Minnesota in the construction of a line of railway to extend from
Stillwater via St. Paul and St. Anthony, to what is now Breckenridge,
on the Red river, and a branch via St. Paul to St. Vincent, near the
international boundary line. At that time the Territory of Minnesota
included all of the two Dakotas to the Missouri river. The legislature
of the territory accepted the grant which amounted to six sections of
land per mile. In the following year Minnesota was admitted as a state
and a constitutional amendment was adopted allowing the state to issue
bonds to carry along the work. Contracts were let and considerable
grading was done at different times, but the financial crash which
preceded, and the war, delayed the progress and it was not until 1862
that any track was laid, and that was only ten miles; it was from St.
Paul to St. Anthony, and was all the trackage of the first division of
what is “now” the Great Northern railway; also the first railway ever
built in the state of Minnesota. All the material and rolling stock was
brought by steamboat on the Mississippi. Minnesota was at the time but
a sparsely settled and remote section of the Union.
I shall not attempt to detail the gradual upbuilding of this great
transcontinental railway to its present system--its growth from a
“then” ten-mile railroad to its “now” grand proportions of 4,786 miles.
Its existence as a strong commercial force in the Northwest dates from
1879, when it passed into the control of the St. Paul, Minneapolis &
Manitoba Railway Company, organized by J. J. Hill.
In 1880 the trackage of this company was a little in excess of 600
miles, with gross earnings under $2,000,000, while according to its
last annual report, its gross earnings amounted to $25,017,903.66. The
building of new track, from the time Mr. Hill acquired control in 1876,
to 1894, averaged about a mile every working day for the entire period,
and the average in gross earnings amounts to an increase of over
$1,000,000 a year. Since 1894 extensions have been confined to branch
lines and improvements to the betterment of the entire system. Aside
from the original grant to the company within the state of Minnesota,
the Great Northern system has extended itself into eight states and to
British Columbia.
Thirty-five years ago the only method of traveling to and from the
Pacific coast was on horseback or in a wagon, with many obstacles on
the way--crossing streams, climbing high mountains and cutting the way
through thick forests. Now railway cars, drawn by the iron horse, which
climbs mountains and leaps over rivers and ravines with an untiring
speed, go all the way to the Pacific ocean; and during all the journey
the traveler enjoys the comforts, almost, of his own fireside. The
solitude that was then
“In pathless woods where rolls the Oregon,
And hears no sound save its own dashing,”
is now broken by the sound of the woodchopper’s ax, the reaper, the
steam whistle, and the rattle of thousands of wheels. The railway is
there now and has made a path of its own in which towns and cities of
many thousands of inhabitants have sprung up, where a few years ago was
a wilderness. And the valleys and plains of the arid region that were
once covered with the brown native grasses, are now interspersed with
fields of grain and meadows that are green, and evidence of the white
man’s civilization.
Before the railway it was a journey of as many months as it is now
days to reach the Pacific coast. The following bit of history of the
northwest corner of our country, and of that historical horseback ride
of Marcus Whitman in 1842 from Oregon to Washington, D. C., and which
was worth three stars to our flag, is from the Omaha World-Herald of
August 4, 1899, and is as follows:
“The ride of Marcus Whitman was over snow-capped mountains and along
dark ravines, traveled only by savage men. It was a plunge through icy
rivers and across trackless prairies, a ride of four thousand miles
across a continent in the dead of winter to save a mighty territory to
the Union.
“Compared with this, what was the feat of Paul Revere, who rode
eighteen miles on a calm night in April to arouse a handful of sleeping
patriots and thereby save the powder at Concord.
“Whitman’s ride saved three stars to the American flag. It was made in
1842.
“In 1792, during the first administration of Washington, Captain Robert
Gray, who had already carried the American flag around the globe,
discovered the mouth of the Columbia river. He sailed several miles
up the great stream and landed and took possession in the name of the
United States.
“In 1805, under Jefferson’s administration, this vast territory was
explored by Lewis and Clarke, whose reports were popular reading for
our grandfathers, but the extent and value of this distant possession
were very slightly understood, and no attempt at colonization was made
save the establishment of the fur-trading station of Astoria in 1811.
