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Show 169 footing, and by 1885, had solved the problems of supply. In September 1881, Captain H. S. Hawkins of the 6th Infantry U.S.A. marched a group of his men over the road from Park City, Utah, a railroad station, to Fort Thornburg. Second Lieutenant A. L. Wagner drew an excellent map, and Hawkins description was of such detail that it appears that the army planned to use this as a supply route. Two other routes were opened soon after. The first was the impractical "Carter Road" built from the Ashley Creek site of Fort Thornburg to the railhead on the Union Pacific. Heavy snow made building the road very difficult, and the soldiers, mainly from Fort Bridger, struggled to complete the route through the summers of 1882 and 1883. Part of the highest elevations required corduroy of wood to make the route usable. A third, and the most practical route, was opened in 1884 and 1885. When the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad completed V its tracks from Denver to Salt Lake City, the joining of the rails took place to the south of the reservation near Green River, Utah, in 1883. Price, Utah became a center for the railroad, and a road was built from there to the Uintah Basin, linked to both the Uintah and Ouray Agencies. When Fort Duchesne was opened in 1886 the road from Price was improved and became the major supply route. The era of intense isolation was over. 12A. R. Standing, "Through the Uintas: A History of the Carter Road," Utah Historical Quarterly. Vol. 35, No. 3 (Summer, 1965), pp.256-267. |