Denver and Rio Grande Railroad Depot in Salida, Colorado

Abstract

Postcard showing the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad Depot in Salida, Colorado with a prospector and his burro in the foreground (image of prospector and burro pasted into photo). The caption on photograph NMHFM-231 identifies this person as Frank Gimlet (aka Frank E. Gimlett), the hermit of Arbor Villa (i.e. Arbourville). The town of Salida was founded in 1880 by the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad (D&RG) during the construction of a narrow gauge rail line from Canon City to Leadville. The D&RG built its division headquarters, company hospital, roundhouses, and maintenance shops in Salida. The stone railroad depot (shown on the postcard) was built in 1880, and was enlarged the following year. By the late 1930s Salida's role as a railroad center was in decline, and the depot was demolished sometime in the late 1930s or early 1940s. The caption on the postcard, "the birthplace of Rudyard Kiplings romance" refers to the fact that Kipling married the sister-in-law of Wolcott Balest.