Perlman's Legacy.

Scott Hightower's comments below were thought- provoking . The mention of Al Perlman will always stir emotions in Narrow Gauge country . The cold truth was Prelman was a good businessman ,and though he intiated major abandonements on the Narrow Gauge ,it had been realized as a necessity by officials since World War I . The D&RGW was a family road ,populated by friends and their relatives .Employees came from almost every lonely station on the system . I read the account of how the D&RGW ran branches like the Lake City line for years at a loss , and officials were reluctant to make the hard decisions .Judge Mc Carthy started the abandonement of unprofitable lines ,but had little taste for it since he was from the region . Perlman was an outsider ,and the perfect hatchetman to make these hard decisions .He ,after all ,left the railroad profitable ,after nearly three decades of receivership . The streamlining of the railroad from a poor line heavy with marginal or unprofitable branches to a profitable bridge route was necessatry to its survival . The process Perlman started was taken up by every other major railroad in the land . It is interesting to note that as the dot-coms crater , they often hire an outsider to do the dirty work .