9 minute read
BOVINE
BOVINE
Track Reached Here: March 27, 1869
Established Station: May 17, 1869
Formally Abandoned: March 20, 1939
Milepost: 698 miles from San Francisco
Crews of the CP reached the site of Bovine from the west on March 27, 1869, before resting on Sunday the 28th. 1 A short time later it became a station. According to John Van Cott, Bovine was named after nearby Bovine Mountain. He notes that, '"Bovine' referred to the region's cattle industry, which used Bovine Town as its center of operation." 2
The 1869 CP "Inventory of Buildings" describes a section house built at Bovine, measuring 16 by 30 ft with a kitchen measuring 10 x 20 ft. 3 Later facilities included a train car body, Chinese bunkhouse and cook house, water tank, and siding. 4
One lone remark was found concerning new construction during the life of the station in the Railroad Engineer's Report for the Commissioner of Railroads. In 1886 a new freight platform was constructed at Bovine. 5 Raymond and Fike also noted this event, though they said it occurred in 1885 and added " ... section gangs built a freight platform and replaced some of the Chinese bunkhouses". 6
In 1870, the federal census for Bovine Section Station counted two foremen, a 27-year-old from Texas and the other a 28-year-old from Ireland, along with 17 Chinese workers, split into two households, with nine and eight individuals. 7 The Chinese ranged in age from 21 to 45, averaging 30 years old.
Early tourist guides along the railroad generally dismissed small section stations such as Bovine. In the case of Crofutt's guide from 1872, it stated, "Eleven miles to the westward. Elevation, 4346 feet. But little of interest to note, the face of the country remaining about the same, though gradually improving." 8 The Pacific Tourist 1884 guide was not much more informative, stating: "Bovine- an unimportant station, with side track for the convenience of passing trains ... " 9
In 1880, Bovine appears within the Grouse Creek Precinct, along with Lucin. On page 6 of the Grouse Creek Precinct, there are 17 railroad workers shown. The south end of Grouse Creek Road ends at Lucin which would make sense for this to be the Lucin station. However, there are two separate households of Chinese, one with nine and the other with six individuals. There are two Irish railroad workers, ages 30 and 45, likely the foremen for two different stations, Lucin and Bovine. Lucin is a station located 10 miles to the west of Bovine. The foreman most likely to be at Bovine is the 30-year-old living in his own household {the other lives with miners which makes it likely he is in Lucin). The second group of six workers is probably attached to Bovine since the census taker was on his way back east from Grouse Creek to count the population in Terrace. The Bovine workers range in age from 28 to 46 with an average age of 36. 10
Bovine cannot be identified within the 1900 Census despite the fact that the railroad would have needed a permanent crew at that station. A Euro-American Foreman and Chinese crew had been stationed there since 1869 and the fact that this line was still the main transcontinental railroad in the US, it is probable that such was still the case in 1900.
Bovine station is listed shortly after construction of the line in timetables, the first being a handwritten employee timetable, dated May 29, 1869, for the Salt Lake Division from Teano to Promontory. 11 Also, in May 1869, Bovine is listed as a station in a public timetable for the CP. 12 Timetables in 1890 and 1904 show Bovine as a regular station, but by 1905, after completion of the Lucin Cutoff, it drops to a flag stop with two daily mixed trains. 13 In 1909 the siding at Bovine is shown as 4653 ft long and shows that a wye exists at Bovine. 14 However, since the wye is not shown before or after this year, it may have been mistakenly added. There is no physical evidence of such a feature. In 1915, the siding at Bovine is stated to hold 50 car lengths.15 By 1929 the car lengths drop to 44, indicating removal for use elsewhere on the system. 16 Beginning in 1935 Bovine is no longer listed on timetables since passenger service was dropped. By March 1937, all train service on the line between Watercress and Lucin ended. 17
Beginning in 1881 SP station lists show Bovine as a non-agency station with no services, but between 1887 and 1889, the station maintained a telegraph station with call number "BO" . 18 Bovine begins to be listed as a Class A Freight Station in 1890 and continues as such until its abandonment in 1939. 19 The 1913 List of Officers, Agents and Stations indicate that a freight platform had recently been added at Bovine. Other sources suggest that it may have been constructed in the 1880s. 20 (Figure 29). Regardless, it remained in place until the station was abandoned in 1939.
