Was it possibly the Russell Gulch Railroad?
Did it inspire Any Rand’s famous novel?
I was pleased to read a letter to the editor (in the September 17 issue) about one of my columns. It’s good to know someone reads them. Not only that, it was a witty and well written letter.
My column had to do with a coffee shop conversation I had with a young man heading back to college. We were speculating about which Colorado gulch the novelist Ayn Rand had in mind when she wrote Atlas Shrugged. He’d just finished the novel and it had raised numerous questions for him. Another question arose as we sipped our brew at the Mountain Mocha. If Rand was inspired by a Gilpin County Gulch which railroad did she have in mind? There’s no way to tell about any of this, of course. It is a novel after all. Still speculation is fun.
The Atlas Shrugged Railroad
There are railroad clues in Rand’s book. Remember that the protagonists in Ayn’s book had retired to their hidden Colorado gulch protected behind some kind of sci-fi type shield. There they lived in what they described as a perfectly balanced market system and celebrated human achievement and genius, surely a good thing to celebrate. But, they’d retired there to escape what they didn’t celebrate, the vulgar masses led by Wesley Mouch and his government. So, if they built a railroad it would have to be after the collapse of the country. That’s the main bit I remember about Atlas Shrugged (which I did read some decades ago). My young conversation partner had just finished the book and remembered a lot more.
As my coffee partner pointed out that day, Atlas Shrugged qualifies as a cult book still today at his college. Folks do put bumper stickers on their cars saying: “Who Is John Galt?” Come to think of it, when I was in college we’d be assaulted by folks urging us to read Ayn Rand and come to their “meetings of free people.” There were several other cult books back in the day including On The Road various books by and about John F. Kennedy, not to mention the assorted Indian gurus. Those books all lost cult status, but Rand’s book is still popular. Sales may approach a half million this year. All of this means it could be fun to actually look for the railroad she had in mind.
Was it a Russell Gulch Railroad?
The young man and I got refills on our coffee that day as we played with the idea that Ayn Rand was thinking of Russell Gulch right here in Gilpin County and that her railroad had to be around here. There are some clues. One of the bright people living in Midas Mulligan’s hidden compound was Dagny Taggart. She had inherited railroad money and was building a new railroad once the country disintegrated completely. Dagny was sort of the sex object for the guys in the compound, though my memory could be wrong about that. In any case, as we played around with Rand’s plot, it looked more and more like she was thinking of a defunct railroad which could be revived. Where was Dagny’s railroad?”
Russell Gulch Railroad Candidates
One obvious candidate for a railroad around Russell Gulch is the Gilpin Tramway. The Gilpin & Clear Creek District Railroad Company was incorporated in 1872. It was built mainly to carry freight from the James Peak area to Black Hawk and Nevadaville, stopping for ore along the way. Much of the gold industry was stoked with wood in those days and wood from Mexican Flats near James Peak was in demand. It was a neat little railroad and able to push tracks up to each newly discovered mine. The rails were logs around 6-8 inches in diameter. The rails in length were 16 foot and made of pine. If you look at the line layout it’s clear that the lower end of Russell gulch was included (listed at 9,300 feet). Also touched were Miner’s Gulch and Peck’s Gulch. The extensions from Russell Gulch reached South Willis Gulch and went up the side of Pewabic Mountain in four long switch backs. The road wound its’ way down to near Central City and ended in Black Hawk. A spectacular photo of a track crew shoveling out an engine stuck in six foot snow drifts is on the wall in the commissioner’s hearing room in the Gilpin County Court House in Central City. It’s worth a look.
It’s remotely possible that this road could be rebuilt. Several sections of grade are still traceable some near the mouth of Russell Gulch itself. The grade leading down to Black Hawk is well preserved. Some have suggested that it would be an excellent bike path/pedestrian path. The grades average 3 ½ percent. Quite easy for bikes. Although the grades up near Nevadaville grow to 4%, a bit of a peddle, the grades are still fairly gentle over all. I could see traces of grading in upper Willis Gulch when I went to see the superfund site there. That grade led down to the Banta Mine in Pleasant Valley at 8,650 feet. That was quite a feat for wooden rails. The Central City Tramway is a contender for our novelist’s railroad..
The Central City and South Beaver Creek
I’ve often found traces of the Gilpin and Clear Creek District Railway. Some of the graded road bed can be seen from the porch of Roy’s Last Shot Bar as it winds its’ way up South Beaver Creek on its way to Central City. This road was worked on from 1904 till 1905. Apparently the idea was to connect with the Denver Northwesern & Pacific which was building at that time over Rollins Pass. That D.N.& P. had reached Yankee Doodle Lake at 10,711 feet, but was having a tough time getting over Corona Pass (Rollins Pass) at 11,611 feet. This Gilpin & Clear Creek line went through some of the most interesting areas of Gilpin County. It was planned to be 17 miles long and serve the old town of Gilpin (in Lump Gulch) as well as Gold Dirt, Perigo, and Wide Awake. The Central City Register Call carried stories about the grading and how many tons of track and ties were piled up at Pactolis ready to go. But very little of the line was built. It was a big project, standard gauge and able to handle fully loaded coal cars. Perhaps that cost factor ended the enterprise. A market for the coal haul surely did exist. An estimated 60,000 tons of coal was being consumed in the district each year. It should have worked, but the line never fully materialized. Again, if Ayn Rand really did have Gilpin County in mind this could have been Dagny Taggart’s railroad.
It wasn’t Ayn Rand’s kind of Railroad
It was fun to think of which railroad could have served Russell Gulch and which could be revived. As we sipped our coffee it was also nice was to think of her idea that some people could become truly great, and invent many fine things for humanity. But, from the point of view of the novel the railroads around Gilpin County could never qualify in Ayn Rand’s book. Rand was a total believer in unfettered free market capitalism. The idea of government subsidy of any kind was anathema to her and still is to her followers. In fact, every one of our early Colorado railroads were forgiven any taxes, surely a subsidy. Many were given free right of way and even sections of land to help with the capitalization process. The legislature regularly gave out charters to promote railroad building full of all sorts of perks. Railroads were thought of as vital to the “common good,” another idea Ayn Rand hated. I’m pretty sure she’d have called government railroad subsidy more of Wesley Mouche’s darn socialism. No matter, her book sparked an interesting and intelligent conversation about Gilpin County. A delightful morning’s talk in Mountain Mocha is worth a lot.