As stated in the opening paragraph of this Chapter, the 1878-1882 contract period was the harbinger of change at Ralston, and two factors above all others were the driving forces behind those changes – the expansion of the mining industry in Grant County, and the approach of the Southern Pacific Railroad from the west.
Mining Camps
The expansion of the mining industry came about as the result of new mineral discoveries. With the associated founding of new mining districts and camps, passenger and mail coach operators expanded and extended existing routes, and established new ones in order to encompass and meet demand from these new settlements.
In June of 1880, several new post roads were sanctioned, each of which ran through at least some part of Grant County and were utilized by the NM&T Co. as follows:
- Silver City, via Soldier’s Farewell to Eureka.
- Shakespeare, via Leitendorf’s Well to the Stonewall Mining Camp.
- Socorro – via, among other places, Hillsboro, Hudson’s Hot Springs and Soldier’s Farewell – to Shakespeare.
- Fort Stanton to Pinos Altos, stopping along the way at the White Oak Mines in Lincoln County, the Puebla Mines, the Magdalena Mines (near Socorro) and the Hot Springs.¹³⁷
Particular note should be taken of the second of these new post roads, Shakespeare to the Stonewall Mining Camp, via Leitendorf’s Well. This was the first time that there had ever been a stage stop at Leitendorf’s Well (the settlement at this place was first called Leitendorf, and later named Pyramid City).
On June 25, 1880, Grant County’s Daily Southwest reported that the NM&T Co. was planning to run coaches “to the east”, passing through Georgetown, Hillsboro and Round Mountain on the way to Fort Craig. By the end of July that line was being stocked, with the aim of the first run being made over it on August 1st; it was estimated that this would shave 12 hours off the time it took to currently reach Fort Craig.¹³⁸
In January of the following year, the Grant County Herald and Southwest reported another new line “running from Shakespeare through Leitendorffs to the San Simon Valley and the California [mining] District to the San Simon Station on the S. P. R. R.”¹³⁹
Financial Problems
The National Mail and Transportation Company seems to have had financial problems. In July of 1880, Joseph Reynolds initiated an attachment suit against James B. Price and Thomas B. Price. Unfortunately the details of the suit are not given,¹⁴⁰ but on March 12, 1881, the Herald and Southwest reported that the stages of the Company had been attached for debt by G. W. Koeheler and M. Barela. Between Mesilla and Rincon (at that time in Doña Ana County, approximately five miles east of present day Hatch) the mails would, as a result, now have to be transported by wagon or buckboard; passengers between the two places would have to hire private transport. There were rumors of insolvency, denied by “friends of the company” who, on the other hand, did admit that the Company had suffered some degree of mismanagement.
James B. Price, President of the NM&T Co., was a contractor on multiple routes. As well as the Mesilla to Tucson Division of Route No. 31454, he held contracts for routes in California, Arizona, Texas, Colorado and Louisiana, and in New Mexico Territory he also operated the Santa Fe to Mesilla, and the Socorro to Silver City routes. One thing however must have been a cause of great concern to J. B. Price and his NM&T Co.’s operations in New Mexico Territory; that was the rapid approach of the railroad, both the Southern Pacific Railroad (SPRR) from the west, which was being laid out almost exactly on the line of the southern overland mail route, and the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe (AT&SF) line, which was approaching the southern overland mail route from the north.
The Arrival Of The Railroad
From the beginning of 1880, almost every edition of Grant County newspapers carried at least some snippet of information on the eastward progress of the Southern Pacific Railroad. In February it was reported that that the railroad was building towards Tucson at the rate of two miles per day, and that a station was to be established 30 miles east of Casa Grande.¹⁴¹ This meant that Division 4 of the Fort Worth – Yuma route had already been impacted, as the advance of the railroad had automatically resulted in the curtailment of the transportation of mails by stage coach over this section of the route.
