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| Eastbound Union Pacific along the south bank of the Columbia River (Lake Celilo impounded by the Dalles Dam). |
19th century railroad construction, though remarkable in its day, was crude by 21st century standards. Massive cuts and fills were possible but generally avoided due to the huge number of men and mules required for even the simplest construction. Thus, in the mountainous Pacific Northwest, engineers preferred to locate their roads along rivers which, though not necessarily tame, were nonetheless significantly less tortuous than the grades necessary to cross the Cascade Range.
This article will discuss the Union Pacific lines that follow three major rivers in the Pacific Northwest -- the Columbia, Snake and Kootenai. (Both the Columbia and Snake have been dammed along most of their lengths, and the images below show trains running beside man-made reservoirs. In some cases, the reservoirs are identified, in others reference is simply made to the river.)
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| https://www.up.com/cs/groups/public/@uprr/@corprel/documents/up_pdf_nativedocs/pdf_service_unit_map.pdf |
As the map shows, Union Pacific's mainline from Portland runs east along the south bank of the Columbia River to approximately the middle of the state (at Boardman) where the tracks turn southeast away from the river to a major classification yard at Hinkle. From there the mainline continues southeast to join the original transcontinental line at Granger, Wyoming.
North of Hinkle, UP tracks rejoin the Columbia near the Oregon-Washington border and follow the wide river north to Wallula, then turn northeast across a portion of Washington's agricultural breadbasket to join the Snake River near the small settlement of Ash. The Snake River is followed to the spectacular Joso High Bridge, then on to Spokane and ultimately to interchange with CPKC at Eastport, Idaho.
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| Union Pacific stacks on the Oregon side of the Columbia River in the desert east of the Cascades. (Lake Umatilla impounded by the John Day Dam.) |
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| Juniper Siding on the Columbia River. The train is preparing to cross from Oregon to Washington on the line that runs from Hinkle Yard to British Columbia. (Lake Wallula impounded by the McNary Dam.) |
While the Civil War raged in the East, the Oregon Steam Navigation Company ran riverboat traffic up and down the Columbia River. Several miles upriver from the Dalles, Oregon, Celilo Falls constituted an impenetrable barrier to sternwheeler traffic, so on the Oregon side the company constructed a five-foot gauge railroad to carry traffic around the impediment. Riverboats would approach the falls from either direction, then unload both passengers and freight onto the railroad to be portaged around the falls to a waiting boat on the other side.
This simple railroad, not ten miles long, was the beginning of what became Union Pacific's line to Portland -- in the person of one Henry Villard, mastermind of the Northern Pacific's line across the Cascades, who also wanted to build a railroad along the Columbia River. Villard made a fortune creating railroads that later went bankrupt and is discussed in detail at https://www.waltersrail.com/2023/04/powder-river-basin-part-two-union.html.
Villard purchased the Oregon Steam Navigation Company in 1879, the same year that he created the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company to construct a rail line along the south bank of the Columbia. Grading work between the Dalles and Wallula, Washington, began in 1880 in conjunction with the conversion of the Celilo Falls portage railroad to standard gauge. The final link through Umatilla, Oregon, was completed in 1881.
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| A northbound mixed freight with CPKC power approaches Wallula, Washington. CPKC run-through power is common on this line. (Lake Wallula.) |
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| Southbound grain in the Wallula Gap, with more CPKC power. The Wallala gap is a large water gap cuting through the Horse Heaven Hills just south of the confluence of the Walla Walla and Columbia Rivers. (Lake Wallula.) |
With Villard at the controls, the Northern Pacific pushed westward towards the Cascades and Puget Sound, while the OR&N built northeast from Wallula toward the Snake River and westward from the Dalles to Portland, the latter completed October 4, 1882. At the same time, the Union Pacific began construction of tracks from Granger, Wyoming, to Baker City, Oregon.
Villard feared competition from the Union Pacific, so the OR&N worked southeast from Umatilla, reaching Pendleton, at the foot of the Blue Mountains, on August 31, 1882. One year later, UP and the OR&N agreed to join at Huntington, Oregon, which required the OR&N to do the heavy lifting across the mountains.
Before the OR&N reached Huntington, Villard's empire collapsed and he was chased like a hound from his enterprises. Though his railroads struggled, he had amassed a personal fortune and spent the next year traveling around the world.
