty on the second Tuesday in May following, on the pro- position ordering the Board of Supervisors to take and subscribe $250,000 of the capital stock of the C'entral Pacific Railroad Company of California. All was ordered by statute, and nothing left to the diseretion of the Board of Supervisors. The cam- paign was lively and the opposition strong and bitter. The Placer Herald opposed the appropriation with great ability, and with singular prescience denounced the growing power of a grasping monopoly, already supercilious in its manner, positive in its demands, and insolent in its threats. Several able correspond. ents contributed to its columns in opposition to the subscription. The Advocate also opposed it. The Placer Courier, of Forest Hill, and the Dutch Flat Enquirer strongly advocated, and were supported by the Sacramento Union, which had a large circulation | in the county, and by many stump-speakers, who, in
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HISTORY OF PLACER COUNTY, CALIFORNIA
the interest of the railroad company, made a thor- ough and active canvass. The Herald charged that money was used extravagantly by the railroad com- pany. James P. Bull, editor of the Auburn Adcocate, published his affidavit that he had been offered $1,000 to advocate the subscription, and that he refused to do so. As the Union Pacific Company, which was expected to build the road from the Missouri River to the eastern boundary of California, had not yet completed its organization, and there were doubts if it ever would, therefore the Central Pacific was denounced as a local affair, and could not claim to be a national work.
ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE.
The railroad company published an address to the voters of Placer County, saying :-
This work, when completed, will be the greatest of any age or country-the great highway of the richest commerce and most extensive travel of the world; and, citizens of Placer, nearly 100 miles of it will be within your county and will pass directly through your county seat. In the construction of the road there will be expended in your county not much, if any, less than nine millions of dollars, and abont two millions of it within the trading and traffic distance of your county scat. The whole of this vast sum, when expended, will immediately enter into all the transactions of business conducte i within the county, and into the permanent and substantial wealth of the country, and will then be subject and liable to taxation in the same manner as other accu- mulated wealth; and, in addition to that, the railroad itself as it is constructed, from year to year, is sub- jeet to the same taxation as other property.
You are asked to assist us to the extent of $250,- 000-let us make up an account of the cost of such assistance. Yon give 8250 000 in bonds at cight per cent interest for twenty years. You will then have to provide $20,000 yearly to meet interest and to meet principal at the end of that time. Your rate of taxation for county purposes this year is unusually small, thirty cents on the $100. Suppose the rail- road alone, without adding any increased value of other property, or adding any property accumulated from the expenditures of building the road were taxed at that rate, (89,000,000 at thirty-five cents per $100) this will yield an income of $31,500, or $11.500 per year more than the interest you will have to pay-this annual surplus at the end of twenty years being nearly sufficient to pay the original bonds. Your whole taxable property for the last current year was only the sum of $3.600,000; with the road completed it will be $12,000,000. * *
,
Citizens of Placer, you, as citizens of the great State of the Pacific Coast, have labored twelve long years in connection with other citizens of the State for the great work. Yon have assisted to make it an important plank in all your party platforms; you have spoken for it at the hustings and voted for it at the polls, and from year to year you have asked aid of the General Government for its construction. With unparalleled munificence the General Govern- ment, in time of direst trouble, granted your request. Now, will you not, out of your abundance, add your mite and render your assistance to consummate this important work ? We believe you will.
THE ELECTION CONTEST.
It would have been very unbusiness-like to have refused to invest in such profitable property. The incorporators were known to be unable to build the road, and thirty miles of new road must be con- structed before the subsidy which the General Government, "with unparalleled munificence," had granted, could be drawn, and withont county and State aid that thirty miles might never be made and the Pacific Railroad go to other hands, other times and another route. With the comparatively small sum of $250,000 in bonds, the addition of $9,000,000 would be added to the assessable property of the county, returning $31,500 annually in taxes. This was impliedly assured and the payment of taxes promised as a consideration for the bonds. Under such circumstances opposition seemed searcely reasonable, nevertheless, it was strong and bitter. This would appear to have come almost entirely from the Democratie clement, as the road was advocated as a war measure, but the opposition to granting aid was equally strong by the professed Union papers of San Francisco, which, at that date endeavored not only to suppress the railroad, but manufactures and the National currency as well, because of its interfering with sea-going commerce.
