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RGS Story, The Rio Grande Southern VoI XI 11 Durango & the Perins Peak Branch
The RGS Story Vol 11 Durango and the Perins Peak Branch by Dell A McCoy, Russ Collman & Robert W McLeod
Hard Cover w/Plastic Protective Cover
376 pages Reflections from the lights on some photos.
Copyright 2005
CONTENTS
1. Durango's First Settler 9
2. The Denver & Rio Grande Reaches Durango 15
3. Durango Acquires a Trolley 43
4. Battle For the Coal Fields Three-Rail Days139
5. Handling the U.S. Mail and Railfans Arrive on the Rio Grande Southern195
6. The Boston Coal & Fuel Company Railroad To Perins Peak327
MAP LIST
KIBBE'S The San Juan Mining Region - 1881 12
DURANGO STREET MAP - 1883-1889 32
NEW YORK & SAN JUAN Mining & Smelting Co. - 1886 33
D&RG STATION MAP - April 1901 36
DURANGO STREET MAP - 1890-1919 48
STANDARD SMELTER and Trackage - 1892 65
D&RG TRACKS at DURANGO STATION and
American Smelting & Refining Co. - 1892 66-67
INDUSTRIAL TRACKS Near Animas River - 1931 93
THE DURANGO RAILWAY & REALTY CO. CARBARN 135
DENVER & RIO GRANDE RAILROAD System - 1912 140
UTAH, COLORADO, NEW MEXICO D&RGW System ., 194
CLASON'S ROAD MAP - Southwest Colorado 194
D&RGW DURANGO YARD - 1930-1948 204-205
D&RGW DURANGO YARD - 1930-1948 - ENLARGED 208-209
DURANGO TO PERINS PEAK 326
PERINS PEAK YARD TRACK EXTENSION 342
AERIAL PHOTOGRAPH - PERINS PEAK TRACK 349
AERIAL PHOTOGRAPH - PERINS PEAK - RGS CONNECTION 356
DURANGO TO PERINS PEAK - U.S. Geological Survey - 1963 371
INTRODUCTION
THE ANIMAS VALLEY has been home to various Native American groups for thousands of years, but people often wonder who the first settler was in the area we now know as the city of Durango.
What was the valley like when that first settler arrived?
What brought him here in the first place?
The historical record is not completely clear about the identity of that first settler, but the honor almost certainly goes to a man named Robert Dwyer.
Born to John and Mary Dwyer in County Cork, Ireland, in December 1847, Robert Dwyer was destined for a life of hard knocks. When Dwyer's father died in a mine accident in 1850, his mother emigrated with young Robert to St. Johns, New Brunswick.
Tragically, Mary Dwyer died soon afterward, leaving the orphaned Robert to be raised by a man named Cornelius Harrington. The young lad received little formal education and was put to work "as soon as he was old enough."
In 1868, Dwyer moved to St. Paul, Minnesota, working various jobs there and in North Dakota. He spent six months operating a sawmill at Fort Totten, North Dakota, during the time of the Sioux uprisings in 1869.
In the fall of 1872, fearful of suffering another winter with "lung fever" in the cold Minnesota climate, Dwyer headed west to Salt Lake City.
Returning east the following summer, Dwyer stayed a few days in Denver where he heard about the mining excitement in the San Juan country. He altered his plans in order to explore this promising new land so full of opportunity.
He made his way to Pueblo, then Del Norte, the jumping off place for Baker's Park, now Silverton. Purchasing some burros, he made the perilous trip over the Continental Divide to Bakers Park, where he worked at the Little Giant mine in Arastra Gulch and prospected in his spare time.
When the Ute Indians ceded more than 6,000 square miles of land in southwest Colorado by terms of the Brunot Agreement in September 1873, Dwyer left Bakers Park to locate a ranch in the more temperate area of the Animas Valley to the south.
In an interview conducted in March 1887, Dwyer recalled that there were only three other white men in the valley when he arrived-Alexander Wilson, Mason Greenlee and David Miller. On October 11, 1873, he established his ranch on Junction Creek near its confluence with the Animas River.
While other sources name several other men as pioneer settlers in the Animas Valley that autumn, virtually all of them established farms or ranches farther north in the valley near Hermosa Creek.
Among them were Seth Sackett, Frank Trimble, A. Johnson and the aforementioned Miller. Alexander Wilson and Mason Greenlee were members of John Moss' prospecting party in the La Plata Mountains, but they did not settle in the valley.
With the weather "warm and bright" that October, Dwyer had a chance to look over the land and choose his homestead. Although the valley was awash in fall colors, it must have impressed Dwyer much as it did banker A. P. Camp seven years later. "The whole place," Camp remembered, "was covered with sage brush, sunflowers and some lofty pine trees."
Dwyer selected a cabin site near the banks of Junction Creek and began to cut and hew logs. As work progressed, he was visited by "a great many Ute Indians who looked on me with not very friendly eyes." Nevertheless, Dwyer occasionally managed to bribe one of the Utes with rations in return for help in erecting his cabin.
With his cabin built and "fixed somewhat comfortably," Dwyer was almost ready for winter. Unfortunately, the nearest store for supplies was 100 miles over the mountains at Tierra Amarilla, New Mexico. He made the trip that fall with some difficulty.
Dwyer continued to make improvements on his land. His ranch became a haven for travelers through the country. The most notable guest at the Dwyer ranch was Colorado's first Catholic bishop, Joseph Machebeuf.
In 1876, Colorado became a state, and the new town of Animas City was laid out about a half mile north of his ranch. Four years later, the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad platted a new town, Durango, a short distance to the south.
In order to make a little income, Dwyer began his career as a lawman by accepting an appointment as county sheriff in 1877. His predecessor, Richard Giles, had died in office.
Dwyer was elected to another term in 1879, though he resigned the following year because the job paid little and the work was dangerous. When Durango's citizens organized town government in April 1881, Dwyer was hired as the city's first marshal.
Four months later, while helping his deputy subdue a crazed drunk, Dwyer suffered an accidental gunshot wound. A slug from the deputy's gun passed through the troublemaker's head, struck the marshal at the side of his nose, and lodged against his jugular vein!
Several months later, Dwyer traveled to Detroit, Michigan, to have the ball removed since "at times it annoyed me." He had the near-fatal slug mounted as a watch fob, which he carried the rest of his life. The grateful citizens of Durango gave Dwyer a commemorative gold badge with a diamond in the center and smaller diamonds on each point.
Dwyer eventually sold most of his ranch to the Durango Railway & Realty Company, and it was developed as Durango's Brookside addition. He built a beautiful brick home at what is now 2535 West Second Avenue, where he and his wife, Mary Jane, raised their two sons. The Dwyer home was placed on Durango's Register of Historic Places in November 1996.
In his later years, Dwyer owned mining properties, bought and sold real estate, and was a shareholder in the Smelter National Bank. A devout Catholic, he helped lay the cornerstone of St. Columba's Catholic Church in June 1881 and gave financial assistance to the Sisters of Mercy to maintain and expand Mercy Hospital.
While many of La Plata County's pioneers eventually moved away, Robert Dwyer lived out his life in Durango. "My faith in Durango," he stated not long before he died in 1920, "has never wavered. That it will be a good business town and a pleasant place to live, I firmly believe."
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