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| Westbound UP stacks near the John Day Dam. The tracks were re-routed to this higher elevation when the dam and resulting reservoir were created. |
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| Led by CP power, an eastbound empty grainer rolls beside the Columbia River across from Wishram, Washington. The tracks above the grainer are the old Oregon Trunk, now part of BNSF. About a half-mile to the right of this image, the BNSF crosses the UP tracks and the river. (Lake Celilo.) |
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| Here is a southbound BNSF manifest crossing the Columbia River on the old Oregon Trunk. In the far right, a Union Pacific eastbounder is approaching. |
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| This is the bridge (crossing Celilo Falls) before the damming of the Columbia River and the construction of I-84 along the south bank. Notice the channel along that bank for riverboat traffic, part of the original lock system around the falls. [https://nprymuseum.org/oregon-trunk-celilo-bridge/] |
Once the OR&N reached Huntington, it began carrying Union Pacific traffic west to Portland. Not content with this arrangement, as agitated as a caged animal, the UP first attempted to purchase the smaller road, then in April 1887, leased the entirety of the OR&N, thereby gaining direct access for its locomotives, rolling stock and employees to Portland and Washington's breadbasket in the Palouse. By 1891, the Union Pacific gained control of 60 percent of OR&N stock and began construction of agricultural branch lines into Washington, Oregon and Idaho.
Then came the Panic of 1893, which forced every Western railroad except the Great Northern into bankruptcy.
In 1873 and again 20 years later, the United States plunged headlong into banking crises that shook the country's bedrock. The Panic of 1873 began across the Atlantic Ocean with two stock market crashes in Vienna, Austria, in May and then again in September. Prior to those collapses, German and Austrian financiers had been major purchasers of American railroad bonds. It was genuinely believed in at least some portions of western Europe that money could be made in America as easily as falling off a chair.
But the Austrian panic caused Europeans to sell their American investments, particularly their railroad bonds, severely depressing the market that companies like Union Pacific relied on to finance construction, operations and debts. American railroads were living off debt, borrowing money for everything, including funds for month-to-month payrolls. When the value of bonds dropped precipitously, the railroads could no longer find new investors to keep the merry-go-round turning. The turmoil forced Jay Cooke and Company, America's first investment bank, into bankruptcy on September 18, 1873.
Creditors quickly lost confidence in railroads and in their financing banks. Since at any given moment, banks generally owe more to depositors than they have in reserves, depositor confidence is crucial to a healthy financial system. Once people feared that banks could not protect their money, bank runs ensued. Then stock markets collapsed. On September 20, for the first time in its history, the New York Stock Exchange closed, and trading was suspended for ten days.
New York's large banks held enough reserves to supply cash to many struggling smaller banks, and the panic, though severe, was limited in scope. Nationwide, about one-hundred banks failed.
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| A giant named "Panic" clearing garbage from Wall Street in 1873. (Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ds-04513) |
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| Westbound UP "garbage train" to Portland. Both Union Pacific and BNSF haul garbage along the Columbia River. (Lake Umatilla.) |
The Panic of 1893 was on an entirely different scale, an elephant compared to a lamb, the worst financial crisis in the United States prior to the Great Depression. Operating on the gold standard, which meant that cash could be redeemed at the U.S. Treasury for a fixed amount of gold, the country saw redemptions reduce reserves in 1893 to about $100 million from $190 million in 1890. Falling gold reserves fanned fears that the United States might suspend the convertibility of its currency, causing individuals and companies to do the very thing that would create suspension. Everyone began converting cash into gold, further depleting reserves. Thus began the "death spiral" that drives all panics.
In addition, the economy slowed prior to the run on gold, increasing defaults on loans, weakening banks' balance sheets. Depositors began withdrawing their money from banks, stoking the flames.
Bank runs exploded in the Midwest and West. 340 banks suspended operations and withdrew funds on deposit with large banks in New York City. To satisfy withdrawal requests, those money center banks sold assets, creating a "fire sale." Asset prices plummeted. To save themselves, New York banks began limiting withdrawals. Highly levereged companies, such as the Union Pacific and other Western railroads, could not raise cash necessary to meet obligations. One-by-one those railroads went bankrupt. Construction ceased. Traffic disappeared.
