For the pioneers of the Eagle River valley, rail service was especially needed to ship livestock, agricultural products, and loads of timber harvested from the area’s mountainsides. Between 1872 and 1874, the Denver & Rio Grande railroad (D&RG) constructed a route from Denver to Pueblo and on to Canon City. Intense competition with the Santa Fe railroad to the south caused the D&RG to turn west and concentrate its efforts toward a mountain route to Salt Lake City. As early as 1880, the railroad’s management was already discussing the goal of pushing the line from Pueblo up the Arkansas River and over Tennessee Pass into the upper Eagle River watershed.
During the late 1870s and early 1880s, the D&RG did in fact move westward through the Royal Gorge to Leadville, and then up over Tennessee Pass to Red Cliff. This narrow gauge line terminated at Rock Creek near Gilman in the steep canyon ten miles southeast of Avon. For several years afterward, it appeared that the railroad had no intention of continuing the line down the Eagle River valley. Residents of the valley from Avon to the west were left dependent upon their wagon road and unable to ship larger quantities of agricultural products, livestock and timber to market. However, they didn’t have to wait very long for the situation to change.
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