The Herald of May 9, 1863, says :-
Governor Stanford has been bere this week to electioneer the county into $250,000 for his railroad. Charles Crocker, W. N. Leet, Senators Higgins and Harriman, Assemblymen Yule and Blanchard, S. T. Leet, W. C. Stratton and many other lesser lights are working like beavers in all parts of the county to carry the measure. Opponents must be active to defeat their machinations.
The election was held on the 12th of May as ordered, and resulted in a majority of 409 in a total vote of 3.810 for the subscription, and Placer County became a stockholder in the Central Pacific Railroad Company. But not yet. Mr. C. H. Mitchell obtained from Judge Myers an order enjoining the Board of Supervisors from issuing the bonds, and similar steps were taken in Sacramento at the instance of J. P. Robinson, of the Sacramento Valley Railroad, and in San Francisco the subscription was refused, but the year following a compromise with the latter county was made by the payment of 8400.000 as a gift. All injunctions were soon dissolved. By the end of the year $200,000 of the Placer County bonds had been issued, and in January, 1864, the remaining $50.000.
PROGRESS OF THE ROAD.
June 1, 1864, the road was completed to Neweastle, thirty-one miles from Sacramento, sixteen of which were in Placer. Newcastle then became an impor- tant and busy depot for stages and teams.
The railroad company was still struggling for funds, but in June obtained 8400.000 from San Fran- cisco, and the work was pushed on. By the subsidy
AUBURNHOTEL
BEBI
CPRR
JU SMITH PROP.
AUBURN HOTEL. AUBURN STATION. PLACER CD. CALIFORNIA
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RAILROADS.
granted by Congress the company was entitled to about one and a quarter millions, and the same amount on first mortgage bonds, and from the mortgage bonds the company acknowledged the receipt of $1,250,000 and 8414,000.14 from individual subscription.
THE FIRST SURPRISE.
The property was assessed in July and the value, as returned by the President of the company, was but 86,000 per mile, and $43,000 as the value of the rolling stock and other property. This was a great surprise to the people of the county, who, when voting to take the stock had been told of the mill- ions it would add to the taxable property. The valuation set by the Assessor was 820,000 per mile, and other property at $78,815. making a total of $398,815. This was afterwards fixed by the Board of Equalization at 8252,011.
In August an effort was made by the Board of Supervisors to investigate the affairs of the railroad company, and James E. Hale and F. B. Higgins were appointed as experts to make the examination. This proceeding was rescinded at the instigation of the railway company. and on the 15th of August the Board appointed its own members, James R. Rogers, A. B. Scott and D. W. Madden as a committee to make the examination. Messrs. Scott and Madden reported that they had made a careful and full examination, and everything had been properly and honestly done. Mr. Rogers made a minority report upon affidavit dated September 19, 1864, saying every obstacle had been put in his way, and that he had been treated very insolently. He was told that fifty-one of the Placer County bonds had been sold, twelve at 663 cents on the dollar, and thirty-nine at ninety-five cents in greenbacks, equal to about fifty cents in coin; also that Governor Stanford had borrowed money on them, paying ten per cent interest on the loan.
Mr. Rogers, as President of the Board of Super- visors had been deputized to cast the vote of Placer County as stockholder in the railroad company, but after his report was made, the authority to do so was taken from him and reposed in the Board, Messrs. Scott and Madden constituting the majority, cast the vote.
Thus early commenced the contest between the authorities of the county and the Central Pacific Railroad Company, which has continued until the present day.