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| Eastbound at Biggs Junction, Oregon. The very top of Mount Hood is visible in the upper left. (Lake Celilo.) |
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| Another eastbound running between opposing lanes of I-84. (Lake Celilo.) |
The Panic of 1893 threw both the UP and the OR&N into bankruptcy. Reorganization followed, a process comparable to untangling a fishing line snarled at the bottom of a pond. Union Pacific emerged from the muddy reorganization waters in 1898 with a Utah charter and immediately purchased a controlling interest in the OR&N.
During reorganization, the UP itself was purchased by E.H. Harriman, who got his start in the railroad business when he obtained for a song the ailing, almost comatose, Lake Ontario Southern Railroad. He renamed it the Sodus Bay & Southern, routed it to profitability and ultimately sold it to the Pennsylvania Railroad at a considerable gain.
Harriman was 49 when in 1897 he became a director of the Union Pacific Railroad. By May 1898, he was chairman of the executive committee. From then on, he controlled the Union Pacific as thoroughly as sunlight controls the growth of plants. In 1903, he became president of the company.
The 1893 Panic overwhelmed railroads because they were perpetually short of cash. Why? Rate wars. Railroads were competing against each other for finite business.
Although the late 19th century economy was growing, it was not expanding nearly as fast as the railroads. Each rail company hoped that as it built new lines, it would create new business. That happened to some extent, but not nearly enough was created to fuel the railroads' rapid expansion. Each company was competing against every other company for a relatively static amount of revenue. The railroad business in the late 19th century was, in other words, mostly a zero sum game.
The Great Northern, Northern Pacific and Union Pacific all provided service to the Pacific Northwest. The only way one company could differentiate itself was by lowering rates, often below costs.
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| Eastbound grain along the original right-of-way of the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company. (Lake Celilo.) |
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| More eastbound grain. |
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| Westbound stacks. (Lake Celilo.) |
In pure survival mode, railroads attempted to pool interests. From a shipper's viewpoint, this amounted to anti-competitive behavior. Moreover, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, railroads were viewed as gigantic, monopolistic, terrible beasts.
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| E.H. Harriman swallowing American railroads. (Licensed from Alamy.) |
Neither the Union Pacific nor the Great Northern directly connected to Chicago, the nation's railroad hub, and both wanted control of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy to provide such access. Harriman swooped in like a falcon, ready to claw the CB&Q into his nest, but he was outbid by James J. Hill's Great Northern, paying $200 per share, a price that even Harriman's empire could not stomach.
Hill also owned a strong minority position in the Northern Pacific, and together the GN and NP took control of the CB&Q. Harriman then launched a bid to take over the Northern Pacific, but Hill outflanked him with the help of J.P. Morgan and Company. Harriman did, however, obtain significant holdings in the NP.
Hill formed the Northern Securities Company to manage his three railroads. Harriman's minority position allowed him to appoint several directors to the Board.
A public outcry arose, and President Theodore Roosevelt personally instructed the Justice Department to file an anti-trust action against Hill's behemoth. J.P. Morgan met privately with the President to discuss settlement, but apparently feeling that Morgan approached him as a fellow businessman, rather than as leader of the American nation, the President refused to budge. No settlement was reached, the lawsuit proceeded and eventually the Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision, ordered the GN, NP and CB&Q to be divested into separate companies.
When the dust settled, Harriman's Union Pacific emerged victorious. The UP's 1907 annual report showed ownership of $9,036,400 par value of Great Northern and $4,152,800 par value of Northern Pacific stock. Union Pacific had also subscribed to an additional $3,614,560 of Great Northern and $2,491,600 Northern Pacific stock.
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| Westbound to Portland along the south bank of the Columbia River. (Lake Celilo.) |
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| Westbound garbage near the John Day Dam. |
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| Pusher on westbound stacks near John Day Dam. The tracks in the foreground were abandoned when the line was re-routed. |
Harriman was not one to rest on his laurels. He began purchasing Southern Pacific stock, intending to swallow the SP's line from Ogden to Oakland, and when he secured a major interest from the estate of Collis P. Huntington, he took over the SP and made it part of the Union Pacific system, creating a through-route from Omaha to San Francisco Bay. His goal of creating a single unified railroad west of the Mississippi might have succeeded had he not made the same mistake as J.P. Morgan and irritated the President of the United States.
