Ch 18, Pt 2: "Birch Private Train #73"

Legacy of the Chief, Chapter 18, Pt 2: "Birch Private Train #73-19"

The train began slowing on the last straight stretch for the tight curve followed by the run over the gorge at Kuskulana. The cantilever steel bridge was built to last. No vibration could ever be felt on the train when it was over the steel part of the bridge. But the wooden trestle approaches shook as the train reached it. The far approach again trembled as the short consist left the steel section for the east trestle approach. It was 237 feet straight down at center, providing a view which, over the years, would cause many a passenger to gasp. The train slowed to the customary ten miles an hour. Birch and Jackling and their two assistants had a good view of the gorge from the high point of the steel bridge.  Various construction views of the Kuskulana Bridge: Top row is from the UAF AK & Polar Regions photo archives. The sepia-ones are from the Van Cleve photo collection. “One of the our overriding considerations in closing the Kennecott mine system will be the amount of maintenance we can defer on this railroad. This bridge may be here a long time. It was certainly designed to last a good century. But most of the line is still highly temporary and expensive to maintain. At this late stage of mine development, we don’t want to find ourselves rebuilding much of this railroad only to close it a year or two later. We want to run the line as long as possible with all our old original equipment and keep it running economically until it is ready to fall apart. This more than anything else may ultimately determine when we shut the whole works down.” Jackling was surprised by this. “I thought that the plan called for extending the Cordova mainline on to Fairbanks.” “Sorry I never brought you up on that, Dan. I forgot that you’re new to this Kennecott Alaska business. Years ago we gave up on that possibility when it became apparent just how hostile the territorial government is to our operation. Once the federal government began building the railroad out of Seward that possibility was eliminated. We will pull out of the railroad business in Alaska when we abandon our mines. There is nowhere near enough other business to support this railroad without our mines.” Kuskulana Gorge & steel bridge  --Laurie Nyman photo Dan looked out the large window toward the distant Chugach Range on his right. To the north he could now get a close view of the treeless Crystalline Mountains. There was nothing unusual about them if you lived in Alaska. But elsewhere they would be considered most remarkable. “What an irretrievable loss for most every adventurous wandering soul. This is scenery which everyone should see at least once in their lifetime.” “We went to so much trouble to carve out this route, Dan. Nature will reclaim our millions of dollars worth of work very quickly. I wonder what people who visit the area by some other means will be thinking sixty years from now -- those people who happen to look down on some piece of overgrown right of way , and spot our old rails way out here. “We’ll leave behind all our old station buildings, but they’re all of wood frame construction. They will all succumb to the elements, or be destroyed by salvagers, vandals and all the other human parasites which always exist in the shadowy background of humanity. “And the wooden trestles. There are so many of them. We’ll see the grand daddy of them all soon. The Gilahina is coming up. These are all going to undoubtedly begin falling in once we abandon the area. We are continually rebuilding parts of them. They are the main reason we have to consider our timing carefully. At one time on the Cordova main line we were going to replace almost all of them with permanent steel ones. The rest of them we were going to fill in. We have already filled in many miles of low-lying trestles. But the large ones like the Gilahina or the O’Brien Creek trestle will just have to be held together by whatever means we can muster until there is nothing further we can do with them. We built the system to last only ten years, you know. Now it’s been thirteen. That’s about enough.” Tom Bell came out with the coffee. Stephen smiled and accepted, as did Jackling. The company aides remained silent as they listened to this long speech. Dermot was getting bored. Stephen’s been at this business too long. He’s talking like an old man. He ought to think about retiring. “Who in the not so distant future could ever possibly conceive of what it really took to build this railroad and mine system into what we now have? Will those distant travelers even care? When we leave, mark my words, only the Indians and a few very hardy or very foolish whites will remain behind. This place will rapidly revert to the wilderness we found here only a few years ago. Little will ultimately remain to remind those people of the grandeur of what once was, what still is today. “None of us will be alive then. No one will remember who we were. If anything, we’ll probably only exist in some school kids’ textbooks as greedy capitalist monsters with no stake in the future of this territory. “We have done so much and come so far. My entire adult life with all the luxuries and power I now enjoy can be directly attributable to this one area. Many came here to follow their dreams. I was one of them. The two of us in this car, representing the absolute pinnacle of industrial American power, will become insignificant in the face of Mother Nature. She will eventually overwhelm everything we have accomplished in this territory.” The train began slowing as it approached the large curved trestle crossing the small Gilahina River ninety-four feet below. This was the largest and tallest wooden bridge in the system--a particularly outstanding example of the uniqueness of the CRNW Railway. The mammoth structure was completed in ten days in the middle of winter when temperatures ran no warmer than thirty below and even dipped to sixty below for a time. Nothing quite like this special bridge would ever be built in this manner again. Gilahina trestle   --Laurie Nyman collection A CRNW passenger train crosses the Gilahina trestle --Skinner Foundation, PCA 44-2-153, Ak State Library In the rear is observation car # 100. The locomotive is one the the new 70-series. ”We may both be part of the so-called evil capitalist elite, but we are much more than that, Dan. We created opportunities which no one else could even imagine. Both of us. You in Utah and I right here. But as I have gotten older and slowed down, I have had to reconsider some of my earlier assumptions. “I had always closed my mind to the Indians who lived here. I did not want to know. I guess because I really knew deep down inside that our mining and railroading activities have come at their expense. I even made it clear that there would be a policy of no Indian hire at Kennecott itself. I was always afraid it might open a can of worms. “I tried to placate their leaders, especially Nicolai. I found myself admiring that man greatly. He stood up to us with quiet dignity while knowing full well how heavily we stacked the cards against him. And he knew that I knew. On matters that were really important to him, he never surrendered his position. In the end, he quietly forced us into concessions that I have to admit were only right. “Not that I could have done it much differently. There were some things we could have done better. But I am a mining geologist representing a profit making company. The biggest of its type. Nicolai understood that. At least, I think he did. It did not take long back in those early days for me to figure out that nothing involving the Indians would work out right if Nicolai was left out of it. Now he’s gone with no one to replace him. What a great loss. Not just for his own people either.” “Steve, you can’t beat yourself up over that. I had my own dealings with them in Utah. It’s not exactly like we could ever go back in time and straighten it all out. I guess it was we who brought in the diseases. And the alcohol. Some among us used it almost as a weapon. None of us paid for any of that land. We never even considered it. We didn’t even ask. We just moved in and overwhelmed them by our sheer numbers and strength.” “Well, Dan, I can’t take it back now. I wouldn’t, anyway. But I once made a promise to help one of Nicolai’s own. I committed myself to advance his education. I won’t forget that. Maybe it’s the only thing I can really do. After all they must all live in our world under our rules. We should at least teach them what that means.” Stephen leaned back and closed his eyes. This was all very stressful and he needed his rest now. Number 73 pulled out of the Gilahina River area and onto a series of very long straight stretches. The engineer cut the locomotive’s power loose, bringing the massive Mikado up to speeds exceeding seventy miles per hour. The sun was shining without any cloud cover as the engineer brought the massive sleek black steel hulk up to its full capacity. The sun’s rays reflected off the large brass bell, bouncing intensely bright beams toward the distant hills. The loud steam whistle sent forth loud bursts which echoed for miles. The railroad was in its glory in 1923.   CRNW MP 195: The final destination: Kennecott --Candy Waugaman photo Continue with Ch 19, "Birch Party at McCarthy"