Gilpin observer., 1909-06-24


Three reports made in this way gave
varying estimates of the expense of
putting a line up the valley, but the three
coincided in this, that the cost would
be prohibitive. Engineers of reputa-
tion had in this respect agreed, but
Glover, who looked after such work
for Bucks, remained unconvinced, and
before McCloud was put into the op-
Grating department on the Short Line
he was asked by Glover to run a pre-
liminary up Crawling Stone valley.
Before the date of his report the con-
clusions reached by other engineers
had stood unchallenged.
The valley was not unknown to
McCloud. His first year in the noun
tains, in which, fitted as thoroughly
as he could fit himself for his profess
sion, he had come west and found him
self unable to get work, had been
spent hunting, fishing, and wandering.
often cold and often hungry, in the
upper Crawling Stone country The
valley in itself offers to construc-
zionist no insuperable obstacles; the
difficulty is presented in the canyon
Elbow mountains. South of this can
yon, McCloud, one day on a hunting
trip, found himself with two Indians
pocketed in the rough country, and
was planning how to escape passing a
night away from camp when his COM
panions led him past a vertical wall
of rock 1000 feet high, split into a
narrow defile down which they rode,
as it broadened out, for miles. They
emerged upon an open country that
led without break into the valley OF
the Crawling Stone below the canyon.
Afterward, when he had become a rail-
road man, McCloud, sitting at camp
fire with Glover and Morris Blood.
heard them discussing the coveted and
impossible line up the valley. He had
been taken into the circle of construc-
tionists and was told of the earlier re-
ports against the line. He thought he
knew something about the Elbow
mountains, and disputed the findings,
offering in two days ride to take the
men before him to the pass called by
the Indians the Box, and to take them
through it. Glover called it find, and
matters in the strategy Of territorial
control then came before him, the pre-
limfnary was ordered and 1McCloud's
findings were approved. McCloud him
self was soon afterward engrossed in
the problems of operating the noun
tain division; but the dream of his
life was to build the Crawling Stone
line with maximum grade of eight
tenths through the Box.
The prettiest stretch of Crawling
Stone valley lies within 20 miles of
Medicine Bend. There it lies widest.
and has the pick of water and grass
between Medicine Bend and the Mis-
sion mountains. Cattlemen went into
the Crawling Stone country before the
Indians had wholly left it. The first
house in the valley was the Stone
ranch, built by Richard Dunning, and,
it still stands overlooking the town Of
Dunning at the junction Of the French
man creek and the Crawling Stone.
The Frenchman is fed by unfailing
springs, and when by summer sun and
wind every smaller stream In the mid
die basin has been licked dry, the
Frenchman runs cold and swift be-
tween its russet hills. Richard Dun
ming, being on the border of the In
dian country, built for his ranch
house rambling stone fortress. He
had chosen, it afterward proved, the
choice spot in the valley, and he
stocked it with cattle when yearlings
could be picked up in Medicine Bend
a
a great body of valley land when 1t
could be had for the asking, and be-
came the rich man of the Long Range.
The Dunnings were Kentuckians.
Richard was a bridge engineer and
builder, and under Brodie built some
of the first bridges on the mountain
division, notably the great wooden
bridge at Smoky creek. Richard
brought out his nephew, Lance Dun
ming. He taught Lance bridge.build-
ing, and Murray Sinclair, who began
as cowboy on the Stone ranch,
learned bridge-building from Richard.
Dunning. The Dunnings both came
west. though at different times, as
young men and unmarried, and as far
as western women were concerned,
might always have remained so. But
a Kentucky cousin. Betty, one Of the
Fairfield Dunnings. related to Richard
within the sixth or eighth degree,
came to the mountains for her health
Bettys mother had brought Richard
up as a boy. and Betty, when he left
Fairfield, was a baby. But Dick-as
they knew him at homeland the
mother wrote back and forth, and he
persuaded her to send Betty out for a
trip, promising he would send her
back in n year well woman.
CTo BE CONTINUED)