I had originally planned to return home from Idaho on Friday so I could attend a stake women's conference, but I decided to stay through part of the day Saturday to get some more work done. This turned out to be perhaps not the best decision, as on Saturday morning, a decent amount of snow started falling in Idaho Falls. The forecast said the snowfall would continue through the afternoon accumulating to potentially over 5 inches, so I figured I'd better not wait to leave until after lunch as I'd thought. Even with my plan to depart ASAP, there were still several things I wanted to complete, so I didn't end up getting on the interstate until about 11:00. Fortunately, the worst weather was in Idaho Falls, so as I drove on it got progressively better. True, there was some pretty torrential rain at parts, but nothing I didn't feel equal to handling.
In contemplating my trip home, I'd thought to make another stop along the way at some point of interest like I had on the way up. My first thought was to go to Logan and visit the temple there, but it was a little farther out of the way than I wanted to go. Then I thought about maybe just going to the Salt Lake temple on the way home. This seemed rather too ordinary, as I will no doubt get myself there in the near future anyway. Finally, I remembered seeing something about Promontory Point when I was in Brigham City and thought that would be a good place to go see. I wasn't sure where it was, so I looked it up and it appeared to be not much farther off the interstate than Brigham City itself, though to the west rather than the east. This seemed like the perfect scheme, so I'd settled it in my mind to go see Golden Spike National Historic Site on the way back.
While it was no longer snowing, it was quite dreary and cold when I got to Utah, and I seriously considered giving up my plan. When the moment of decision arrived, though, I figured that despite the less-than-ideal conditions, it was worth taking a chance to see something I may not get another occasion to visit so conveniently in the future. I was rather regretting my decision about 30 minutes later when it became clear I was headed out to the middle of nowhere much further than I'd originally believed based on the map. It was definitely farther than Brigham City and it was so deserted and ill-marked along the way, that I became uneasy that I'd somehow passed it and started off on a wild goose chase. Fortunately, my courage didn't altogether fail me, and eventually I started seeing markers again and came to the right place.
When I went in, there were only two cars in the parking lot. The ranger inside told me a group had just left to tour the enginehouse. He radioed the other ranger and asked if I could join the tour, which was affirmed. So I made the short drive up and joined the group. There were about 5 other people already there. A few things had already been explained apparently, but I made it for most of the tour.
Lots of interesting things were discussed. The two engines, the Jupiter and the 119, are pretty much exact replicas based on pictures of the originals. Even the paint jobs are historically accurate. In the Gilded Age, bright colors and beautiful engines were typical, and each engine would be completely wiped down after each trip. This remained important until hauling passengers became less profitable than hauling freight, at which point more subdued colors were preferred.
This is a picture of the sand dome on the 119. It stored the sand that would be released to run under the wheels to provide traction on uphill climbs. From pictures, it's well known that the dome had a painting of Johnny Appleseed on one side. Because there were no pictures of the other side, it was decided to paint a picture of prominent Utah figure Jim Bridger, who is credited with discovering the Great Salt Lake. I was proud of myself for coming up with the right answer when the ranger asked what the train would use sand for. But don't worry, my ego wasn't too inflated, because I also answered several questions wrong! Basically, I was the only one willing to venture a guess.
Several railroad jobs were discussed. Interestingly, being the engineer was considered the best job on the train, though it was pretty filthy and unpleasant, considering it was right near the boiler and the cabin was open to the air in the back so the firemen could get to the fuel to throw into the boiler. I was lucky enough to have more of a reference point for what the engine jobs were like, having seen the episode of Top Gear where Jeremy raced the others on a steam train and worked as a fireman.