On July 24th, the Grant County Herald stated emphatically that Shakespeare would have a railroad connection to the west by October 1, 1880. By mid-August the SPRR was 51 miles east of Benson, Arizona Territory,¹⁴² and by the first week in September it had reached the head of the San Simon Valley and “Promises to be at Shakespeare on September 15.”¹⁴³ Only a little late in fulfilling this promise, the railroad had indeed reached the New Mexico line by September 18th, and by the end of that month was in Grant County itself, with regular passenger trains running from the west as far as San Simon station.¹⁴⁴
Lordsburg
Oddly, the Grant County newspapers provide no information on the tracks of the SPRR reaching what would become Lordsburg; this information was found in California newspapers.
Both the Los Angeles Herald and the Sacramento Daily Union of October 20, 1880, reported the event, reprinting a dispatch sent from Tucson the previous day in which it was stated that the SPRR had opened a new station, two miles from Shakespeare, on the 18th of October. Both newspapers, quoting the Tucson dispatch, say that the new station was named Lordsburg, with the Herald spelling it “Lordsburgh.”
The Grant County newspapers were a little slower to use the name; on November 6, 1880, the Grant County Herald referred to the delivery of “all freight from the West” to a point “near Shakespeare”, from where it could be delivered to Silver City in about three days. It was not until the following week that the name Lordsburg was used when, on November 13th, the Grant County Herald reported that the tracks of the SPRR had now reached “a point 33 miles [east] from Lordsburg”; the track was being laid at the rate of three miles per day.
As for how the station acquired the name Lordsburg, again Grant County newspapers give no information. Two possible explanations exist – one that it was named for Delbert Lord, a chief engineer for the SPRR, and the other that it was named for Charles H. Lord, the prominent Tucson merchant. There is no evidence to indicate that there ever was a Delbert Lord associated with the SPRR, certainly not as a chief engineer. There is one document, dated 1910, which does refer to a Mr. Lord in connection with railroad matters; the January-June 1910 edition of Engineering-Contracting, a civil engineering publication, refers to an L. H. Lord of Tucson who was at the time Assistant Chief Engineer for the Arizona and Colorado Rail Road. This was a Southern Pacific line, and was responsible for the construction of a branch line to Globe, Arizona from Lordsburg.¹⁴⁵
Once more it is the California newspapers (the Los Angeles Herald and the Sacramento Daily Union) which clear up any misconceptions regarding the naming of Lordsburg. The re-printed Tucson dispatch which had appeared in the October 20, 1880, Daily Union states that the station was so named “in honor of Dr. C. H. Lord” of Tucson.
Originally from New Jersey, Dr. Charles H. Lord had come to Arizona Territory after the Civil War as surgeon for the Cerro Colorado mine, south of Tucson, in 1866.¹⁴⁶ By 1869, he had become involved in mercantile businesses, banking, government contracting, and mining. In 1868 he was appointed Territorial Auditor for Arizona, and in 1869 Postmaster at Tucson; he also served as a Designated Depository of the United States at Tucson. Undoubtedly C. H. Lord, of the firm of Lord & Williams of Tucson, was the supplier of much of that “freight from the West” being delivered to the rail head near Shakespeare.
The arrival of the railroad at Lordsburg necessitated changes to the way in which the NM&T Co. provided service. Not only was the route between Mesilla and Tucson being speedily and drastically curtailed by the construction of the railroad line, but the Company also had to make changes to what remained of its route. West of Lordsburg, all mail on the main southern route was now being carried by the railroad.
As early as 1834, Postmaster General William T. Barry had stated in his Annual Report that “the celerity of the mail should always be equal to the most rapid transition of the traveler”,¹⁴⁷ and in 1838, Congress legislated that every railroad in the United States would automatically be designated a post-road. In 1845, Congress resolved that henceforth the Postmaster General would be authorized to contract directly with railroad companies for the transportation of mails without having to advertise for bids from any other source.
