USA > Colorado > History of the State of Colorado, Volume II > Part 8
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Beyond question, the continental revolution was the prime cause of the changes associated with the origin of our mineral wealth ; for the period just mentioned coincided with the beginning and the end of this revolution, and all the changes were directly connected with the several phases, of which the record is well preserved.
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CHAPTER IV.
1872-SUCCESS OF THE NARROW GAUGE EXPERIMENT-THE DENVER PACIFIC CONSOLI- DATED WITH THE KANSAS PACIFIC- OUR FIRST RAILWAY WAR-A YEAR OF RAILWAY PROJECTS-CENTRAL CITY ANTICIPATES A GOLDEN FUTURE-COMPLETION OF THE COLORADO CENTRAL TO BLACK HAWK -BUILDING OF THE ARKANSAS VALLEV RAILROAD TO PUEBLO-W. B. STRONG'S VISION OF A GREAT SOUTHERN METROPOLIS-THE DENVER AND SOUTH PARK RAILWAY-NARROW GAUGE CON- VENTION IN ST. LOUIS-OLD STAGING DAYS IN COLORADO-J. HARVEY JONES AND HIS STAGE DRIVERS-MOVED BACK BY THE IRON HORSE-BANKING AND INTEREST RATES-EXTRAVAGANCE GIVES WAY TO ECONOMY.
Reviewing further the progress of the Rio Grande Railway in its experimental stages, we find that machine and repair shops, with car building works, were erected at the point three miles above the city, on the Platte River, now known as "Burnham Station," by the Denver & Rio Grande Company, in the autumn of 1871. At this time the working force comprised three machinists, three laborers, one boiler maker and one pattern maker. Meanwhile the success of the narrow gauge experiment had been, if not fully, very satisfactorily demonstrated by the operation of the first division. It proved of material commercial value, also, to the City of Denver in the way of additional trade. Prior to its opening the only lines of exterior traffic which brought tribute to this city were in the mining regions of Gilpin, Clear Creek and Boulder. Merchants in those parts who were financially able to purchase by the carload in Chicago or St. Louis, used Denver only as a stocking point, to fill the minor deficiencies. With the inauguration of the new artery commerce began to expand, by small degrees at first, but in a manner to indicate heavy accessions when the most populous centers south of the Divide should be placed in communication by rapid transit. A few
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orders came in from New Mexico, a trade territory that was to be exten- sively cultivated. It was hoped that as the narrow gauge railroad pro- ceeded further and further southward under the great scheme projected by Palmer, Denver would in time supply the principal towns lying south of Colorado. It was not then anticipated that a gigantic rival, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé, would step in and crush these aspirations by diverting the trade of both sections to Kansas City. Some delicious dreams were indulged in by our wholesale merchants, of the rich com- merce to come to them from these prolific fields. No doubts of its acquisition were entertained. It was one of the certainties of the immediate future. A few years later, before they had enjoyed even a reasonable opportunity to establish friendly relations with Santa Fé, every stone in their carefully reared fabric was ruthlessly pulled down by the rough iconoclasts of the Atchison Company. Nor have our people since been able to secure more than a fraction of their anticipated trade in that direction.
Meanwhile the Denver Pacific Railway had become a prominent disturber of railway traffic between the East and the Pacific Coast. The first week in March, 1872, matters reached a crisis which impelled the resignation by Governor Evans of the presidency, when Gen. R. E. Carr was chosen in his stead.
This proceeding, brought about after some rather acrid discussion, gave the Kansas Pacific full control between Kansas City and Cheyenne. The impossibility of making an equitable arrangement for through business with the Union Pacific while the management was divided between two distinct companies, led to the change. The consolidation was a sudden surprise to the entire community. The reasons subse- quently made public were, in substance, that the original charter for a Pacific railway provided for one main continuous line and a system of branches. The Central and Union Pacific Companies were to construct eastward and westward respectively, forming a junction at an interme- diate point. The Eastern Division was one of the branches provided for in the system, and it was required to make connection with the main
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trunk, first on the one hundredth meridian, but it was subsequently changed to read at a point not more than fifty miles west of the meridian of Denver; this, in accordance with the Congressional act of 1866, changing the Kansas Pacific route from the Valley of the Republican to the Smoky Hill. The charter provided, also, that the two roads should pro rate with each other on through business, and be operated as one line,-not two distinct lines, each endeavoring to harrass and cripple the other to their own injury and the detriment of the people they were created to serve.
