Castle Gate is a

ghost town A ghost town, deserted city, extinct town, or abandoned city is an abandoned settlement, usually one that contains substantial visible remaining buildings and infrastructure such as roads. A town often becomes a ghost town because the economi ...

in the

western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

, located in Carbon County in eastern

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

. A mining town approximately southeast of

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The city is the core of the Salt Lake Ci ...

, its name was derived from a rock formation near the mouth of Price Canyon. This formation features two sheer

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

walls on either side of the

Price River The Price River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed October 30, 2020 southeastward flowing river in Carbon, Utah and Emery counties in eastern Utah. It is a tributary to ...

, which appear to open like a giant gate as travelers approach this narrow section of the canyon.

Coal mining origins

The first

coal mine Coal mining is the process of resource extraction, extracting coal from the ground or from a mine. Coal is valued for its Energy value of coal, energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to Electricity generation, generate electr ...

, named the Castle Gate Mine #1, opened around 1886, after the

Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad The Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad , often shortened to ''Rio Grande'', D&RG or D&RGW, formerly the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, was an American Class I railroad company. The railroad started as a narrow-gauge line running south fr ...

constructed its Utah Division over the

Wasatch Plateau The Wasatch Plateau is a plateau located southeast of the southernmost part of the Wasatch Range in central Utah. It is a part of the Colorado Plateau. Geography The plateau has an elevation of and includes an area of . Its highest point is So ...

, from the town of Springville. The mine produced high-quality coal for the steam trains. Castle Gate Mine #2 opened in 1912, and was found to have the finest coal in the region. In 1914, Castle Gate was incorporated as a town, which was owned and tightly controlled by the Utah Fuel Company and the D&RGW; a third mine opened in 1922.

Historic events

The town is most famous for two historic events. On April 21, 1897,

Butch Cassidy Robert LeRoy Parker (April 13, 1866 – November 7, 1908), better known as Butch Cassidy, was an American train robbery, train and bank robbery, bank robber and the leader of a gang of criminal outlaws known as the "Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch, ...

and

Elzy Lay William Ellsworth "Elzy" Lay (November 25, 1869 – November 10, 1934) was an outlaw of the Old West in the United States. He was a member of Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch gang, operating out of the Hole-in-the-Wall Pass in Johnson County, Wyoming. ...

held up an employee of the Pleasant Valley Coal Company in a daylight robbery at the busy railroad station in Castle Gate, making off with $7,000 in gold. On March 8, 1924, the Utah Fuel Company's Castle Gate Mine #2 exploded, killing 172 miners. Fatalities included 49 Greeks, 22 Italians, 8 Japanese, 7 English, 6 Austrians (Yugoslavs), 2 Scots, 1 Belgian, and 76 Americans, including 2 African-Americans. It was the third-deadliest disaster in the history of coal mining in the United States at that time, and remains the tenth deadliest at present.

Deconstruction of the town

Castle Gate was dismantled in the summer of 1974, and residents were relocated to a new subdivision at the mouth of Spring Canyon, west of Helper. The former townsite was cleared and replaced with coal-loading facilities neighboring the railroad line. Image:CastleGateUtah.jpeg, Castle Gate, with the former townsite to the left File:D&RGW Castle Gate steam train approaching.jpg,

locomotive at Castle Gate (circa 1929) File:ABC Coal Mine, Castle Gate Mine, Castle Gate Utah.jpg, Castle Gate Coal Mine, circa 1959

References

External links

* {{authority control Ghost towns in Carbon County, Utah Company towns in Utah Coal towns in Utah Mining communities in Utah Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad Populated places established in 1886 Ghost towns in Utah 1886 establishments in Utah Territory 1974 disestablishments in Utah Populated places disestablished in 1974

Coal mining origins

Historic events

Deconstruction of the town

See also

References

External links