Silver City, Pinos Altos and Mogollon Railroad (SC, PA&M) was a

narrow gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge (distance between the rails) narrower than . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with Minimum railw ...

railway serving

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

mines along the

Continental Divide A continental divide is a drainage divide on a continent such that the drainage basin on one side of the divide feeds into one ocean or sea, and the basin on the other side either feeds into a different ocean or sea, or else is endorheic, not ...

in the mountains of southwestern

New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...

. The communities of Silver City and Pinos Altos developed as 19th century miners recovered easily extracted

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 ...

and

silver Silver is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag () and atomic number 47. A soft, whitish-gray, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. ...

from ore deposits of the area.

Standard-gauge A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), international gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge in Europe, and SGR in East Africa. It is the ...

Santa Fe Railroad The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway , often referred to as the Santa Fe or AT&SF, was one of the largest Class 1 railroads in the United States between 1859 and 1996. The Santa Fe was a pioneer in intermodal freight transport; at variou ...

reached Silver City in 1886, and SC, PA&M was incorporated 24 August 1889 to build a railway north to

Mogollon, New Mexico Mogollon, also called the Mogollon Historic District, is a former mining town located in the Mogollon Mountains in Catron County, New Mexico, Catron County, New Mexico, United States. Located east of Glenwood, New Mexico, Glenwood and Alma, Ne ...

. Construction was limited to of grading until

Wisconsin Wisconsin ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest of the United States. It borders Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michig ...

-based Comanche Mining and Smelting purchased the railroad and the Pinos Altos mining claims of

George Hearst George Hearst (September 3, 1820 – February 28, 1891) was an American businessman, politician, and patriarch of the Hearst family, Hearst business dynasty. After growing up on a small farm in Missouri, he founded many mining operations a ...

in 1903 after

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 mi ...

-drawn ore transport became uneconomical. The Silver City

smelter Smelting is a process of applying heat and a chemical reducing agent to an ore to extract a desired base metal product. It is a form of extractive metallurgy that is used to obtain many metals such as iron, copper, silver, tin, lead and zin ...

burned shortly after purchase, but was rebuilt with three

blast furnace A blast furnace is a type of metallurgical furnace used for smelting to produce industrial metals, generally pig iron, but also others such as lead or copper. ''Blast'' refers to the combustion air being supplied above atmospheric pressure. In a ...

s and a

reverberatory furnace A reverberatory furnace is a metallurgy, metallurgical or process Metallurgical furnace, furnace that isolates the material being processed from contact with the fuel, but not from contact with combustion gases. The term ''reverberation'' is use ...

to handle 225 tons of ore per day. Two

Shay locomotive The Shay locomotive is a geared steam locomotive that originated and was primarily used in North America. The locomotives were built to the patents of Ephraim Shay, who has been credited with the popularization of the concept of a ''geared st ...

s were moved to Silver City in August 1905 from the

Gilpin tramway The Gilpin Railroad, earlier the Gilpin Tramway Company, was a narrow gauge railway in Gilpin County, Colorado, in operation from 1887 to 1917. Gold extraction In April 1859, John H. Gregory discovered alluvial gold in Clear Creek, near Go ...

Gilpin County, Colorado Gilpin County is a county located in the U.S. state of Colorado, smallest in land area behind only the City and County of Broomfield. As of the 2020 census, the population was 5,808. The county seat is Central City. The county was formed in ...

. The railroad was built through

iron Iron is a chemical element; it has symbol Fe () and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, forming much of Earth's o ...

and

limestone Limestone is a type of carbonate rock, carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material Lime (material), lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different Polymorphism (materials science) ...

mines on Chloride Flat west of Silver City. The limestone was used as a

flux Flux describes any effect that appears to pass or travel (whether it actually moves or not) through a surface or substance. Flux is a concept in applied mathematics and vector calculus which has many applications in physics. For transport phe ...