“Strangely enough, England, too, claimed this same territory by virtue
of rights ceded to it by Russia and also by the Vancouver surveys of
1792. The Hudson’s Bay Company established a number of trading posts
and filled the country with adventurous fur traders. So here was a vast
territory, as large as New England and the state of Illinois combined,
which seemed to be without any positive ownership. But for Marcus
Whitman, it would have been lost to the Union.
“It was in 1836 that Dr. Whitman and a man by the name of Spaulding,
with their young wives, the first white women that ever crossed the
Rocky mountains, entered the valley of the Columbia and founded a
mission of the American board. They had been sent out to christianize
the Indians, but Whitman was also to build a state.
“He was at this time thirty-five years old. In his journey to and fro
for the mission he soon saw the vast possibilities of the country, and
he saw, too, that the English were already appraised of this and were
rapidly pouring into the territory. Under the terms of the treaties
of 1818 and 1828, it was the tacit belief that whichever nationality
settled and organized the territory, that nation would hold it. If
England and the English fur traders had been successful in their plans
the three great states of Washington, Oregon and Idaho would now
constitute a part of British Columbia. But it was not destined to be.
“In the fall of 1842 it looked as if there would be a great inpouring
of English into the territory, and Dr. Whitman took the alarm. There
was no time to lose. The authorities at Washington must be warned.
Hastily bidding his wife adieu, Dr. Whitman started on his hazardous
journey. The perils, hardships and delays he encountered on the way we
can but faintly conceive. His feet were frozen, he nearly starved, and
once he came very near losing his life. He kept pushing on, and at the
end of five terrible months he reached Washington.
“He arrived there tired and worn; a bearded, strangely picturesque
figure, clad entirely in buckskin and fur, a typical man of the
prairies. He asked audience of President Tyler and Secretary of State
Webster and it was accorded him. All clad as he was, with his frozen
limbs, just in from his 4,000-mile ride, Whitman appeared before the
two great men to plead for Oregon.
“His statement was a revelation to the administration. Previous to
Whitman’s visit, it was the general idea in congress that Oregon was a
barren, worthless country, fit only for wild beasts and wild men. He
opened the eyes of the government to the limitless wealth and splendid
resources of that western territory. He told them of its great rivers
and fertile valleys, its mountains covered with forests, and its mines
filled with precious treasures. He showed them that it was a country
worth keeping and that it must not fall into the hands of the British.
He spoke as a man inspired and his words were heeded.
“What followed--the organization of companies of emigrants, the rapid
settlement of the territory and the treaty made with Great Britain in
1846, by which the forty-ninth parallel was made the boundary line west
of the Rocky mountains, are matters of history.
“The foresight and the heroism of one man and his gallant ride had
saved three great stars to the Union.”
Compare those perils and horseback rides of Whitman “then” to what
Vice President Stevenson says of his ride from the Pacific coast to
Washington, D. C., “now.”
He said: “The passenger service on the Great Northern railway is equal
to the best in the land, not to speak of the buffet car, which, in
itself, is one of the greatest conveniences to tourists in making
long journeys I ever enjoyed. So elaborate and complete are the
accommodations that a man hardly realizes that he is traveling. It is
a comfortable thing to find a library of books and tables spread with
magazines, daily papers and writing materials, easy chairs and bath
rooms, a barber shop and smoking room. It really seems as though a man
had left his home and gone to his club, to step aboard this car.”
Think of the perils, hardships and delays the traveler encountered
“then” and the comforts and accommodations he is having “now.” “Then”
for protection against hostile Indians he had to equip himself with gun
and ammunition, “now” for comfort and pleasure he equips himself with
Havana cigars, daily newspapers and magazines. And he sings:
Riding o’er the mountains in a buffet car,
Writing loving letters, not a shake or jar;
Leaping over rivers, flying down the vale;
“O bless me, ain’t it pleasant riding on a rail.”
I know of no other section in the United States where there have been
greater changes made since “then” and “now” in the way of traveling
and otherwise, and in the same length of time, than in Northern
Montana. A few years ago this part of the Union was but a region in
the wilderness. Then the only mode of traveling or transporting goods
was with vehicles drawn by horses or mules, and, not infrequently, by
the slow and tedious ox or on the backs of animals. Now there are in
Northern Montana over seven hundred miles of railroads in operation.