As the Post Office Department changed to using railroads as the primary mode of mail transportation, one of the first things it “almost invariably” did was to appoint mail-route messengers.¹⁴⁸
J.E.Long and O.R. Smythe; Post Offices at Shakespeare and Lordsburg
Mail-route messengers were responsible for the authorized, safe and secure transfer of mail between railroad depots and the nearest Post Office. The 1881 Post Office Department Register of Employees, which names J. E. Long as Postmaster at Shakespeare, also names O. R. Smythe as being in charge of the Mail Messenger service between the Post Office at Shakespeare and the railroad depot at Lordsburg. Prior to this, Smythe had been General Manager for the NM&T Co. on that section of the route, replacing J. E. Long in that position after Long resigned.¹⁴⁹ By the end of August 1881, Lordsburg would have a Post Office of its own¹⁵⁰, although it would operate alongside that at Shakespeare for some time. The United States Official Postal Guide for January of 1882 lists both the Post Offices at Lordsburg and Shakespeare as being operational on December 1, 1881.¹⁵¹
Cow Springs and Gage
At the same time that the SPRR was laying tracks across southern New Mexico Territory towards El Paso, the AT&SF railroad was progressing in a southerly direction, also towards El Paso, from Santa Fe/Lamy.
In the vicinity of Rincon, Doña Ana county, the AT&SF tracks branched; one branch continuing to El Paso, the other taking a southwesterly path to meet with the SPRR line. The point at which the two railroads would meet was predestined to become an important point on the railroad, but that point had not been decided on in advance and there was much speculation on exactly where it would be.
At the end of October of 1880, it was reported that the next station on the SPRR (after Lordsburg) was to be at Cow Springs, and that it was expected that it would be the point at which the two railroads would connect.¹⁵² This expectation was not met, and the location of the junction remained undetermined.
The following month yet another station was established, this one christened Gage.¹⁵³ Sidings were constructed there, and it served largely as a supply base for the SPRR,¹⁵⁴ although a settlement would develop at the site. Still the site at which the two railroads would meet remained an unknown.
Deming Station and Deming Junction – the Tale of Two Demings
Eventually the location of the junction would be decided upon, that point was Deming or, more correctly, Deming Junction, the location around which the present day town of Deming has grown. But this was the second site to be given the name Deming, the original Deming had been located about 11 miles further east and had been known as Deming Station, though it never developed into a town.
For several months, as the two railroads advanced towards each other, the exact point at which they would meet remained undetermined. In October of 1880, it was reported that the junction was to be at a location identified as Florida Point.¹⁵⁵
In early December the Herald and Southwest said that the AT&SF engineers were currently “about 5 miles in a direct line below [Fort] Cummings” and that a survey had begun “in five different directions in order to ascertain the best possible point for a junction of the two roads”.¹⁵⁶ Later that same month both the Herald and Southwest and the Los Angeles Herald were describing “the new Station on the SPRR called Deming.”¹⁵⁷
It was not until February of 1881 that the precise location for the junction of the two railroads was finally fixed, though at that time it had no name. On February 7, 1881, the Sacramento Daily Union published the following in its “Arizona” column:
Items from Tucson
Tucson, February 5th – A special dispatch from Deming to the Star says: Yesterday the connecting point of the A., T. and S. F. with the Southern Pacific was fixed at a point eleven miles west of Deming. Superintendent Towne, of the S. P., and Manager Strong, of the A., T. and S. F., closed the business by wire, the former being at the Palace Hotel and the latter in a palace car at Deming. Connections will be made March 10th. The track of the Southern Pacific is laid within twenty-one miles of El Paso.
On March 9, 1881, the Sacramento Daily Union reprinted a Tucson Star “special from Deming Junction” on the driving of the silver spike at the junction of the SPRR and AT&SF railroads; the first through train was to leave San Francisco on the morning of the 19th, and was to “make the trip through to Deming Junction in 60 hours.” The first through train from the east arrived at Deming Junction from Kansas on March 20th.¹⁵⁸
Despite some accounts that Deming (Junction) was at first known as New Chicago, it never actually went by that name; its first and only name was Deming Junction, later shortened to just Deming, something which seems to have happened quite quickly as on March 12th the Herald and Southwest was using just the name Deming to refer to “the town at the junction.”
