Be cautious about railroad documents as the most reliable, they too can be flawed despite being primary sources. Newspapers can be extremely reliable--and completely incorrect, too. But they are extremely valuable and shouldn't be dismissed out of hand. In the other thread you give credence to the memories of old South Park workers but memory is quite unreliable, too. It shouldn't be dismissed but should be taken with a grain of salt. All these data points inform--as do omissions at times. I can't see relying only on one source but instead rely on balancing all that is available. Interpretation, yes, but it requires more than 3 data points to get there. In this exercise there are many data points that bear further digging, such as the 1893 reference to turntables. Poor is one historian's reference point, the earliest of the bunch and still the go-to start for any research, yet there has been a great deal of information that has been unearthed since his opus was published. Not everything in Poor has stood the test of time--and I'm sure he'd be happy to admit that given what he had at the time to work with. UP and DL&G archives may hold the key but with the pandemic I don't see having the ability to get to those for a long long time.
1886 - yes, I mentioned that. The turning at that time was done at Pitkin and St Elmo.
1889 - yes, I mentioned that. The UP had just approved spending but hadn't installed.
1897 - yes. Perhaps related to other references to the turntable being moved up around 1897 or 1898, one of these, I believe, by Poor.
I consider several options as the most likely at this moment in time: 1) installed in 1882 and quickly removed, most likely to St Elmo 2) installed in 1890 during the large upgrades at the tunnel 3) installed around 1897-98 4) it never happened. All have data points, some strong, others weak. As I gain details in just this one month of research I've been changing thinking on each of them. I still heavily lean to #2 but that doesn't mean I'm saying that's the ultimately the answer.
Yes, interpretation because that's what we as historians do. But please provide more than just the 3 items when asking us to interpret if we're to do this exercise properly. The flaw in the previous threads is that only one or a few details are given. I'd like to see more of laying out the full range of known data points as I did responding to this thread--and the addition of those that surface. You pointed out the 1893 St Elmo reference that I'd omitted--and this has me rethinking things. That is powerful, but it is not conclusive. I hope more facts in relation to what I posted are revealed.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/21/2020 10:49AM by degg13.