The worst and most dangerous job by far, probably on the entire railroad, was working as a brakeman. Each brakeman would typically have charge of several cars, and his job would be to apply the wheel brakes when a slowdown was required. He would apply the brakes on one car, then dash along the top of it while still moving and put the brakes on the next car and so on until he applied the brakes for all his cars. While this responsibility seems dangerous enough while the train is in motion, the brakeman's job was even worse before the trip started. He was in charge of placing the connecting pin to link the cars up at the station. This was very dangerous because there were two major risks. First off, if he didn't place the pin correctly quick enough, he was likely to lose fingers or a hand. Secondly, brakemen were crushed to death between the cars with some regularity. Apparently, when hiring brakemen, they could tell how experienced you were by how many fingers you had. Someone with all their fingers was a newbie and someone with no fingers was retired! I was caught by surprise by realizing as the ranger explained this while putting his hand on the coupling that he was missing several fingers on that hand. It lent a weird kind of realism to what he was saying, though I'm pretty positive that isn't how he lost his fingers.
It's hard to see why anyone would sign up for such a dangerous job as brakeman, but the pay was very good for the time. Also, there were many former soldiers after the Civil War who were looking for jobs along with recent Irish and Italian immigrants, and the railroads were one of the biggest employers at the time. They did have problems keeping people on though, as many would work on the railroads just long enough to acquire funds to go west and make a gold claim. This is why the Chinese ended up being a major force, especially for laying the track. They came initially for the gold too, but were later banned from laying claims. This left them little recourse other than signing on with the largest employer, the railroads. They ended up being hugely integral to the success of the transcontinental railroad efforts.
There were other interesting tidbits too. Like the fact that between the wood used by the track along with the much larger wood supply that was required to fuel some of the engines, like the Jupiter, 1/3 of California's forests were used at the time. Interestingly, the Jupiter was also not intended to be the engine used at the Golden Spike ceremony. Due to a signaling error, the Antelope, which was intended for the honor, was struck by a large log rolled down a mountain by a logging operation and damaged as they didn't know there were two engines passing.
After the tour was done, I asked the ranger what I had missed. He was there with one of the engineers who had answered a few of my questions earlier in the tour. I hadn't missed much info, but then I had a number of questions which both answered for me. This went on for quite awhile, as both of them were adding more info than I probably needed in response to my questions. I think they were just excited to have someone actually interested, since I think they don't get many visitors in the winter, and if my group was any indication, most are pretty passive and uninquisitive.
The ranger eventually had to get back to the visitor center, but in response to one of my questions, the engineer suggested showing me the cabin of the Jupiter. So I got to actually go up in the train and see everything. It was cool to be on the train itself. The engineer even let me ring the bell, which was pretty awesome. The bell would signal certain things while the whistle would indicate others. I remember that one indicated which direction the train was going, but I can't remember which.
After getting out of the Jupiter, the engineer also showed me the machine shop where they do all the repairs for both engines. This was probably a little more than I had much desire to see, but he showed me the different machines they use and explained a bit about them. While it was somewhat interesting to me to see, it no doubt would have been appreciated much more by someone like Gerrit. I think that the engineer believed me to be rather more entirely interested than I really was. It was nice of him to show me everything, though I was a little unsure how acceptable it was for me to see everything I did. I definitely got a much closer look than the regular tour, as I went to areas that are roped off for the general public. Either way, there was no harm done, and I had a great time seeing and learning about everything!
The visitor's center was pretty anti-climactic after the enginehouse. The Golden Spike isn't even there, it's at Stamford as the original maker willed it to them or something. Plus, the monument wouldn't have sufficient security for it in the end. So maybe I will have to go to Stamford sometime to complete the picture! I did learn about how Promontory Summit was graded too steeply in their eagerness to join the lines, which over time meant a lot of strain and expense for the engines, requiring helper engines to be used in the area. These expenses lead to the construction of a causeway across the Great Salt Lake in 1903, which cut off a significant distance from the Promontory line and resulted in major savings. The whole Promontory line was pulled up in World War II to use the metal for war efforts and a ceremonial undriving of the spike was performed, although the real Golden Spike had been removed long before.
The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful. I got home safely and was very glad that I'd decided to take time to swing by Promontory. It was very interesting and allowed me to see some things I probably couldn't have seen any other time. The whole trip was a very good experience for me. It allowed me to feel very useful and have some valuable experiences along the way. I'm glad that I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to go to Idaho.
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