Judge Hemingray looks for lost grizzlies

Mediocre mines by Robert Carter

D. Robert Carter

From 1873 through 1877, tourism continued to thrive in American Fork Canyon, and each of those years, the canyon attracted important men like a magnet.

Utah artist George M. Ottinger and prominent photographer C.R. Savage visited the canyon in 1874, accompanied by Savage's son.

Their train car ran smoothly up the track behind the small engine referred to as the "iron colt."

During the daytime, Mr. Humphries, the railroad's superintendent, put a handcar and a man to run it at the trio's disposal, so they could roam the canyon at will. In the evening, the cool August nighttime air encouraged the party to sleep under three blankets.

The two artists tarried in the canyon in search of views — and they found them. Ottinger painted what he labeled "Lone Peak," while Savage photographed the artist. The photographer also took pictures of Hanging Rock, the "old tumble-down saw mill" and other canyon scenery. Many prints from these glass plate negatives survived to provide us with a view of what the men saw.

The pleasures and scenery in American Fork Canyon continued to thrill rusticators in 1876. In August of that year, a party of 30 or 40 campers from Salt Lake City traveled to the canyon to escape the rat race of city life, much the same as we do today. Included in the group were Chief Justice Michael Schaeffer, Judge Hemingray, Postmaster Moore, District Attorney Howard, Capt. Parsons, Court Clerk S.C. Hill, Fred Lockley and their families.

The pace of life slowed, and responsibilities changed in the canyon. A vacationer who returned from American Fork Canyon reported to the Salt Lake Tribune that the last time he saw "Chief Justice Schaeffer, he was toting two buckets of water to the camp for the ladies to boil potatoes in, while District Attorney Howard was fattening the trout on bait, and Judge Hemingray was looking for two or three lost grizzlies up in the mountains."

Some hunters actually succeeded in bagging their bear, but few of the animals were grizzlies. In August 1876, three Salt Lake City men killed a small bear near a sawmill in the canyon, traveled to Salt Lake City, donated one of the bear's hindquarters to the Tribune and returned to the hunt.

Regardless of whether tourists stayed a day or a week, the return ride to the valley provided sightseers with a thrilling conclusion to their trip. The locomotive went down the canyon first and the rolling stock followed later, drawn by gravity. No engine obstructed the view of the tourists.

A Salt Lake Herald reporter left the following first-hand account of the trip back to the valley:

"The cars are impelled by their own weight, the momentum increasing rapidly as they descend. They wind smoothly over serpentine track, now seeming to be on the point of driving full face against a perpendicular mountain of rock, but gracefully escaping a catastrophe by gliding round a curve, through a narrow gorge, only to repeat the action within a hundred yards; rolling across a bridge thirty feet above the dancing, dashing, foaming stream, and finally emerging into one of the prettiest valleys of the earth . . . Mr. Smails stands with hands on the brake, and not only regulates the speed, but inspires one with perfect assurance."

From 1873 through 1877, the canyon railroad began operating in the spring as soon as the snow melted off the track. Until tourist season began, trains ran "semi-occasionally," or only when they were needed to service the canyon's industries. American Fork Canyon became a popular tourist destination in 1873. People preferred it to Lake Point and other resorts on the Great Salt Lake.

This tourist trade stimulated business in the town of American Fork. Some visitors bought lunch there, and others stayed a night or two. This commercial activity usually extended into the fall. Late in September 1876, the Salt Lake Herald reported concerning the seasonal bustle in American Fork, "Parties of tourists pass through the place daily."

At the beginning and toward the end of tourist season, trains operated on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Sightseers usually crowded the canyon during July and August, and trains made daily trips up and down the canyon, except on Sunday.

During the summer of 1874, 10 to 15 small railroad cars loaded with charcoal, bullion, ore and lumber made the trip down the canyon each day. That same year, some of the mines in the canyon began to peter out, and for the next several years, prospectors located new finds, but these claims proved unprofitable to mine.

Railroad traffic generated by the mining industry declined, even though tourism continued to increase. Without business from the mines, the little canyon railway did not make enough money to justify its existence.

Near the end of the 1875 tourist season, probably the busiest year the canyon saw until it was opened to automobile traffic, the Salt Lake Herald predicted, "We foresee the time when every body will visit American Forkcanyon, and its railroad will pay handsome dividends."

Half of this prognosis failed miserably. Tourists continued to visit the canyon, but in 1878, the American Fork Canyon Railroad Co. became the first Utah railway to go out of business. That railroad season began early in April when a horse-drawn train moved laboriously up the canyon. Little more than a month later, newspapers received the word that starting on May 27, regular trains would run into the canyon, not to bring in tourists, but to remove the track, starting from the top and working down the canyon.

This information caused the Salt Lake Tribune to lament, "It is a great pity that the mines in American Fork have not proved sufficiently rich and extensive to warrant the continuous operation of the canyon road."

Salvagers removed all the switches and sidings first, and then they tore up the track. By July 20, 1878, the railroad was gone, but the Tribune was careful to report that the scenery, cold water and trout fishing were still there.

The canyon railroad company stored the salvaged ties and rails in American Fork. The Tribune reported the Wasatch & Jordan Valley Railroad Co. bought many of the rails to use in their extension up Big Cottonwood Canyon. The Salt Lake Herald said the Utah & Pleasant Valley Railway also used many of the rails and ties on the railroad it constructed in Spanish Fork Canyon.

A good wagon road replaced the railroad track. Most of the current North Fork road now covers the old railroad grade. Stephen Carr states in his book, "Utah Ghost Rails," that where the highway begins its steep climb to Tibble Fork Reservoir, the old track bed can still be seen following the course of the stream to the east of the road.

Robert Keppernick, proprietor of the American Fork House Hotel in American Fork, planned to run a coach and saddle train up the canyon on this wagon road for the use of tourists who stayed in his establishment.

N.C. Heiselt soon started an express carrying passengers and mail from the Utah Southern Railroad tracks in American Fork to Forest City. He drove up the canyon on Mondays and Thursdays, and returned to American Fork on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Heiselt charged $3 for the round trip.

How did the mine owners get along without the railroad to haul their ore? Toward the end of September 1878, the Tribune reported: "Ore shippers from the Fork don't seem to feel very bad over the railroad's removal, as they get ore down by team very reasonably."

After half a decade, American Fork Canyon's little locomotive fell silent in 1878, and its track disappeared faster than boiler steam dissipates on a hot, dry day. Mediocre mining success, not lack of tourists, hobbled Deer Creek's iron horse, and the state of Utah fell heir to its first "ghost railroad."

D. Robert Carter is a historian from Springville. He can be reached at 489-8256. "Tales of Utah Valley" is now available at Borders and Pioneer Books, BYU Bookstore, all in Provo and The Read Leaf in Springville.