When the ICC Valuation survey team came through Bovine in June 1916, there were three structures noted on the SP Track Map, including a tank, 16 x 20 ft section house and a 12 x 14 ft car house. This lay south of a quarter mile-long siding. Though not shown on the drawing, the ICC structures report described that a 35 ft long car body had just been added that year to function as a freight depot and shed. 21 An interesting note about the end of Bovine's existence comes from a March 20, 1939 newspaper article. For some reason, among all small section stations on the line, which had largely become unoccupied shipping points, Bovine still retained a "stationmaster" on site until it closed, though the newspaper adds that" ... trains had not stopped for passengers or freight for a long time" .22
Archaeological Survey Aside from the brief survey work carried out at Bovine (42BO2250) by Raymond and Fike in 1981, no professional archaeological surveys were conducted at Bovine until 2016 when USU Archaeological Services was hired by the State of Utah to carry out an inventory. As part of a larger project to better understand the role of Chinese at railroad stations at Terrace and on the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railway in southern Utah, USUAS undertook a complete mapping of the site to document surface Chinese overseas material culture and associated features. A total of 4 7 cultural features were identified representing a wide range of both domestic and industrial activities undertaken at the site over its 70 years of existence. 23 (Figures 30 and 31).
Newspaper accounts surrounding Bovine: From the Salt Lake Herald 1882:
From the Deseret News 1886: A Railroad Accident on the Central Pacific, in which it was at first reputed that several persons were killed and others injured. Of course, we could learn nothing of the officials of the road, or from the employers-and the latter feel afraid to tell if they know anything about it. Some located the catastrophe at Terrace and others at Toano. A later report which is said to be the correct one, says it occurred at Bovine, and was caused by a big washout, through the bursting of a waterspout. The train was a double header freight, and consisted of nearly twenty box cars some of which were loaded with coal, and quite a number of them were broken up. The engines were ditched, and one brakeman named McLaughlin had his legs badly crushed, and another man named George Burleigh was reported hurt somewhat. Full or further reliable particulars we have been unable to ascertain. 25
From the Ogden Semi-Weekly Standard 1889:
Arrested for Turning a Switch. Yesterday morning Mr. Glen Harris, Southern Pacific detective, arrived in this City from the West having in charge a man named Frank Herman charged with having turned a switch on the Central Pacific road with intent to wreck a train . .... The crime was committed at Bovine, ten miles west of Terrace a short while before the passenger train No. 4 was to pass that point the switch was turned, it is alleged, by Herman. There being a smooth piece of road on each side of this station it has been customary to run from forty to fifty miles an hour in order to make time. The misplacement of the switch was observed by the wife of the section boss residing in the vicinity, who immediately reversed it a few minutes before the train passed by. It is unnecessary to speculate on the probable results, the wreck and carnage which would have followed a passage of the switch had not this woman seen the danger and averted it. 26
1 Lynn Farrar, Tracklaying Record of the Central Pacific by Days 27 July 1868 to 08 May 1869 Near Brown, Nevada to Promontory, Utah. Central Pacific Railroad Photographic Museum, 2005 http://cprr.org/Museum/CPRR_DAI LY_ TRACKLAYI NG.pdf (accessed 1-11-21).
2 John W. Van Cott, Utah Place Names {Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1990), 47.
3 Central Pacific Railroad, [List of Buildings on the Central Pacific Railroad from Sacramento, California to Ogden, Utah, including the Sacramento, Truckee, Shoshone, Humboldt, and Salt Lake Divisions]. August,1869. National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland.
4 Kenneth P. Cannon, Houston L. Martin, Jonathan M. Peart, Molly Boeka Cannon, John Blong, Paul Santarone, Kathy Selma, Kassidy Price and Chris Dunker, The Archaeology of Chinese Railroad Workers in Utah: Results of Surveys in Box Elder and Emery Counties. USUAS Special Report Number 3 (Logan: Utah State University Archaeological Services, 2016), 27.
5 Railroad Engineer's Report, In: Annual Report of the U.S. Commissioner of Railroads to the Secretary of the Interior, {Government Printing Office, Washington, 1886), 22. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.31951d0047724 4u&view=lup&seq=5 (accessed on 11-9-20).
6 Anan S. Raymond and Richard E. Fike, Rails East to Promontory: The Utah Stations, Bureau of Land Management, Cultural Resource Series, No. 8 (Salt Lake City: Bureau of Land Management, 1981), 36. https://www.blm.gov/sites/blm.gov/files/documents/files/Li brary_Utah_CulturalResourceSeries08.pdf (accessed 12-7-20).
7 Ancestry.com. 1870 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. "Bovine Section, Box Elder County, Utah".a George Crofutt, Trans-Continental Tourist's Guide (New York: Geo. A. Crofutt, Publisher, 1872), 124. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Crofutt_s _Trans_ co ntinental_Tourist_s_Gu/lqlXAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=l &dq=George+Crofutt, + Transcontinental+ Tourist%E2%80%99s+Guide+(New+York:+Crofu tt,+1872)&pg=PA105&printsec=frontcover (accessed 2-21-21).
