This is a trail I used to walk, bike, and later ride my horse on many years ago. It doesn't exist anymore, all traces of it long grown over. Most doesn't know it ever existed. Well, I'm telling you it did. It was once much more than a trail along a highway, bordered by a small lake. It was a railroad bed for rails that brought in the first settlers by the hundreds and even, yes, thousands, for a period of time in the late 1870's and early 1880's. It was rush, a rush of people, flowing through St. Vincent, with a handful staying on. It was wounded by the 1893 flood, but it wasn't until the 1950 flood that it was given up for dead. My great uncle saw many a train come and go on those tracks. The train brought the world to St. Vincent's door. How many people eagerly awaited catalog orders, relatives, or entertainment, all coming down those tracks?
Saturday, October 06, 2007
Ghost Trail
This is a trail I used to walk, bike, and later ride my horse on many years ago. It doesn't exist anymore, all traces of it long grown over. Most doesn't know it ever existed. Well, I'm telling you it did. It was once much more than a trail along a highway, bordered by a small lake. It was a railroad bed for rails that brought in the first settlers by the hundreds and even, yes, thousands, for a period of time in the late 1870's and early 1880's. It was rush, a rush of people, flowing through St. Vincent, with a handful staying on. It was wounded by the 1893 flood, but it wasn't until the 1950 flood that it was given up for dead. My great uncle saw many a train come and go on those tracks. The train brought the world to St. Vincent's door. How many people eagerly awaited catalog orders, relatives, or entertainment, all coming down those tracks?
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something about this picture and your description makes me immeasurably sad. but not in a bad way, altogether, if that makes any sense.
ReplyDeleteMakes perfect sense to me, Andy. One of the pervading emotions of my childhood was melancholy...
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