January 2, 1865, the famous decision by the Supreme Court of California was made, that the Act guaranteeing the interest on $1,500,000 at seven per cent per annum was constitutional, and the company drew from the Treasury the sum of $51,555 in gold as the first payment of the semi-annual interest on 1,473 81,000 bonds, twenty-seven bonds having been sold to other parties.
GREAT ENERGY IN THE WORK.
The road was now pushed forward with more energy. The work from Newcastle to Auburn was very heavy, involving deep cutting, known as the Bloomer Cut and other expensive work. On the 22d of May, 1865, cars commenced running to the present station on the outskirts of Auburn, and this remained the depot until Clipper Gap was reached in June. The town of Colfax was laid out early in July on land belonging to the railroad company, and lots sold at auction. Early in September the road was completed to that point, and it became an important business place. The railroad was now running fifty-four miles from Sacramento, to a point so far toward the rich mining region of Nevada as to command the transmountain travel and freight, and its business assumed proportions of an impor- tant and profitable character.
TRIUMPH OF ENGINEERING AND FINANCE.
May 7, 1866. the passenger depot was made a Secret Town, nine miles from Colfax; July 15th, at Alta, and at Cisco November 29th of the same year, ninety-two miles from Sacramento. From this date the road was rapidly extended, reaching Wadsworth, Nevada, in July, 1868, 189 miles from Sacramento at the eastern base of the Sierra Nevada, and on the 13th of May, 1869, made connection with the Union Pacific at Promontory, Utah, 691 miles from Sacra- mento. There and then the golden spike was driven by Governor Stanford, who, on the 8th of January, 1863, had shoveled the first earth in the construction of the road on the levee at Sacramento. By subse- quent arrangement with the Union Pacific Company, the Central Pacific was permitted to use that road from Promontory to Ogden, a distance of fifty-four miles. The Western Pacific from Sacramento ria. Stockton connected with San Francisco by a route of 135 miles, and this with the Union Pacific, 1,032 miles in length, made the Pacific Railroad complete, with a total length of 2,012 miles, to the Missouri River.
NEVADA COUNTY NARROW-OAUGE. RAILWAY.
Upon the completion of the Central Pacific to Colfax it became the depot for the travel and freight business to Grass Valley, Nevada City, North San Juan, and other points in Nevada and Sierra Coun- ties. This business was very large, and in 1874 a company was formed to construct a narrow-gauge railroad from Colfax to Nevada City. A route was surveyed showing a length of road required to Grass Valley of seventeen miles, and to Nevada twenty- two and a half miles. The work of construction began in 1875, and the road was completed, and the last spike driven at Nevada on the 20th of May, 1876. But two and a half miles of this road is in Placer County.
36
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HISTORY OF PLACER COUNTY, CALIFORNIA.
JOIIN B. WHITCOMB.
Was born at Ellensburg, Clinton County, New York, February 22, 1833. In his infancy he removed with his family to Peru, in the same county, where he lived until twelve years of age. Ilis next move was to Franklin County, where he reached bis majority. In 1855 he emigrated to Minnesota, and settled at Farmington, but after one year's trial in the West, returned to his native State. In 1857 he again went to Minnesota and remained until 1859. During the latter year he crossed the plains to Cali- fornia, and located at a point on the Sacramento River known as "Grizzly Bend," where he remained about one year. He then made a trip to Los Angeles, and returning settled in Marysville, Ynba County, and spent the winter of 1861-62. He was at the last-named place during the great floods. In 1862 he crossed the Sierra to the State of Nevada, and located in Humboldt County, where he followed mining and dealing in mines, until 1865. During that year he removed to Virginia City, Storey County, where he remained until 1880. During his residence there he generally followed his profession, that of an engineer, and was in that capacity nine years, at the Gould and Curry mine. In 1880 he came to his present residence, near Colfax, having previously purchased the place where his family had resided for some years.