for smelting the copper ore. The railroad climbed using 48 bridges or trestles with of track at grades of 1.5 to 6 percent to cross the from Silver City to Pinos Altos. The Continental Divide summit was at an elevation of near Pinos Altos. Ore was carried in 33 ten-ton capacity drop-bottom

hopper car A hopper car () or hopper wagon () is a type of railroad freight car that has opening doors or gates on the underside or on the sides to discharge its cargo. They are used to transport loose solid bulk commodities such as coal, ore, grain, a ...

s built in Silver City from riveted or bolted

steel Steel is an alloy of iron and carbon that demonstrates improved mechanical properties compared to the pure form of iron. Due to steel's high Young's modulus, elastic modulus, Yield (engineering), yield strength, Fracture, fracture strength a ...

channels, angles and sheets. The railroad also built ten wooden

flatcar A flatcar (US) (also flat car, or flatbed) is a piece of rolling stock that consists of an open, flat deck mounted on trucks (US) or bogies (UK) at each end. Occasionally, flat cars designed to carry extra heavy or extra large loads are mounted ...

s which were modified upon occasion to serve as excursion cars, lowside

gondola The gondola (, ; , ) is a traditional, flat-bottomed Venetian rowing boat, well suited to the conditions of the Venetian lagoon. It is typically propelled by a gondolier, who uses a rowing oar, which is not fastened to the hull, in a scul ...

s, a

steam Steam is water vapor, often mixed with air or an aerosol of liquid water droplets. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization. Saturated or superheated steam is inv ...

-powered derrick for recovering derailed cars, a corrugated steel

boxcar A boxcar is the North American (Association of American Railroads, AAR) and South Australian Railways term for a Railroad car#Freight cars, railroad car that is enclosed and generally used to carry freight. The boxcar, while not the simpl ...

, and a

tank car A tank car (International Union of Railways (UIC): tank wagon) or tanker is a type of railroad car (UIC: railway car) or rolling stock designed to transport liquid and gaseous commodity, commodities. History Timeline The following major event ...

to carry

boiler water Boiler water is liquid water within a boiler, or in associated piping, pumps and other equipment, that is intended for evaporation into steam. The term may also be applied to raw water intended for use in boilers, treated boiler feedwater, steam c ...

for the locomotives. There was also one

caboose A caboose is a crewed North American railroad car coupled at the end of a freight train. Cabooses provide shelter for crew at the end of a train, who were formerly required in switching and shunting; as well as in keeping a lookout for load ...

. Two new locomotives were purchased while the older locomotives handled construction trains. When regular service was established on 4 July 1906, the newer locomotives pulled trains of nine or ten ore cars from the mines to ore concentrators and smelters in Silver City. Mining equipment was transported back to the mines in empty ore cars. No

railway air brake A railway air brake is a railway brake power braking system with compressed air as the operating medium. Modern trains rely upon a fail-safe air brake system that is based upon a design patented by George Westinghouse on April 13, 1869. Th ...

s were fitted, and a runaway ore train derailment on 7 February 1907 killed the locomotive fireman and a visiting representative from

Lima Locomotive Works Lima Locomotive Works (LLW) was an American firm that manufactured railroad locomotives from the 1870s through the 1950s. The company's name is derived from the location of its main manufacturing plant in Lima, Ohio ( ). The shops were located be ...

. The older locomotives shunted cars around the smelters and transported slag from the smelters to disposal sites. Another larger locomotive was purchased in 1907. A southwesterly extension was considered to reach Burro Mountain. A 7-stall engine-house was constructed in anticipation of two more locomotives, but operations ceased on 10 October 1907 after the price of copper dropped 50 percent within a few weeks. Comanche Mining and Smelting merged with

Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...

-based Savannah Copper Company in 1908. The line operated briefly after copper prices recovered in 1910,Myrick (1970) p. 155 and was scrapped in 1913.

Locomotives

References

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Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Silver City Pinos Altos Mogollon Railroad 2 ft gauge railways in the United States Defunct New Mexico railroads Narrow-gauge railroads in New Mexico Railway companies established in 1889 Railway companies disestablished in 1913 1889 establishments in New Mexico Territory