If you blast through Carbon County
on Interstate 80, you begin to think that all there is to see is high desert
and the towering Elk Mountain.
But that part of Wyoming offers so
much more.
Last week, I fulfilled a bucket
list item by driving State Highway 70 over Battle Mountain Pass for the first
time. Wow, what a gorgeous trip!
Near the top of the pass, almost
10,000 feet, is a prominent plaque placed where the famous inventor Thomas
Edison went fishing and reportedly came up with the idea for filament to use in
the invention of the light bulb. It occurred while he was messing with flies
during a wonderful fishing trip. That very impressive plaque was mounted on a
big brick podium, back in 1949 by a statewide historical group. More on that later.
There are massive groves of mature
Aspen trees all along the way and I kept looking for the famous Aspen
Alley. This is a narrow road cut through
a mighty grove of Aspens that shimmers like gold in the fall. Famed Wyoming
photographer Randy Wagner of Cheyenne has the best image I have ever seen of
that site.
On this day, I missed it because it
is a few miles down WYO 71, which goes north from Battle Mountain Pass all the
way to Rawlins. Hopefully next time.
The name Battle Mountain Pass came
from a famous fight between Indians and some trappers on Aug 21, 1841. Mountain
Man Jim Baker, just 21 at the time, had to lead his men after Captain Henry
Frapp was killed. After a six-day fight, the trappers left. However the
formerly named Bastion Mountain has been re-named Battle Mountain because of
that fight for the past 178 years. Baker went on to become one of the more
famous mountain men exploring Wyoming mountain ranges.
To get to this famous pass, we
drove south from Interstate 80 to Saratoga and briefly visited with Joe Glode.
He is an extraordinary community leader for that area. We were going to eat
some of the best prime rib in Wyoming at Doug and Kathleen Campbell’s Wolf
Hotel, but they were not open yet. We had to get to our granddaughter’s wedding
celebration in Montrose, CO, so we soldiered on.
After passing through the beautiful
towns of Encampment and Riverside, we climbed up the Sierra Madre
Mountains. I can only imagine how that
area must look in the fall. All those
Aspen trees must make the place look like it is on fire.
Cody’s Rev. Warren Murphy’s first
assignment was Dixon and Baggs. He
writes about the area: “Route 70 is indeed one of the most amazing and
unknown highways in the state. Especially in mid- September when the golden
aspen leaves fall. They cover the highway and when driving along you are riding
on a carpet of gold. There is so little traffic. Aspen Alley is a unique
piece of ground but sadly the alley trees are aging out. However, the young
ones are growing fast.”
John Davis of Worland tells this
story about his early experience on Battle Pass: “When I was first married,
Celia and traveled to the Sierra Madres to hunt deer. We didn’t get any
deer, but proceeded toward Baggs and Savery. Celia got worried about the
amount of gas we had, but I wasn’t worried, because most Chevrolet vehicles (we
were traveling in a 1955 Chevrolet sedan) still had 5 gallons when showing empty.
“Well, this one didn’t, and just
before the pass, it coughed and died. We caught a ride down the mountain,
got some gas, returned to the vehicle, and proceeded home.
“But this incident had long term
consequences. Ever since, Celia got nervous whenever the gas gauge in one
of our cars got just a little past half full. We never again ran out of
gas as we did on Battle Mountain Pass, but I’ve heard complaints about getting
gas about a hundred times since, he concluded.”
After enjoying the beauty of the
Aspen-covered Pass, Nancy and I started our way down the mountain. We drove
through Savery and Dixon, two pleasant little towns.
My friend radio station owner Joe
Kenney said his dad grew up in Encampment and his mom, Maudie Lake, grew up in
Savery. He recalls visiting those towns as a little kid and marveling at how
high the snow was. When I asked him how
his dad and mom got together, since the highway was closed all winter, he said,
“they always met up in Rawlins.”
I grew up in a very small town and
these towns reminded me of home. My wife calls these little towns “peek and
plumb towns.” She says, “you peek around the corner and you’re plumb out of
town!”
I always said my hometown was so
small that both “resume speed” signs are on the same post, just on opposite
sides.
Growing up in my little town, we
had a public restroom, which was an outhouse.
The toilet tissue consisted of the town’s yellow pages. Unfortunately,
the yellow pages only consisted of one page.
We always like getting to Baggs. This
is a pretty little town with a great museum along the Little Snake River.
Again, the roads north and south of Baggs go through high desert country, which
lack scenery. But Baggs area residents have a lot of fun places to visit in
their little bit of heaven.
Rocky’s Quick Stop is a wonderful
convenience store which has a fine restaurant attached to it at the north edge
of Baggs.
We should mention that our trip to
Montrose was hot, hot, hot. We chatted with Zane Bennett of Powell at the motel
in Montrose and he said he drove his motorcycle through a hail storm south of
Green River.
Oh yes, about Thomas Edison and how
he discovered filament for light bulbs.
Historian and author Phil Roberts
of Laramie says the story is a wonderful tale but is just not true. Edison was
just 31 but already a famous inventor during this visit to Wyoming.
He joined a group that traveled to
Wyoming by train in 1878 to watch a total eclipse of the sun. Edison had a device that he wanted to use to
measure temperatures during an eclipse, which did not work at all.
Edison had a great trip, killing
elk and deer. Reportedly his fishing party caught 3,000 trout.
He returned to Menlo Park, NJ
rested and ready to invent. After experimenting with 6,000 different materials,
he was able to get a filament to work in his light bulb.
|