Evening star., 1933-09-03

- IFTY years ago man completed his
struggle of more than a decade with
the wild and desolate Northwest when
he drove the last spike into the rails OF
the first Northern transcontinental
railway
Fifty years have passed and now large ana
important cities have arisen along the line
where once the Grow, the Sioux and the Black
foot roamed where only the hardest Of white
pioneers dared traverse and where many lives
were lost in civilizations westward expansion.
September g. 1883, is the day that opened
up the vast untamed territory lying between
the Great Lakes and the Pacific Coast. On
that day. Henry Willard, father of the liberal
journalist Oswald Garrison Willard, drove home
the last spike on the great railroad that helped
take people and industry to the Northwest
Even before the Civil War, Eastern fnanciers
had dreamed of the possibilities of this great
Northwestern empire. But it was not until
1864 that President Lincoln signed the con-
gressicnal charter authorizing the construction
of the railroad that later became the Northern
Pacific And actual work on this great prof.
ect had to wait six more years. when the nrSt
shovelfuls of earth were turned at Thomson,
new Carlton MINI. near Lake Superior.
THE county that is now Minnesota. the Da-
kotas, Montana, wyoming. Utah, Wash
irotor and Oregon was almost unknown to
the white man at that time. In 1870 not
town existed between the Red River OF the
north and what is now Bozeman, Mont.
distance of 781 miles Central Montana was
entirely waste SO far as white civilization was
concerned The site of Bismarck, N Dakr
was shimmering expanse of prairie.
Tacoma, the proposed Pacific terminal OF
the Northern Pacific had practically no popu-
lation to speak of in 1870. Duluth, the nrst
Eastern terminal, was settlement OF 3ou
Spokane including its surrounding three
counties had $50, and the total white popu-
lation of Northern Idaho Appropriated 500.
Only Seattle could be considered Of fair Size
It's population then was 200O
Bitter cold Winters faced the railroad build
ers Savage Indians threatened them. Deso-
late prairies stretched for miles on all Sides
And finally the formidable Rockies stood as an
almost impossible barrier to their progress
But with the aid of Government troops, with
the persistence Of staunch leaders, the army OF
surveyors, graders, tracklayers, scrapermen,
mules, cooks and camp followers dogged their
way to the western slope of the Rockies, where
another gang of railroad builders coming East
from the Pacific met them The final meeting
place was at Gold Greek, in the Heliga@e
Canyon of Montana.
The first three years of this westward str7ig-
gle seemed fairly easy. Brainerd, Mimi, was
reached late in 1870 and the Red River the
following year. The work continued almost
uninterrupted across the Dakota pratries until,
IN 1873 the tracklayers arrived at Bismarck,
N Dak on a high bluff overlooking the Mis-
souri, River.
BISMARCK Was a pine-board town OF hard
u drinking, gambling and swearing COW
punchegs, cavalrymen and bcatmen- Its main
street Of paanked sidewalks. its wood-front
stores, its restaurants, gambling halls and
drinking resorts resounded with clanking spurs
and the shouts OF the bull -whackers. The
occasional blast Of the river boat made 1t evi-
dent that here, in Bismarck, West was really
West
And here. for six years, the western terminal
q the Northern Pacific remained For it was
ln 1873 that the New York banking house Of