Mr. Whitcomb was married March 15, 1874, 10 Mrs. Charlotte Trousdale, a native of Canada. They have one child aged six years.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
WAGON ROADS OF PLACER COUNTY.
Roads in 1849-First Wagon in Yankee Jim's-Emigrant Roads -Emigrant Road of 1552 -- Surveys in 1855-Placer County Emigrant Road-Biographical Sketch of Captain Thomas A. Young-Road Convention at Yankee Jim's-List of Delegates -- Speeches Delivered -- Resolutions Offered -Last of the Emigrant Road Scheme -Placer County and Washoc Turnpike-Toll-roads, Ferries, and Bridges-Bear River Bridge -Auburn Ravine Turnpike-Mineral Bar Bridge and Road -- Other Toll-Roads Before 1860-Auburn and Yankee Jim's Turnpike-Lyon's Bridge and Road-Lake Pass (Dutch Flat) Wagon Road-Dutch Flat and Donner Lake Wagon Road-Pacific Turnpike-Colfax and Forest Hill Toll-road - Auburn and Forest Hill Turnpike - John Carlson.
THE boldness of the engineering that has con- structed the wagon roads of the mountainous regions of California must win the admiration of all who behold the works. The county of Placer is most particularly distinguished in this respect. Extend- ing, as her territory does, from the plains of the Sac- ramento Valley to the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada, a direct distance of about seventy miles, embracing a section of the great mountains through their entire breadth. Included in this mountain area are the canons of the Middle and North Forks of the American and Bear Rivers, the valley of the Truckee
and the slopes of Lake Tahoe, and the many deep cañons, gulches and ravines intersecting the county in every direction. Few can conceive the depth and precipitousness of these awful chasms in the earth unless they have had the experience of their passage without the aid of the fine graded roads and the easy riding coach that enterprise, money and labor have prepared for them.
These cañons are from 1,000 to 2,000 feet in depth below the bordering ridges which inclose the stream at the bottom with the declivity and rigidity of a V flume, In the short distance across the county from Bear River to the Middle Fork, are the canons of the Bear, North and Middle Forks, making an aggre- gate rise and fall of about 6,000 feet in eight miles of direct line.
Higher up in the Sierra the canons are deeper and succeed each other with appalling frequency if the traveler is passing transverse to their course. The difficulty is not so serions when following the direc- tion of the dividing ridges, but even then many deep depressions obstruct the way. The great Sierra Nevada stands like a mighty dorsal column, with summit passes and peaks from 8,000 to 10,000 feet above the sea, and throws out to the westward its ridges, like ribs to the body, which extend, when unbroken by rivers, with comparative evenness to the valley. By these lateral ridges the first immigrants made their difficult way, on unimproved roads, across the mountains, and by one which reaches the valley between the American and Bear Rivers, in Placer County, the Central Pacific Railroad found a feasible route to the summit.
ROADS IN 1849.
Wagon roads reached to Auburn, to Bear River, and to Illinoistown without serious difficulty in the fall of 1849. In the spring of 1850 occurred the excitement and rush to Bird's Store and El Dorado Cañon, on the divide between the North and Middle Forks. Wagons were taken as far as Kelley's Bar, on the North Fork, being let down the canon by ropes, or by attaching limbs of trees as a drag to retard the descent. Zigzag trails were cut to facili- tate the passage of pack animals. Similar trails were made from Oregon and Spanish Bars on the road from Coloma, through Todd's Valley, to the same points of destination. Such were the first roads in Placer County.
But the immigrants of 1849, having toiled with their wagons over unknown plains, mountains, and deserts, learning by experience many devices for passing successfully the most serious obstacles, would not long be delayed nor turned aside by the canons of the American. Early in the summer of 1850 wagons found their way up the divide as far as the Forest House and vicinity. These wagons brought merchandise from Sacramento, delivering it on the ridge, from whence it was taken, on men's baeks, or on pack-mules, to the mining camps in the canons and on the river bars.
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