The Great Falls and Canada extends from the north and south, a distance
of over one hundred and fifty miles. The Great Northern system has its
Montana Central, with its Sand Coulee and Neihart branches, besides the
two lines that lead to both sides of the falls of the Missouri; and the
Great Northern itself extends for over three hundred and fifty miles
through the center of this northern Eden.
[Illustration: GATE OF THE MOUNTAINS, MISSOURI RIVER, ON THE MONTANA
CENTRAL RY.]
Some one may ask why I should name this remarkable section Eden. Well,
I will answer by asking a few questions myself. Why was it that tens
of thousands of buffaloes used to roam here from time immemorial until
they were killed off by white people? And why was it that from fifteen
to twenty thousand Indians lived here “then,” and without doing a lick
of work or receiving a single ration from the government? And why is it
that there are “now” over two hundred thousand cattle roaming on the
same land and feeding on the same kind of grasses as the buffalo did
then and without care or shelter, except that provided by nature?
ROBERT VAUGHN.
Great Falls, Mont., Nov. 2, 1899.
YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK.
It would be hardly proper for me to lay down my pen and make no
mention of the Yellowstone National Park, which is in the heart of the
“Rockies.” Besides, in my letter headed “Stampede to the Yellowstone,”
I stated that “Wonderland was not known then.” That indicated that
there was such a region in existence somewhere. Therefore it is
necessary, at this time, to give a brief sketch of this wonderful
place. The time of its first exploration was in 1869-70. It lays mostly
in the northwest corner of Wyoming, extending a few miles into Montana
on its north and Idaho on its west. It extends from a few miles east
of 110 degrees to a few miles west of 111 degrees west longitude from
Greenwich. Here the United States government, by an act which passed
both houses of congress unanimously, and was approved March 1, 1872,
has withdrawn from sale and occupation and set apart as a National Park
or perpetual pleasure ground, for the use and enjoyment of the people,
a region fifty-four by sixty-two miles and covering an area of 3,312
square miles or 2,119,680 acres. Its average elevation above the sea is
from 7,000 to 7,500 feet, while its highest peak rises to the height of
11,155 feet.
A tourist wrote that in this remarkable region nature has assembled
such a surprising number of the most sublime and picturesque objects,
and amidst the grandest scenery of mountains, lakes, rivers, cataracts,
canyons, and cascades exhibits such a variety of unique and marvelous
phenomena of spouting geysers, of boiling and pulsating hot springs and
pools of steam jets, solfataras, femerells and salses, rumbling and
thundering and pouring out sulphurous hot water, or puffing out clouds
of steam and throwing out great masses of mud that its early explorers
gave it the name of “Wonderland.”
The first public conveyance to enter the Yellowstone National Park was
a stage coach, owned by J. W. Marshall, which made its first trip,
leaving Virginia City, Montana, at daylight, Oct. 1, 1880, following
the beautiful Madison valley for over thirty miles, crossing the
Rockies and thence going by Henry Lake, which is a sheet of water two
miles wide and five miles long. One of the passengers described the
lake as being then “full of salmon trout.” Ten miles farther, and in
a northwesterly direction, was Cliff Lake, another remarkable sheet
of water having a total length of three miles and a breadth of half a
mile, in whose azure depths 1,400 feet of line failed to reach bottom.
It took sixteen hours to make the trip, a distance of ninety-five
miles, from Virginia City to the National Park House, Lower Geyser
basin, then the only hotel in the park. This pioneer hotel was a
two-story, hewed log structure, the property of Mr. Marshall.
And now the Monida & Yellowstone Stage Company, in connection with the
Oregon Short Line railroad and the transcontinental lines, conducts a
line of Concord coaches from Monida to all points in the Yellowstone
National Park.
Monida is a station on the Oregon Short Line railroad, and the starting
point for the stage ride, and is less than one day coaching distance
from the Yellowstone Park. It is on the crest of the Rocky mountains,
7,000 feet above the tide. The lower Geyser basin in the park is about
the same elevation.
The name “Monida” is a composite of the first syllables of “Montana”
and “Idaho.”
The Rev. T. De Witt Talmage writes: “A stage ride from this place
to the park ‘is a day of scenery as captivating and sublime as the
Yellowstone Park itself.’