When the Kansas Pacific was completed to Denver, and had thus made its proper connection, as it supposed, or assumed, with the Union Pacific at Cheyenne via the Denver Pacific, Gen. Carr demanded the pro rate for its west bound traffic, and was promptly refused, on the ground that the connection had not been made in compliance with the requirements of the charter, the Denver Pacific being an independent line and in no legal sense a part of the Eastern Division. By this course of reasoning, which was not sustained by the facts nor by the courts, the Union Pacific, having no interest in or sympathy with Colo- rado, was enabled to put an effectual embargo upon its western traffic, and, in its results, shut it out from any business communication with the States and Territories outside its own borders, except Kansas.
The true secret of the opposition of the Union Pacific proved to be that it desired to compete for the Colorado carrying trade over the Denver Pacific track, and its managers took this method of enforcing that consummation. In making the consolidation, the Kansas Pacific hoped to accomplish its purpose of compelling the pro rate, but its pow- erful adversary remained obdurate, yielding not an inch of its advantage. It would neither pro rate nor recognize the Kansas road as a connecting line. Driven to extremities, Carr and his associates drafted a memorial to Congress quoting the law relating to the Pacific railroads, epitomizing the facts stated above, and praying that body to compel the Union Pacific to obey the law. This memorial was sentto the legislatures of Colorado, Kansas and Missouri for indorsement, and thence to
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Congress, accompanied by a powerful lobby to urge the passage of proper remedial legislation.
In the meantime the war continued to rage fiercely. Merchants and consumers alike suffered great damage by the contention and the embargo. The Kansas Pacific was never a profitable line. Debarred from through business, it had great difficulty in meeting current expenses. It may be interpolated here, that until after its incorporation with the Union Pacific system by Jay Gould and Russell Sage, it was neither well patronized nor well maintained. Its ties rotted and were not replaced with new ones; its iron wore out and was not relaid ; its traffic was insufficient to meet its fixed charges, and it declined from year to year until, when well nigh wrecked, it fell into the hands of the great dictator.
Tom Scott, on behalf of the Kansas Pacific, proposed as a compro- mise between the contending roads, a through rate from Ogden to Kansas City, whereby the Union Pacific would receive sixty per cent. and the Kansas Pacific forty per cent. of the charges, but even this liberal concession was curtly declined.
The Senate Committee on Pacific railroads, after duly considering the memorial and the bill which accompanied it, decided in favor of reporting the bill compelling the Union Pacific to give the Kansas branch an equitable pro rate in its through business between Cheyenne and Ogden, but the measure was not brought up for action until near the expiration of the session, therefore it was buried in the debris of the adjournment and was never revived until after the admission of the State, when Senator Chaffee forced an agreement, as will appear hereafter.
In March, 1872, a company was organized with the declared inten- tion of building a railway to Georgetown, and thence across the mount- ains by the most feasible route to Salt Lake City, to effect a junction with the Central Pacific at Ogden. This was a bold move by the Kansas Pacific to secure an independent outlet to the coast. Carr, Evans, Moffat and Perry were among the leaders. The design was first to connect Denver with the chief centers of mining, and second to pene- trate and develop the well-known resources of the Middle and North
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Parks, where lay immense treasures of coal, iron, petroleum, gold and silver. The line was to begin at Denver, running thence westerly through Mount Vernon Cañon via Idaho Springs to Georgetown, and thence over the Range,-Black Hawk and Central City to be connected by a branch. R. E. Carr was chosen President, John D. Perry Vice- President, R. R. McCormick Secretary, and D. H. Moffat, Jr., Treasurer. Perry was appointed a commissioner to negotiate with the people of Clear Creek County for a liberal subscription in the form of county bonds. Evans, Hughes and others, also visited and addressed the people on the subject. As a result, the County Commissioners sub- mitted a proposition to the electors to vote two hundred thousand dollars in aid of the enterprise.
