Denver & Rio Grande Western HO Scale Models

The Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad traces its origins to October 27, 1870, when General William Jackson Palmer incorporated the Denver and Rio Grande Railway as a narrow gauge operation intended to run southward from Denver toward El Paso, Texas. Construction began in earnest on July 28, 1871, and the line reached the embryonic community of Colorado Springs by that autumn. Palmer's vision was shaped in part by his admiration for narrow gauge operations in Wales, and the three-foot gauge was seen as a practical economy for conquering the rugged mountain terrain of the American Southwest. The railroad's ambitions were repeatedly tested and reshaped by competition, most notably the fierce right-of-way conflict with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway between 1877 and 1880, a struggle that involved hired gunmen, courtroom battles, and political maneuvering. The eventual settlement, sometimes called the Treaty of Boston, awarded the Santa Fe control of Raton Pass while the D&RG paid approximately 1.4 million dollars to secure its route through the Royal Gorge of the Arkansas River, opening access to the booming silver mining district around Leadville, Colorado. Through the 1880s the railroad extended its reach westward across Colorado and into Utah, connecting with the separately organized Denver and Rio Grande Western Railway, a Palmer-affiliated Utah line building eastward from Provo. The two lines met near the Green River in March 1883, completing a narrow gauge transcontinental corridor to Salt Lake City. Financial strain from aggressive expansion forced the original Denver and Rio Grande Railway into receivership by July 1884, and after foreclosure the reorganized Denver and Rio Grande Railroad formally assumed control of the property on July 14, 1886. Over subsequent decades the system gradually converted its main lines from narrow gauge to standard gauge, though an extensive narrow gauge network survived across southern Colorado and into New Mexico. At its greatest extent the D&RGW's narrow gauge mileage was the largest such network in North America, reaching approximately 1,861 miles by 1889 and serving mining communities at Silverton, Ouray, Durango, and Chama. The railroad's main line crested Tennessee Pass in Colorado at 10,240 feet, making it the highest standard gauge mainline railroad in the United States, and it also operated through the Moffat Tunnel beneath the Continental Divide and along the storied Royal Gorge route. The railroad formally became the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad as the twentieth century progressed, operating as an independent Class I carrier with a well-earned reputation for rugged mountain railroading and a certain stubborn self-reliance. It continued to operate its own intercity passenger service long after most comparable railroads surrendered such trains to Amtrak in 1971, running the Rio Grande Zephyr between Denver and Ogden until 1983, making it the last privately operated intercity passenger train in the United States for several decades. The D&RGW's primary function as a bridge carrier connecting Denver with Ogden gave it strategic value as a link between the eastern rail network and the Southern Pacific at Ogden. That relationship ultimately shaped the railroad's fate when, in 1988, Rio Grande Industries, the D&RGW's parent corporation, purchased the Southern Pacific Transportation Company. Despite being the smaller of the two railroads, Rio Grande Industries absorbed Southern Pacific, though the larger Southern Pacific name was retained for the combined operation. The D&RGW continued as a nominally separate division until 1992, when it was fully integrated into Southern Pacific. The final chapter came when Union Pacific Railroad merged with Southern Pacific in 1996, absorbing the former D&RGW main lines into its own vast system. Union Pacific subsequently closed the Tennessee Pass line in 1997, removing one of the most dramatic and historically significant railroad routes in the American West from active service. Several former D&RGW branch lines survived as heritage railways, most notably the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad in southwestern Colorado and the Cumbres and Toltec Scenic Railroad operating along the Colorado-New Mexico border, both of which continue to operate narrow gauge steam excursion service over original D&RGW trackage. The Denver and Rio Grande Western left a substantial legacy as a pioneering mountain railroad, an innovative narrow gauge operator, and a carrier that demonstrated remarkable corporate independence throughout more than a century of operation in one of North America's most challenging geographic environments.