The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1917-07-27

ravine, taking it's name from the little
brook far down in its narrows, was
known as the kicking Horse"
So the railroad ran up the ravine
and the Picket Wire was left still vir-
gin to the assaults of man. But the
day came when it was despoiled Of it's
hitherto long standing, unravished in
nocence. Shouts of men, cracking of
whips, trampling of horses, grooming
of wheels, wordless but vocal protests
of beasts of burden mingled with the
ringing Of axes, the detonations of dy-
Mantle The whistle of engines and
the roar of steam filled the valley. On
der the direction Of engineers, huge
mound of earth arose across it's mar
rOwest part, nearest a shoulder, or
spur, of the mesa reaching westward.
No more should the silver Picket Wire
flow unvexed on its way to the sea. It
was to be damned.
All that the huge, hot inferno of
baked plain, where sage brush and
buffalo grass alone grow, needed to
make it burgeon with wheat and corn
was water. The little Picket Wire
which had meandered and sparkled
and chartered on at its own sweet will
was now to be held until it filled a
great lakelike reservoir in the hills
back of the new earth dam. Then
through skillfully located irrigation
bitches the water was to be given to
the millions of hungry little wheatlets
and cornlets, which would clamor for
drink. The fierce sun was no longer to
work its unthwarted will in burning
up the prairie.
With the promise of water on the
plain beyond, Coronado sprang into
newer and more vigorous life. In the
language of the West it Doomed" The
railroad had been a forlorn branch
running up into the mountains and
ending nowhere. It's first builders had
been daunted by difficulties and lack
of money, but as soon as the great dam
was projected, which would open sew
eral hundred thousand acres for cult
walton and serve as an inspiration in
it's practical results to other similar
attempts, people came swarming into
the country buying up the land, the
price for acreage steadily mounting.
The railroad accordingly found it
worth while to take up the long-aban-
doned construction work of mounting
the range and crossing it. Men sud-
denly observed that it was the short
est distance between two cardinal
points, and one of the great transcOn-
tinental railways bought it and began
improving it to replace it's original
rather unsatisfactory line.
The long wooden trestle which
crossed the broad, sandy depression in
front of the town, the bed of the an
cient river, through which the Picket
Wire and further down its affluent, the
Kicking Horse, flowed humbly and
mOdestly, was being replaced by a
great viaduct of STEEL Far up the
gorge past the other side of the Span
ish Mesa another higher trestle had al
ready been replaced by a splendid
steel arch. A siding had been built
near the ravine, a path made to the
foot of the mesa, and arrangements
were being made to run local train
up from the town when all was COM
pleted to give the people an oppor-
tunity to ride up the gorge and see the
great pile Of rock, on which enterprise
was already planning the dissertation
of summer hotel, the blasphemy of
an amusement park!
Up the valley of the Picket Wire one
morning in early fall came a young
man roughly dressed like the average
cow-puncher from the ranches further
north. He rode we'll, yet with a Ger
tain attention to detail and a niceness
that betrayed him to the real rough
rider of the range, just as the clothes
he wore, although they were the or
binary cattleman's outfit, were worn
in little different way that again be-
trayed him. One look into the face of
the man, albeit his mustache and beard
hid the revealing outlines of mouth
and chin, sufficed to show that here
was no ordinary cow-puncher. He rode
boldly enough among the rocks of the
trail and along the rough road, which
had been made by the wheels of the
wagons and hOofs of the horses. There