About the same time the Colorado Central Company, supported by the Union Pacific, proposed to build a narrow gauge short line from Julesburg, or Pine Bluff, up the valley of the Platte, taking in Greeley, Evans, Longmont and the Boulder Valley coal fields, to a junction with the Colorado Central, at a point about midway between Denver and Golden City. This project was an outgrowth of the intense rivalry between the Kansas and Union Pacific roads, and local contentions between Denver and Golden. It was advanced, apparently, as a foil to the proposed Denver, Utah & Pacific,-otherwise the High line,-and intended to strike a decisive and paralyzing blow at the supremacy and arrogant pretensions of Denver by virtually destroying the Denver Pacific, and giving Golden the prestige of a railway center. It became the subject of a long and bitter controversy. For months the news- papers blazed with arguments for and against the scheme. It provoked lively antagonisms between differing factions here and elsewhere. The Colorado Central interest, led by Henry M. Teller and W. A. H. Love- land, was arrayed in deadly hostility to the Denver interest, led by Carr and Evans. The former with some show of right, regarded the mount- ain counties as their exclusive property. They had mapped out a system of roads for Gilpin and Clear Creek, and while they could do little or nothing toward building them, resolutely determined that the Denver
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people, having no right there, should be kept out. Human passions were stirred to their depths. It was war to the knife, and knife to the hilt,-Golden against the "Cherry Creek settlement," Teller against Evans, and the Union Pacific practically master of the situation, though acting perfunctorily. It wanted to hold the line, but manifested no active desire to build.
As an offset to the Colorado Central proposition to build from Julesburg on the north side of the Platte to Golden, the Denverites proposed a standard gauge from Fort Kearney straight to their city. After this had been argued for a time, it was discovered that it would vir- tually kill the Denver Pacific, without affording them any material relief.
At the election held in April, 1872, Clear Creek County, exasperated by the long unredeemed pledges of the Colorado Central Company, and perhaps trusting too implicitly to the assurances given by the Denver, Utah & Pacific, voted in favor of aiding the latter. Teller, Loveland and their associates opposed this action at the polls, but were unable to defeat it. However, the movement came to naught.
The extension of the Boulder Valley road from Erie to Boulder was effected by the enterprise of some of the principal citizens of that town, who subscribed the funds to grade and tie the roadbed. This work was begun on the 21st of March, 1871. Having executed their part of the agreement, the people naturally expected a prompt response on the part of the company, but nothing further was done until the early days of June, 1872, when the property was transferred to the Boulder Valley Railway Company. Col. L. H. Eicholtz was then commissioned to put in the bridges and lay the iron. After many delays the road was finally completed to Boulder September 2, 1873.
In June, 1872, Gen. T. E. Sickels, chief engineer of the Union Pacific, appeared in the Territory, evidently commissioned with the duty of reducing the affairs of the Colorado Central Company to some kind of practical order, and thereby enable his company to build the line to Black Hawk. The people of Gilpin and Clear Creek Counties becoming impatient, resolved to have a railway, and openly declared that if the
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Union Pacific delayed much longer they would lend all their influence to any company that would pledge itself to make the connection. A pleasant and rather sagacious diplomat was Gen. Sickels. The impres- sion he made in his walks and talks with the people was highly favorable to the successful issue of his mission. In 1871 Gilpin County had voted three hundred thousand dollars in bonds to the Colorado Central Com- pany, yet very little had come of it. It had then been stipulated as a part of the contract that the road should be completed to Black Hawk by May 1, 1872, and that it should be extended to Central City and Nevada. But the undertaking proved too great for the limited time, and the limited means employed in the work. Hence the bonds were forfeited. Moreover, a strong feeling of hostility had been incited by the long and perplexing inaction.
Sickels, having carefully measured the general sentiment, invited conferences with deputations of prominent citizens, and finally with the County Commissioners, with whom, after due explanations, a new treaty of alliance was perfected. This was, in effect, that a new proposition to vote two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in bonds should be sub- mitted to the electors, with the proviso that the railroad company should finish its line from Golden to a point near the junction of North and South Clear Creeks by September 1, 1872, to Black Hawk by the first of January, 1873, and to Central City within one year. The extension to Nevada was relinquished on the ground of engineering difficulties, but the terminus at Central was to be at a point substantially the same as that now employed.
