Three Miles a Day: The Great Northern Races the Snow to the Columbia
With tracklayers advancing west from Spokane and a tunnel still to be bored, John F. Stevens tells Seattle he needs men—and expects to connect the line by mid-November.
Rock Island, Aug. 27.—Grading on the line of the Great Northern has been slightly retarded owing to the scarcity of laborers, many having gone into the harvest fields. A crew of 113 men came in from the East today, and arrangements have been made for others to come at once. The tracklaying force is now about 100 miles west of Spokane and proceeding at the rate of three miles a day. This rate will be reduced to two and one-half miles for fifteen miles along Crab Creek, after which the work will be lighter. The engineers and contractors expect the completion of the track to this point by the 1st of October.
Work on the approaches to the bridge over the Columbia is progressing satisfactorily, but the steel will not be shipped until the track is finished. Meanwhile the steamer Nixon, now here, will be used as a transfer boat.
John F. Stevens, principal assistant engineer of the Great Northern Railroad, is at the Northern hotel with his son. In an interview with a Post-Intelligencer reporter he said:
“At present we are bending all our efforts to finish the rock work near the summit before the heavy snow comes. Work is being done on the switchback and the location of the tunnel is being made. The maximum grade on the switchback will be 4 percent, and on the tunnel 2.2 percent. We expect to connect track about the middle of November if the weather is favorable. What we need now is men. We have 2,000 to 2,500 west of the mountains and 1,000 or more east of the mountains, but we want more. We want about 100 more men to form a tracklaying gang from Lowell east.”
“What we need now is men. We have 2,000 to 2,500 west of the mountains and 1,000 or more east of the mountains, but we want more.”
The Great Northern’s arrival cemented Seattle’s role as a rail terminus and helped turn a lumber town into a continental port. The same pattern—infrastructure promises, labor shortages, and booster optimism—still shapes how the region argues about growth and who pays for it.
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