Durango and Silverton: The Railroad That Outlasted the Mines
Near Durango, Colorado
The Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad has been running continuously since eighteen eighty-two, making it one of the oldest operating steam railroads in the United States. Denver and Rio Grande engineers laid the three-foot-wide tracks to navigate the tight curves of the Animas River canyon where standard-gauge equipment simply could not go.
The line opened to haul silver and gold ore down from the San Juan mines to the smelters in Durango. Over its lifetime it carried a fortune in precious metals. When the mines played out, the railroad kept going, first because ranchers and locals depended on it, then because tourists discovered it. Hollywood found it too: it appeared in films including Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Now operated by American Heritage Railways, the steam engines still make the forty-five-mile run through canyon country that looks much the same as it did in the eighteen eighties.