Sickels, in his extreme anxiety to reach a distinct and favorable understanding, made many verbal statements to the author and others concerning rates to and from the mines, which, could they have been realized, would have established much pleasanter relations between the people and the company than now exist. For example, he stated to me personally, that a maximum charge of two dollars per ton on freight from the Valley to Black Hawk would be ample, affording the road satisfactory profits upon the tonnage as then estimated.
7 II.
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The people of Gilpin County formed many radiant pictures of their destiny when the road should be secured. It was their expectation that Central would develop into a large and prosperous city, the seat of a golden empire; the center of industrial and speculative enterprise ; of vast commercial houses; of palatial dwellings, and in the course of years would become the supreme influence in the land. It was not only to rival, but eclipse the rather nebulous splendors of Denver, and set all other towns wild with envy. Partly upon this assumption the Teller House was built by our senior Senator at the National Capital, wherein was irretrievably sunk a large part of his private fortune. An odd expres- sion used by Mark Twain,-" They danced blithely out to enjoy a rain- bow, and got struck by lightning,"-seems to fit the case.
After two years of labor and almost continuous turmoil, the Col- orado Central narrow gauge was finished to Black Hawk, on Sunday, December 15, 1872. The depot used was a stone mill, erected some years previous by Gen. Fitz John Porter, then manager of the New York & Colorado Mining Company, but never used for the purpose intended. It soon became evident that this was to be for a long time, if not the permanent, terminus of the road, whereat the people of Central com- plained vociferously, but without effect. The engineers found it impos- sible to build the road straight up the gulch, therefore the only alternative was the " switchback," subsequently resorted to, but which at that time the company was not prepared to undertake. The County Commis- sioners therefore cut off fifty thousand dollars from the amount of bonds voted, as a fair compensation for the loss of the extension. The terminus remained at Black Hawk until the 21st of May, 1878, when the last rail was laid, and the last spike driven, at or near the present site of the depot in Central City.
The first locomotives used on the road between Golden and Black Hawk were, if I remember rightly, second hand machines, suited to the ordinary purposes of construction trains, but wholly unsuited to so large and various a traffic as that which sprung up when the road was com-
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pleted. They were equal to hauling only two or three loaded freight cars over the tremendous grades and innumerable curvatures.
In July, 1872, Boulder County voted two hundred thousand dollars in bonds to the Golden and Julesburg railroad, and a week later Weld County voted one hundred and fifty thousand to the same project. The line as now proposed was from Julesburg to Greeley, thence up the Platte to the St. Vrain, up that stream to Longmont, thence via Boulder and the Marshall Coal banks to' Golden City.
About the middle of September, 1872, Gen. Carr, President, and Superintendent Bowen of the Kansas Pacific, arrived in Pueblo, where they were joined by Col. Lamborn of the Denver & Rio Grande. They met and conferred with a committee of citizens at the office of Wilbur F. Stone, attorney for the Rio Grande, with a view to devising ways and means for the extension of the Kansas road to Pueblo. Carr was extremely anxious to make the connection, and the people were by no means averse to having a second outlet, provided the terms could be made mutually agreeable. Carr offered to build if the county would subscribe three hundred thousand dollars to the stock, and upon this basis would sign a contract to have the road in operation within eighteen months from the date of the ratification of the agreement by the people. The Committee informed him that his terms were too high, that no such proposition would be accepted if submitted, and flatly refused to be the bearers of it to the Board of Commissioners. While the people were friendly to the Kansas Pacific, and would probably respond to a reasonable call for aid, they could not be induced to add three hundred thousand dollars to the obligations already incurred. It was finally arranged that the Commissioners should be petitioned to submit a sub- scription of two hundred thousand dollars, with the stipulation that the terminus should be located on the north side of the Arkansas River, and the depot buildings within a mile of the court house.
