Green River 80 years ago

Editor's Note:  The narrative below the dashed line was scanned and OCR transcribed directly from the 1941 Edition of The WPA Wyoming Guide.  

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At Rock Springs is the junction with US 187 (see Tour 7b).

US 30 skirts rocky ledges through a region of scrubby sage and low- growing greasewood. Far ahead, a prominent butte shows through a gap; emigrants used it as a landmark.

An occasional small chicken ranch, with weather-beaten buildings, appears along the highway, and a cluster of bright-yellow section houses stands by the railroad. The road runs on between eroded red and white sandstone hills, where receding prehistoric seas left their sediments in great wavelike deposits; then it winds out of a bowl, up through Bitter Creek Valley, and curves down a steep hill. Running along a shelf, it commands a view of the Green River, which in flood times is jammed with ties. Smoke from many trains and from railroad shops hangs over the valley.

GREEN RIVER, 126.7 m. (6,100 alt., 2,589 pop.), seat of Sweet- water County, division point on the Union Pacific and eastern terminus of the Oregon Short Line, is built on the north bank of the Green River. During tie drives, when more than 300,000 ties are floated down river, daring youngsters amuse themselves by walking up the bank a mile or so and riding the ties down the swollen stream.

Green River, with trim houses, lawns, and gardens and tree-lined streets, is bordered (R) by sandstone cliffs, of which the most promi- nent, CASTLE ROCK, rises 1,000 feet above the river. A path leads to the crest, circling the rock on the east. Across the valley (L) is a curiously eroded formation, known as the OLD MAN'S FACE.

In 1862, the Overland stage route crossed the Green River a little to the south. Settlement did not begin until July 1868, when some men, who hoped to profit by the boom the railroad was likely to bring, laid out a town; by September 2,000 people occupied the site. When the Union Pacific arrived, however, its builders gave the speculators no attention, but bridged the river and moved on as fast as possible.

The small HUTTON MUSEUM (adm. by appointment), 185 N. 2nd St. contains fossils, Indian relics, and pioneer mementos.

Running sharply uphill through a cut, US 30 follows the river. The Union Pacific roadbed (L) is cut from the mountainside high above the stream. At TOLLGATE ROCK, 128.2 m., Mormons cut a passage and charged a toll of those who passed. Brigham Young, on the way to Salt Lake Valley in 1847, is said to have delivered a sermon from PULPIT Rock (R). For more than a mile the highway skirts the PALISADES, sheer buff sandstone cliffs, tinted pink and rose by late afternoon sun- glow.

Though the GREEN RIVER, 131.2 m., takes the color of the shale over which it flows, it was named for a business associate of the trader, William H. Ashley. The Indians called it the Seeds-ke-dee-agie (Ind., prairie hen). It was also known as Spanish River. The valley, which has many small truck farms and sheep ranches, extends more than 125 miles north and south. Protected by mountain ranges on the western slope of the Continental Divide, it has relatively mild winters, with only brief cold snaps. Summer heat, too, is moderate. The valley was for many years a trappers' rendezvous (see Tour 9). Wild flowers are numerous here, especially red Indian paintbrush (the State flower), white rock and sand lilies, and bluebells. Wild currants grow abundantly along the riverbanks. Cactus, greasewood, sagebrush, mesquite, and grama grass are found on the hills and in the canyons. Cottontail and jack rabbits, prairie dogs, gophers, chipmunks, coyotes, badgers, weasels, beavers, deer, and antelope are native to the region. Sage hens, sparrows, magpies, hawks, bluebirds, and robins are common. Rattle- snakes and scorpions are seen occasionally.

West of the valley, the highway veers across low sage-covered hills and flood-washed sand flats. An occasional large truck carrying ties, with axes crossed atop the load, rumbles past.

At 139.7 m. is the junction with a dimly marked trail.

Right on this trail to the SITE OF BRYAN, 0.2 m., where in 1868 the Union Pacific built machine shops and a 12-stall roundhouse; from the Government freight depot here, shipments were taken by wagon and stage to other places. Beginning in 1869, a daily stage ran to the Sweetwater gold district, and considerable freighting was done to the gold camps. When the railroad straightened its tracks, the freighting business shifted to Point of Rocks, and Bryan became a ghost town. The cemetery remains.

An old concrete Lincoln Highway marker (R), 144.2 m., recalls the early days of the first transcontinental highway. On December 13, 1913, a string of bonfires, nearly 450 miles long, lighted the route across southern Wyoming, heralding the opening of the pioneer trans- continental route.