“The road threads the foothills of the Rocky mountains, skirting
beautiful Centennial valley, the Red Rock Lakes, and after passing
through Alaska basin, crosses the divide to Henry Lake in Idaho,
whence it recrosses the range into Montana via Targhe Pass near the
western entrance to the park. Red Rock Lakes are one of the sources of
the Missouri river, and in Henry Lake originates one of the branches
of the Snake. From Henry Lake are distinctly visible the famous Teton
peaks. Near the western entrance to the park, prettily situated on
the south fork of the Madison river, is Grayling Inn (Dwelles), the
night station for tourists going in and out of the park. After passing
Grayling Inn the road enters the reservation, winding through Christmas
Tree Park to Riverside Military Station, following the beautiful
Madison river and canyon to the Fountain Hotel in Lower Geyser basin.”
I will not attempt to write a description of this wonderful region
myself, but will give the picturesque sketch of it written by my
friend, Olin D. Wheeler, for the Northern Pacific railway’s Wonderland
series of books. After reading the account of this trip given by Mr.
Wheeler, the reader will find that there is a great contrast in the way
of getting into the National Park now in comparison to what it was in
1880, and that vast change has taken place since General Sherman made
his trip through the “Sioux Country” in 1877.
Speaking of the train he was about to take passage on, and which was
standing in the station awaiting the hour of departure, Mr. Wheeler
says: “At its head is a huge, ten-wheeled Baldwin locomotive. On each
side of this machine there are three driving wheels sixty-two inches
in diameter. As it stands, its length from peak to pilot, or in common
parlance, cow-catcher to end of tender, is about fifty-five feet. From
the rails to top of smokestack it stands fourteen feet five inches.
With its tender loaded with coal and water it weighs nearly ninety-four
tons. Behind this noble combination of iron, brass and steel extends a
long train. First comes the mail car, in which Uncle Sam’s messengers
run a traveling postoffice. Then follows the express car, carefully
guarded by ever vigilant expressmen. The third car is the principality
of the baggage man. Then follow the various classes of passenger
coaches--the free colonists’ sleeping car, where man or woman may find
a fair bed at night and a comfortable seat by day. The smoking car, and
the first-class coaches with their high-backed, easy, reclining seats,
are succeeded by the Pullman tourist car. Behind the tourist car is the
dining car, which is a feature of this train. Behind the dining car
are the first-class Pullman sleeping cars--from two to four of them.
These are of the most approved type, with heavy trucks and wheels of
large diameter, insuring smoothness of motion. This entire train is
vestibuled and the car wheels are of paper and steel tired.
“But the bell of that monster engine is ringing, the conductor is
signaling to start. Jump aboard and we will continue our dissertation
as we glide swiftly along.”
The Northern Pacific through trains from St. Paul to Portland, Oregon,
a distance of 2,050 miles, are of the same description, only on a
larger scale. The average time these trains make is twenty-seven miles
an hour, schedule speed, including all regular stops.
After describing his journey through Dakota and up the great valley
of the Yellowstone for 341 miles in Eastern Montana until arriving at
Livingstone, where the National Park branch of the Northern Pacific
began and on which the tourist train continued to the country of
wonders, fifty-one miles away, Mr. Wheeler was still in his observation
seat taking notes of the grand scenery that the swiftly moving train
brought to view. Again he said:
“The entrance to the heart of Wonderland is through an enormous
gateway. The gateway, or opening, was made by a river, through a
mountain wall, and it is known as The Gate of the Mountains.
“Through this gateway pours the river, fresh from the eternal snows
far back in the mountains; from the great lake, a vast reservoir into
which the melting snow banks drizzle in a million streamlets; from the
wondrous canyon between whose divinely sculptured and colored walls it
throws itself in an ecstasy of fury. Beside the stream lies a railway,
which, following it in its sinuosities, leads the pilgrim to the very
border of Wonderland. As the river flows out of the mountain gate into
the broad, unpent valley, it seems to sing, in the words of Colonel
Norris, whose name is indissolubly connected with Wonderland, of the
region it is leaving far behind:
‘I sing in songs of gliding lays
Of forests scenes in border days;
Of mountain peaks begirt with snow,
And flowery parks, pine girt below;
Of goblins grim and canyons grand,
And geysers spouting o’er the strand
Of Mystic Lake, of Wonderland.’