While these negotiations were pending, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé, which had been rapidly pushed westward, began to inves- tigate the opportunities for a branch from its main trunk to Pueblo. At
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this time its roadbed had been graded to a point about forty miles below Fort Lyon. Regular passenger trains were running to Fort Dodge. The Kit Carson branch of the Kansas Pacific had been graded to within ten miles of Fort Lyon.
On the 20th of November, 1872, articles of incorporation of the Kansas & Colorado Railway Company, afterward changed to the Pueblo & Arkansas Valley, were prepared and filed. The object, as set forth in the charter, was to construct a road from the eastern line of Colorado Territory up the Valley of the Arkansas via Pueblo into Lake County. The capital stock was placed at one million dollars. The trustees for the first year were Thomas and Joseph Nickerson, Isaac T. Burr, F. H. Peabody, Alden Speer, C. W. Pierce, C. K. Holliday, D. L. Lakin and T. J. Peter. This company proposed to form a con- nection with the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé road, and it was under- stood to be a branch of the same.
The introduction of this new and aggressive factor was by no means palatable to the Kansas Pacific directors. It provoked also all manner of contentions among the people. Carr had been slow and deliberate in his movements. On the other hand, the manager of the Atchison was energetic and rapid. Pending the expiration of the call for an election to vote on the Kansas Pacific subsidy, he adroitly slipped in and laid before the commission a more attractive proposal. This opened a general war; the people split in factions, each contending with its best ability for its particular view of the questions involved. With each day the battle grew more and more animated; it was the paramount and all absorbing topic on the streets, in the stores, shops, hotels, every- where. The excitement fattened upon various reports and rumors set afloat from day to day. The Atchison people plunged into the conflict with their sleeves rolled up. W. B. Strong, until recently (August, 1889) the President of the company, while acting as its Vice-President and General Manager in 1878-79, personally related to me that he had conceived the idea of building to Pueblo, and by the various influences he could bring to bear, to create a powerful trade center at that point,
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that would sap and possibly undermine the commercial prestige of Denver. He had in view a number of extensions, notably to Cañon City, and thence into the mountains via the Grand Canon of the Ar- kansas, with perhaps a line into the San Juan country. It was his pur- pose to so concentrate the traffic of Southern and Southwestern Colo- rado at Pueblo as to entirely cut Denver out of any participation in the trade of that part of the country. Large wholesale houses in dry goods, groceries, hardware, clothing and other lines were to be established, and supplied from Kansas City over his road. This is, in brief, a fair outline of his plan. We shall see as this history develops, how and why it failed.
The infusion of this new element, the predetermined sweeping rev- olution in the carrying trade of the South; the sudden and amazing transition from wagon transportation and slow coaches to which the people had been so long accustomed, and to which their intercourse with other communities had become attuned, produced much unwar- ranted local disturbance. Here was the promise of two more roads that when built would transfer all desirable prestige from Denver to Pueblo. Those who had little to lose were for both, but the more con- servative who had to foot the bills studied the question from all sides, turning their faces toward the one that promised most for the imme- diate future. Each asked for two hundred thousand in bonds, but one must be sacrificed. They had already issued that amount to the Rio Grande, and could ill afford to treble the burden. The Kansas Pacific being first in the field, the County Commissioners submitted its proposal to be voted on December 3, 1872. A few days prior to that date the Atchison people secured the ears of the commissioners and persuaded them to order a postponement of the election to the 21st of January fol- lowing, and at the same time to call an election for a vote on their prop- osition a week earlier, otherwise on the 14th of January. This action, while it delighted the Atchison faction, excited a storm of indignation from its opponents, who boldly charged the commissioners with having been corrupted. They denounced the Atchison as a bankrupt corpo-
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ration that was simply playing a game of bluff without serious intention of carrying out its pledges. Nevertheless, the bonds were voted in its favor, and the building of the Pueblo & Arkansas Valley road was the result.
The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fé Railway crossed the State line of Colorado, en route to New Mexico, January 1, 1873, and was extended to Granada, twelve miles beyond, a town of its own creation, on July 4 of that year, where it rested for a time. In December, 1875, it was advanced to La Junta. The branch to Pueblo was completed February 26, 1876.
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