The San Francisco call., 1898-12-30
EASTERN TRUNK
 LINE EXPECTED Northern CalifOrnianS Have Strong Hopes. LANDS ALREADY BOOMING
LANDS ALREADY BOOMING
EXTENSION OF BURLINGTON OR UNION PACIFIC PREDICTED.
But the Southern Pacific Is Also Watching the Situation and Will Endeavor to Shut
 Out Competition.
Special Dispatch to The Call.

BEDDING, Dec. 2S.-Strong hopes
 are entertained in extreme Northeast ern California that rumors of the com
 ing of an Eastern trunk line railroad are soon to be realized. The rumors
 are so persistent that people all along the prospective route are becoming in- fected with the speculative spirit aroused by the advent of a great over land road into new territory, and the price of farm and stock lands has re-
 ceived an upward tilt in consequence. Several years ago the Union Pacific surveyed a line from Bedding up Pit | River, through MOdoc County, and on to Boise City Idaho, where connection | was made with the Oregon Short Line. | The survey was without result to the country traversed, as the Union Pacific | never made any attempt at construc- | tion work, though the engineers made a most favorable report to headquarters in Omaha. It is now reported that sur veyors were again in the field, working this way from Idaho, and were only withdrawn late in the fall It is ex- pected that early in the spring they will again take the field and push forward to the head of the Sacramento Valley.
 What road these surveyors represent is
 not known but it is the general opin-
 ion here that the Union Pacific is be-
 hind'the survey.
 Were 1t not for the fact that the "Q''
 road has considerable realty holdings,
 besides dock privileges, at Grays Har-
 bori Washington, there would be req son to believe that the Chicago Bur lington and Quincy was headed this
 way, making for San Francisco by the l most feasible pass through the Sierras by following the course of Pit River. passing down the Sacramento Valley and entering Lake County and thence to a junction with the Donohue road at
 Hopland or thereabout. Billings, Mon tana, Is the western terminus of ll,e
 Burlington track. The Union Pacific
 would follow the same route as out lined for the Burlington. One of the most fertile stock regions on the coast lies directly in the path of the survey.
 Three spurs from the lines of the Southern Pacific Company, lying in waiting for indications of overland competition from northeastward. are gradually being thrown forward in the | direction of Idaho. though on the sur- | face these branches appear to be noth- | ing but feeders to the main line from | the Sierra timber belts. One road l leaves the Shasta route at Anderson | in this county, another at Castle Graz, and the third at Upton, in Siskiyou 1 County. The latter, the McCloud River
 Railroad, has been built with a solid
 substantial roadbed, inspected and ac,
 cepted by the Southern Pacific engi-
 neers, and railroad people have inti-
 mated time and again that that road
 would be used to head off any Eastern
 trunk line that might seek to enter the
 State from the northeast The Castle
 Graz line will be pushed forward in the | spring to Modoc County, following the
 timber belt to the Whitehorse forests
 where a Michigan syndicate has a bond l on 90,000 acres of sugar and yellow pine
 lands. The people of Modoc believe 1 that it is this road which will event
 ually be continued forward to South
 eastern Oregon with the idea of shut | ting out the Union Pacific or any other | incoming road. If the development of the
 Oriental trade, tooether with the easy
 matter of financing road with money so abundant in banking and financial centers of the country, induces any of l the big comnanies in the Northwest to strike toward California it will be over the route along Pit River down to the Sacramento Valley. It is through a
 rough country for e'-rtv or one hun
 dred miles, but cannot be compared
 with the Shasta route in expense per
 mile.