The museum entrance
The north entrance including the fire station bay
Beautifully restored and maintained
To understand and appreciate the displays in the museum, it is helpful to understand the history of Rock Springs. This was a coal city and a railroad city. A few days ago we visited where the Golden Spike was driven in Utah joining the Central Pacific & Union Pacific Railroads and the transcontinental railroad was complete. The Union Pacific railroad construction started in Omaha NE and headed west, and it came right through here. One key resource needed by the railroad was coal - fuel for the engines. Under this city are miles and miles of coal veins. With the railroad and coal mining there were jobs and immigrants were brought in by the railroad and coal mining companies to work. Welsh and British people were initially most populous, but later, Irish, Blacks, and refugees from the Southern part of the United States also came, in addition to Chinese who were a key part of completing the transcontinental railroad.
A map showing the coal mining tunnels under the city
Their iconic sign today
Their iconic sign back in the day
I digressed - back to the museum. We entered the museum and were greeted by a volunteer who gave us some background on the building and it's contents. The museum is free of charge. There are displays relating to the coal industry, the Union Pacific Railroad, and life in Rock Springs including the famous outlaws Butch Cassidy and Calamity Jane!
The main hallway
An entire room was dedicated to hundreds of pictures, tools and artifacts relating to the coal industry
Communications! Yes!
A beautifully-maintained city safe full of banking equipment
History of photography in the city
The city jail with six different cells
The police office
When the building was remodeled they added a stairway and a mezzanine and so now the old fire truck will no longer fit, but these pictures are from the fire station
The hose tower where fire hose hanged to dry
The Chief's office
A hand-drawn hose cart, used from 1880-1900
A wooden ladder and other fire gear
Upstairs was primarily the courtroom and the judge's chambers which had been converted to displays.
Items used to distill alcohol during prohibition
Scottish heritage
Judge's chambers adjacent to the courtroom
Sports in the area
Medical items
We finished up in the museum and then walked down towards the railroad tracks. That is where we found the Rock Springs Coal welcome sign. There is also a railroad outside display and the old train depot.
The train depot
A view downtown. Not sure where all the drivers were.
We finished our walk through the old downtown area but many of the businesses were either empty or not open on Saturdays.
From here we drove a few miles north of town to a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Wild Horse Holding Facility. From their web site, "It is the only federal off-range corral and preparation facility in Wyoming. The facility houses approximately 800 wild horses, primarily gathered from Wyoming herd management areas. The facility also serves as a rest stop location for wild horses being transported eastbound from western states." There is a viewing area located above the corrals so we headed there.
We found it a bit ironic that they call this a "wild horse viewing area" yet they are penned up in corrals, but reading the signage at the viewing area helped us understand. The public lands of the Western United States are rugged and beautiful, not unlike the horses and burros that live there. Today's free-roaming horses and burros are descendants of those brought here by the Spanish explorers and also those released by Native Americans, US Cavalry units and immigrants. So they are actually considered as feral - descended from domestic animals but no longer under human control. So they don't use the term "wild" as much. They are also referred to as mustangs.
So why are they penned up? According to the BLM, it is all about the numbers. A reasonable number of these animals can co-exist on the public lands. They have few natural enemies so the herd sizes can double every 3-4 years. Along with wildlife and domestic livestock, they simply cannot sustain unchecked wild horse and burro population growth. If growth was not managed, many of the animals would suffer slow and gruesome deaths due to starvation and dehydration. So the BLM monitors and manages herd size. They herd excess wild horses and burros and coral them here where they can be adopted at a very reasonable price! Very interesting! There is a 26+ mile loop that you can drive, much on gravel roads where you can potentially view the horses and burros in the wild, but we chose to just view them in the corral.
From here we drove back into town for lunch and stopped into a tavern called "Johnny Mac's" as a tribute to a military comrade who is no longer with us. Col John McDonald was a A-7D and F-16 fighter pilot with the 132d Fighter Wing. He joined in 1971 and served for 34 years. RIP Johnny Mac.
I ate about 1/3 of my serving! Wow!
Back at the campground we walked Liberty a bit, tuned in the Chicago Cubs vs Pittsburgh Pirates baseball game, and then walked over to greet (and assist if needed) an Alliance Avenue that rolled in and appeared to be having some leveler issues. We met a nice couple, Ray "Bear" Schoch and his wife Retha from California and this was just their second outing with their Alliance coach. Ray was beer-less so we hooked him up with a cold one and a koozie, and Doreen brought an Alliance embroidered towel for Retha. They are headed for the Michigan Rally in Traverse City. It's great meeting new Allies!
Tomorrow, our last day here, we plan to visit the Flaming Gorge which is a huge reservoir created by the Flaming Gorge Dam, located near the Utah Wyoming border about an hour south of us.
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