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Show - 20 ~S n CARDON'S· ·SHOES The Railroad Arrives in Cedar City Randall O. Christensen Serving Southern Ut.a h since 1934 ~f.~O~O'~ cO " to ¢J..{'f.l ~ 0 .. Ie":>' s'l.O IlA1vDBAGS . Reduced - ) 20" David Bulloch riding first train into C~dar City, June 14, 19~3, An R. D. Adams Photo from the Gladvs Mc- Tom Peck, Scotsman and minor railroad official, was in Cedar City: He wanted to go up onto Square, or Lone Tree, Mountain. George A. (Bert) Wood was asked to take him. Bert arranged for ' a buggy, and the two men drove .as far- up the mountain as they could. Then, they walked up to the lone tree that gave the mountain its name. It was a clear day, and they could see the Butte out on the desert. . Peck had brought along a pai::- of the finest binoculars Tradition means Quality ··CARDON'S .·D 0WNT.O WN· CED~R CITY Connell Collection. Courtesy' SUSC Special Collections Library. Wood had ever seen. He studied the view before them for some time before handing the glasses to Bert. "I'm a dreaamer '" he declared. "See where that butte is out there. Lund is -right north of that. Someday, there. will oe a train coming in here to .C edar 'City, ... and they (people) will take busses ; and they will go up to Cedar Breaks ; they will go out to the Grand Canyon; they will go over to Bryce Canyon ; and .they will go down to Zion Park. " Wood was skeptical; but, years later, he helped to develop a lot of the things the "dreamer" foretold that day. . Peck wasn't the only one to envision the possibilities of rail travel in Southern . Utah. Seventy years .before, Brigham Young had said, " From this city (Salt Lake City) , a railroad will most probably be constructed to Iron County, as also continuously to Southern California, terminating at San Diego." George A . Smith, too, had seen the need for a SALE·! MR. R MENSWEIR: 2 DAYS ONLY N6v~mber 7 and 8 Ev~rthing Banquet of "The Messiah Chorus" Chorus in the EI Escalante Hotel Dining Room, January, 1925. Courtesy in the Store Red'a ced . - 20·% MR. R MENSWEAR . . 82 North Main - Cedar City . , . railroad in the south. Only five days after arriving on Center Creek (Parowan) with • the Iron Mission company, he worte a petition on January 18, 1851, to the General Assembly requesting "a railroad from the Great Salt Lake to Iron Springs". , He recongnized the need of an industry such as he had been charged to establish for rails to carry its products to market. The trans-Continental railroad was completed in 1869. Gradually rail travel crept south, to York in 1875 and to Milford in 1880. For a quarter of a century, howe~er;- 'Mi'ford was the railhead·..of'Souther.n Utah and travel : to it was by freight wagon, stage, buck- SUSC Special Collections Library, Wm. R. and ·Kate I. Palmer Western Histor.y Collection. companies at that time board-, and white-top large enough to handle that buggy. size enterprise. Then, in 1905, the Salt It wasn't until nearly 20 Lake to Los Angeles years later that any great railroad stretched southenthusiasm was generated ward into western Iron County, and Lund betame ' to run a spur line into Cedar City. It might not the door to rail traffic for almost two decades, ' have happened then had it not been for the tourist shortening thE) freighting haul from Cedar City and . factor predicted by Tom Parowan to only 30 miles. Peck. Theodore Roosevelt's Determined to get the national conservation greatest possible benefit program had resulted in from the advantage, enthe creation of Grand terprising citizens of Cedar Canyon National City formed a company, Monument in 1908. It was raised money by public quickly fo.\lowed. by subscription to put a bond, Mukuntuweap NatIOnal and sub-let contracts to Monument, later to become smaller companies to build ZfonNational Park, in 1909. a road -from Cedar City to Subsequently, the Natinal Lund . This was a Pa ~ ks > Serv.i.e-e " w'as necessarY's tep 'sj,ncE! .tHere were no cont-ruction,- • established in 1916. |
