Ch 12, Pt 2: "Mary & Stephen Birch Arrive at Childs Glacier

Chapter 12: Mary and Stephen Birch Arrive at Childs Glacier

click on picture for larger image: these pictures are the one which appear in the book for this chapter.

Cordova depot area after RR abandonment --Cordova Museum

Below: A Miles & Childs Glacier excursion train leaves Cordova  --Cordova Museum

Below: Cordova RR yard with the town site in distance:   --Laurie Nyman collection

The train left Cordova in an easterly direction, following a relatively flat glacial out-wash for the first twenty miles, crossing many small streams before it reached the foothills south of Sheridan Glacier. It followed along the hills until reaching the first crossing of the Copper River at Flag Point, CRNW mile 27. This was a complex bridge set-up, consisting of a series of wooden trestle approaches connecting nine narrow steel spans. The longest of these spans was 300 feet. This is the area of heavy winter winds that approached 100 miles per hour, causing snow drifts high enough to completely bury entire trains, as had happened in the past. The five days in Cordova were mostly sunny, as was this day. The ten mile-wide delta with its countless ducks and other birds seemed to extend almost forever in the glimmering rays which reflected back off the long expanses of partly-submerged lowlands covered with thick marsh weeds. RR tangent east of Cordova   --B.Bragaw Collection, 85-108-12, UAF AK & Polar Regions Flag Point Bridge, CRNW MP 27    --Cordova Museum Once it crossed the bridges at CRNW mile 27, the train began heading north. It was far enough away from the shore to enable a good view of the southern edge of the Chugach Range. Then the train passed the steel bridges at Round Island, CRNW mile 34. These crossings consisted of a 200 foot span extending to a sand bar, then a wooden trestle which bridged the bar that extended to two more 200-foot steel spans. Now it was only a few miles to the Million Dollar Bridge. An excursion train approaches the Round Island bridge on the Copper River delta on the return to Cordova   --UAF, Frederick Mears, 84-75-382 Continue with "Mary and Stephen Birch Arrive at Childs Glacier"