All Aboard

Promoters called this rail route the "Scenic Line of the World" to attract travelers to western Colorado, and the Denver & Rio Grande guidebook Around the Circle invited readers to experience a canyon whose scenery was described as kaleidoscopic and ever changing, with the train gliding along close, exalted walls. British author Rudyard Kipling found the ride through the gorge less than sublime, recalling rocks two thousand feet sheer and a mad ride so glorious, wondrous, and mysterious that he offered prayers for the train's safety. Engine 361 pulled one of the last trains through Black Canyon in 1949, and in 1895 a Pratt truss bridge replaced the first wooden bridge over the Cimarron River, making for a safer descent into the canyon.

Colorado · United States