The ''Prospector'' was a passenger train operated by the Denver & Rio Grande Western railroad between

Denver Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

and

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 ...

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 ...

. There were two incarnations of the train: a streamlined, diesel multiple unit train that operated briefly in 1941 and 1942; and a

locomotive A locomotive is a rail transport, rail vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. Traditionally, locomotives pulled trains from the front. However, Push–pull train, push–pull operation has become common, and in the pursuit for ...

-hauled train of conventional passenger equipment that operated from 1945 until 1967.

1941–1942 ''Prospector''

The train was inaugurated November 17, 1941. The original equipment was a pair of

Budd Company The Budd Company was a 20th-century metal fabricator, a major supplier of body components to the automobile industry, and a manufacturer of stainless steel passenger rail cars, airframes, missile and space vehicles, and various defense produ ...

-built diesel multiple units numbered M-1 and M-2. For the inaugural trip in 1941, the railroad made

stainless steel Stainless steel, also known as inox, corrosion-resistant steel (CRES), or rustless steel, is an iron-based alloy that contains chromium, making it resistant to rust and corrosion. Stainless steel's resistance to corrosion comes from its chromi ...

pass holders that were intended to be distributed to passengers. The holder was engraved with a line drawing of the train on the outside. On the inside were two cards: one with an embossed picture of a

prospector Prospector may refer to: Space exploration * Prospector (spacecraft), a planned lunar probe, canceled in 1962 * ''Lunar Prospector'', a NASA spacecraft Trains * Prospector (train), a passenger train operated by the Denver & Rio Grande Western ra ...

and

mule The mule is a domestic equine hybrid between a donkey, and a horse. It is the offspring of a male donkey (a jack) and a female horse (a mare). The horse and the donkey are different species, with different numbers of chromosomes; of the two ...

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

, the other with a message reading: The holders were not distributed as intended to passengers. The trainsets had significant reliability problems exacerbated by difficult terrain and the train was discontinued July 5, 1942. The trainsets were returned to Budd and ultimately scrapped.

The Postwar ''Prospector''

Anticipating increases in overnight Denver-Salt Lake City rail passenger traffic after the end of World War II, the Rio Grande restored the ''Prospector'' on October 1, 1945, using conventional heavyweight equipment. The railroad also began planning the acquisition of new lightweight equipment for the train. In 1949 it purchased three dome-observation cars built by Budd, and in 1950 it took delivery of 25

Pullman-Standard The Pullman Company, founded by George Pullman, was a manufacturer of railroad cars in the mid-to-late 19th century through the first half of the 20th century, during the boom of railroads in the United States. Through rapid late-19th century d ...

cars — equipment that had been ordered by the

Chesapeake and Ohio Railway The Chesapeake and Ohio Railway was a Class I railroad formed in 1869 in Virginia from several smaller Virginia railroads begun in the 19th century. Led by industrialist Collis Potter Huntington, it reached from Virginia's capital city of Rich ...

, but never used by that railroad. The Pullman-Standard cars began service on the ''Prospector'' in late 1950, whereas the Budd dome cars generally served on the ''Royal Gorge'' (see below) and therefore only appeared on the ''Prospector'' west of

Grand Junction, Colorado Grand Junction is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Home rule municipality, home rule municipality that is the county seat and largest city of Mesa County, Colorado, United States. Grand Junction's population was 65,560 at the 2020 United St ...

. In response to a coal miners' strike, in 1950 the Rio Grande began combining the ''Prospector'' and the railroad's ''Royal Gorge'' train west of Grand Junction. This combined operation continued until 1964 when ''Royal Gorge'' service was cut back to Salida, Colorado. Between 1950 and 1953 the train's western terminus was extended from Salt Lake City to Ogden. Between 1964 and 1967 the railroad occasionally attached flatcars carrying highway vans — piggyback cars — to the rear of the ''Prospector'', a relatively rare combination of passenger and freight service in the same train. The ''Prospector'' made its final runs on May 28, 1967.

References

*. * * * {{DRGW named trains Passenger trains of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad Railway services introduced in 1941 Railway services discontinued in 1967 Budd Company