Omaha daily bee., 1883-12-01

wss named after him. A young ma,
named CLARK, a relative O
Horace +. Clark, afterwards pres
ident of the road, was also killed
We frequently had some very narrow es
capes from the Indians. Among othe
capcrs they once carried off thirty mile
of telegraph wire"
"Of course you suffered hardships a
| timcs1r
"Very frequently. In the spring q
1867 we marched 800 miles throu III snoS
two feet deep, aud could not eros,
the mountains on account of snow.
When we crossed the plains tho buf,lc
and antelope were very thick, aud We had
plenty of fresh meat, which helped IL,
out considerably. The bniTlloes were 80
thick that frequently they had to be
driven away to allow the passage of the
o Y freight trains that were then eros ,ing
the plains. The buifaloes were so tame
that they came up tn the trouyhs ut old
Fort kenrney to drink. When We
crossed the Red desert we had 60 carry
water for a whole week in blrrots. We
ran oNt OF sater aud were loft in n sori.
GUS predicament. Had il not boon for a
heavy rain storm one night we would
have died before We could have got wa.
ter. We dug holes in the ground and
thus collected enough water to carry us
through tn Bitter Creek"
Can yCu give us anything else regard.
ing the early days of tho Union Paciic1'
"Well, for q while was inspector of
ties and bridge material Mt Omaha. Tho
ties were floated do n the rivor on RATS,
and were brought up tho river in steam
ers. join A. Horbach was q heavy con.
tractor in those days. In the spring of
1856 the river was unusually high, and
carried off an immense number of ties
aud swept every portion OF the first
mile of track. One of tho steamboats,
was also sunk"
Who were the chief engineers of tho
road7'
First came Peter A. Dey, who was
followed by j. L. House, who wa, act.
ing chief engineer until the appointment
of 7. b. Reed. The next was General
D.dye, who wssfollowedby T Il Sickles.
The present chief engineer, Mr.. Blick-
ensderfcr, was tho man selected by
tho government to determine what con
stituted tho Rocky Mountain division"
a., Interview With j. IG. House.
when die you begin your surveying
work on the . ZION PAcitic" inquired n
Bea co nmisstonor of Mr.. j. Il.
House, who had charge of the first sur.
veys on the eastern division of tho road.
~ oam, her, in Ootobor, 1853. Cur
surveys were started on the 18th of that
mouth. We atarted a limo from the
river to tho we'tw,rd, AMI crossed the
e khorn river at the present location.
We were engaged during the winter of
lSG3.G4 in making surveys between what
is now known as the Sioux City & Pa
ciiic, on the north, and tho Plato river
on the south. We really made two loca-
tions from Omaha to Fremont. One was
on the Dey liue to tho Elkhnrn river,
and the other WAS up the valley of the
Big Papillion by the way of Elkh ,rn
CITY and Bell Creek. | was in charge of
tho surveys aud locations, and was the
engineer of construction for the contrac-
tors. Peter A Day was the chief engi.
noer of the railroad company"
"When did you begin grading on the
Dey line2"
1--WE began grading on the Dey line in
the spring of 1864 Mr.. N. l.. Williams,
of Syracuse, N. y, had charge of the
frat four mlles to the summit, and Lewis
Carmichael had charge of tho work be-
You'd. We worked ON the grade during
the summer of 1864. think it was in
January, 1860, that the Chicago Il Rock
Island was completed from Grinnell To
Keller, and tho entire force of men and
cams was transferred from that road to
the Union Pacific, and right in the midst
of this orders came to change tho loca-
ton of the road 10 tho Mud Creek
"Whon did you make tho changer
"Not until February, as | had to sur
vey the now route; but meantime | kept
the men at work on the Dey line in order
to hold tn I'm. BY the way, during the
summer of 1864 We worked a very small
force on the grade, not averaging at
times over twenty five mon, the trouble
being that the freighters kept hiring our
men away from us for teamsters. 1t was
almost impossible to keep men"
"When was the track laying beguu2"
''lu August, 1865. We laid, and had
examined aud accepted, frrty miles of
track by January, 1866 From this time
work progressed very rapidly. During
the winter of 1Sj6-G7 the headquarters
of the superintendent Of construction
were at North Platte, and during the
winter of i867-6S Mt Cheyenne"
"When did Chief Engineer Dey re-
sigu2''
in February, 1865. was then divi-
sion engineer III charge ofconstructionfor
the contractors. When Chief Engineer
Reed came, is Dey's successor, in Janu-
AIRY, 1866, | WAS transferred to tho engi-
neer department Of the road. | located
the second 100 miles Of the road in tho
month of February that year"
Where were your headquarters in
Omaha2"
"Over Caldwell & Hamilton's bank,
until the fall of 1865, when the construc-
ton department moved their offices to
the little old capitol building the first
capitol of Nebraska-on the west side of
Ninth street, between Farnam and
Douglas. 1t was long since tore down.
Our offices remained i'll that building I'M
til 1869"
Odd you ever have orders to stop
work, and go to Bellevue with a view of
locating the road from that point2"