There is one mention of the name New Chicago, but the name was never officially used:
Some genius seems to have been a trifle previous in the name New Chicago; which is not only a bungling and pretentious title, but has not as yet been adopted by either of the railroad companies, who chance to own the land and will have the naming of the town.¹⁵⁹
In what will be the final installment of Part III, we will look at the significant impact that the establishing of Deming Junction had on Route No. 3145, including the ways in which it effected change at Shakespeare which would now cater more to the transport of people rather than mails. We will also look at how the remaining stage routes in southwestern New Mexico devolved into local routes, as opposed to being the cross-Territory, Inter-State, primary modes of transport that they had been prior to the arrival of the railroad.
©2007-2023 Jim & Erica Parson
REFERENCES FOR THIS INSTALLMENT
¹³⁷The Statutes At Large Of The United States Of America, From April, 1879, To March, 1881. Washington: Government Printing Office (1881). Volume XXI. Page 208. Note: The Eureka Mining District is 6.2 miles WSW of Hatchita, NM, in Township 28 South, Range 16 West, Sections 1 and 22 at the old Hatchita Mining Camp. The Stonewall Mining District is 1.7 miles WSW of the place called Hermanas, NM, centered around Carasalillo Springs in Township 28 South, Range 11 West, Sections 28, 29 and 33.
¹³⁸Daily Southwest. July 23, 1880.
¹³⁹Herald and Southwest. January 15, 1881.
¹⁴⁰Daily Southwest. July 28, 1880.
¹⁴¹Grant County Herald. February 28, 1880.
¹⁴²Grant County Herald. August 14, 1880.
¹⁴³Grant County Herald. September 4, 1880.
¹⁴⁴Grant County Herald. September 25, 1880.
¹⁴⁵Engineering-Contracting. Volume XXXIII, Number 7. January-June 1910. Page 32. Chicago: The Myron C. Clark Publishing Company.
Note: One other reference to L. H. Lord “of the Great Western” was found in the Philadelphia publication Railway World. Volume 43. December 30, 1899. Page 1454.
¹⁴⁶Sonnichsen, C. L. (1987). Tucson: The Life And Times Of An American City. University of Oklahoma Press. Page 93.
¹⁴⁷A History Of The Railway Mail Service (1903). Washington, D.C.: Columbian Correspondence College, Page 54.
¹⁴⁸Report Of The Superintendent Of Railway Mail Service. In : Annual Report Of The Postmaster General Of The United States For The Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1879. Washington: Government Printing Office (1879). Page 218.
¹⁴⁹Grant County Herald. September 25, 1880.
¹⁵⁰New Southwest and Grant County Herald. August 27, 1881.
¹⁵¹United States Official Postal Guide. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company (1882). Page 266.
¹⁵²Sacramento Daily Union. October 25, 1880.
¹⁵³Gage is located approximately 20 miles west of Deming, NM.
¹⁵⁴Sacramento Daily Union. November 9, 1880.
¹⁵⁵Grant County Herald and Southwest. October 30, 1880. T. M. Pearce, editor of New Mexico Place Names (University of New Mexico Press,1998), identifies Florida Point as being 14 miles northeast of present day Deming. Established in 1881, Pearce says that Florida Point was first known as Porter Station, then Cummings before becoming known as Florida Point. The Herald and Southwest refers to Florida Point in October of 1880, with the name Cummings appearing in December of that year. The first reference found to “Porter’s Station” was in Grant County’s New Southwest and Herald of December 12, 1881, in an item reporting that it seemed likely that a new military post was soon to be built “near old Fort Cummings, and on the line of the piping or water conduct [sic] laid from the springs at the post [Cook’s Spring] to Porter’s Station by the A.T. & S. F. R. R.”
Porter’s Station may have been named for W. Jay Porter who had a general merchandise and forwarding and commissioning business. Porter relocated to Deming Junction in March of 1881.
¹⁵⁶Herald and Southwest. December 11, 1880.
¹⁵⁷Herald and Southwest. December 18 and December 25, 1880; Los Angeles Herald, December 15, 1880
¹⁵⁸Herald and Southwest. March 19, 1881.
¹⁵⁹Herald and Southwest. February 26, 1881.
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