“After having passed through the gate of the mountains one is in
Paradise valley, for such is the name of the beautiful valley which
stretches up to the portals of Wonderland. The farther one invades
these precincts, the more one comes to feel that the valley is rightly
named. The great mountains, the very temples of the gods, loom high
above. Mighty canyons, rocked ribbed, ragged, gloomy, forest-garbed,
deep and fascinating, have been gouged from their very vitals. From out
these latter the mountain streams rush, singing songs of deliverance
as they dance down the long, sweeping slopes to the mightier river.
In their courses the streams have been harnessed by man, and their
fructifying influences are seen in the broad fields of waving grain and
alfalfa that checker the slopes.
“Mountains, fields, streams, trees, slopes, form truly enough such a
picture that the thought of paradise is borne in upon me.
“The scene changes! The mountains crowd together, the valley contracts,
the rocky sides of the former rise high above, the river is throttled
by craggy canyons and rushes madly along far below us--we are in a wild
eyrie where the echoes of the iron horse’s brazen throat reverberate
among the crags and cliffs. Sweeping through this scene of wildness we
reach the threshold of the Wonderland of Wonderlands, nature’s greatest
wonderland--
YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK.
“The scene here hinted at is that beheld by the tourist as he rides
from Livingstone, on the main line of the Northern Pacific, up the
valley of the Yellowstone to Cinnabar, the terminus of the National
Park branch line at the northern edge or boundary of the great park.
“The valley is indeed one to arouse enthusiasm. At two places it
becomes constricted, forming small but ragged canyons that but pave the
way for the grander visions which, in the days to follow, are to break
upon the eye.
“Well up the valley Emigrant Peak, a noble, snow-capped mountain
of august mien, stands sentinel, thrusting his crown above brawny
shoulders to a height of 10,629 feet.
“Just before reaching Cinnabar, Cinnabar Mountain, famous for its
Devil’s Slide, is rounded. Soon there comes into view the giant peak of
the region, Electric Peak, which, with its 11,155 feet of altitude, may
well be termed the guardian peak of the park. Facing it, but of lower
altitude, stands Sepulcher Mountain, a rough, imposing mountain, the
origin of its name involved in obscurity.
[Illustration: OLD FAITHFUL GEYSER, YELLOWSTONE PARK.]
“On the opposite side of the valley rise the sister peaks of the
Emigrant and its companion, the Absaraka, the range swinging to the
eastward and forming the eastern boundary and mountain wall of the
park. High up on the flanks of the range in and about the town of
Crevasse, men are toiling with more or less of success for the gold
that everybody covets.
“But our train has stopped at the platform at Cinnabar. We step from
the cars, ready, with our hand bags and bundles, for the next move on
the program.
FIRST DAY’S RIDE.
“Soon there come prancing round the corner six splendid horses, drawing
behind them a huge Wonderland stage coach. Another appears, and, if
necessary, still others come swinging up to the platform to transport
the waiting throng on to Wonderland. How the people scramble aboard!
Some climb up the sides of the coaches to the broad, open seats on the
roof, where they will obtain, as they ride along, unobstructed views
of the landscape. Other, less agile or venturesome, clamber into the
interior of the coaches, satisfied with less elevation, less sun, and
nearly as much advantage in sightseeing. The bags and valises are
strapped on the trunk racks behind the vehicles or thrown into the
boots, the conductor calls out, “All set,” the driver tightens the
reins, speaks to his horses, and the stage is off and away over the
hills bound for Mammoth Hot Springs, seven miles distant.
“After a short ride, a collection of low and in some cases mud-roofed
houses is seen. Through the heart of the little frontier town,
Gardiner, the coaches carry us, when, swinging at right angle, we are
soon skirting the Gardiner river, a typical mountain stream with which
one falls in love at first sight. For several miles, first on one side
then on the other of this torrential, beautiful river, the coach is
slowly dragged up an ascending grade. The stream is beset with boulders
against which, over which, under which, yea, through which, as one will
easily see, the tremendous current dashes in a chorus of sound and a
mass of spray. It is a royal trout stream and the heart of the angler
leaps within him even as does the trout itself leap within the boiling
waters.