On February 1st, 1908, the United States filed a Complaint in federal court for the District of Utah against the Union Pacific, charging the railroad with restraining competition in violation of federal anti-trust laws. The suit was brought at the express direction of President Roosevelt, who insisted that one company should not control both the Union Pacific and Southern Pacific.
On September 9, 1909, Harriman died at the age of 61 -- at home with family, who closely guarded the cause of death. Several newspapers described the cause as "acute indigestion." Contemporary sources indicate that he died from stomach cancer. Apparently, he did not receive any significant medical treatment and died in pain.
On December 2, 1912, the U.S. Supreme Court rendered a final decision in the anti-trust case against Union Pacific. Justice Day delivered the Court's unanimous opinion (Justice Van Devanter recusing):
The case in its principal aspect grew out of the purchase by the Union Pacific Railroad Company in the month of February, 1901, of certain shares of the capital stock of the Southern Pacific Company from the devisees under the will of the late Collis P. Huntington, who had formerly owned the stock. Other shares of Southern Pacific stock were acquired at the same time, the holding of the Union Pacific amounting to 750,000 shares, or about 37 1/2 percent (subsequently increased to 46 percent) of the outstanding stock of the Southern Pacific Company.
The Court then reviewed previous anti-trust decisions and found:
. . . a combination which places railroads engaged in interstate commerce in such relation as to create a single dominating control in one corporation, whereby natural and existing competition in interstate commerce is unduly restricted or suppressed, is within the condemnation of the act.
So the question for decision was whether the combination of the UP and SP "unduly restricted . . . natural and existing competition."
The case focused on the line from Omaha to Oakland. UP's track ran from Omaha to Ogden; SP's from Ogden to Oakland. Common logic says that the two lines were not in competition. Instead, they were complementary, providing together a single route from the Missouri River to the Pacific. Yet the Court eschewed logic, instead pointing out that the Union Pacific also provided traffic to Portland and could ship traffic by water from Portland south to San Francisco Bay. Thus, the Court reasoned, UP was a direct competitor to SP.
The facts disclose, as we have already said, that the Union Pacific had a line to Portland by way of the Oregon Short Line and the Oregon Railroad & Navigation Company, and thence to San Francisco by steamboat connection. It may be admitted that this was a much longer route than by way of the Ogden connection, and that, as a practical matter, nearly all of the freight intended for San Francisco and nearby points went over the Ogden route; nevertheless, the Portland route was a factor in ratemaking to the coast.
This was nonsense, as the Court knew. Whoever wrote the opinion, probably a law clerk, must have been thoroughly embarrassed, but you do whatever your boss requires. Either that or quit, and to your author's knowledge, no clerk has ever quite the Supreme Court.
The opinion then explained the real reason for the decision. E.H. Harriman would not be allowed to control any railroad other than the Union Pacific.
After acquiring the Southern Pacific stock, Mr. Harriman, who dominated in the affairs of the Union Pacific, became president and chairman of the executive committee of the Southern Pacific Company, with the same ample power which he had in like positions in the Union Pacific Company and the companies owned and controlled by it. These facts cannot be lost sight of in determining the object and scope of the transaction in question, which resulted, as we have said, in that unified control which has in its power the suppression of competition.
At no point did the Court explain how the transaction in question constituted "the suppression of competition." The Court simply assumed that one man, in the person of E.H. Harriman, should not be allowed to control two major western railroads.
Harriman was dead when the decision was rendered, but his spirit lived on, and the Supreme Court did President Roosevelt's bidding and killed it. Before the end of the century, however, many years later, the same government would allow the same UP to swallow the same SP. And today (December 2025) the UP is seeking to purchase Norfolk Southern and establish a coast-to-coast railroad. Not even Harriman was that bold.
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| More garbage along the Columbia River. (Lake Umatilla.) |
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| Eastbound manifest passing Horsethief Lake State Park across the water. (Lake Celilo.) |
UP's line to the Pacific Northwest served not only Portland, but also Spokane, Washington. The line to Spokane followed the Columbia River northeast from Umatilla, Oregon, to Wallula, Washington, through the Wallula Water Gap, where the tracks left the river and crossed a portion of the Palouse before intersecting the Snake River along the south bank. The Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway ran along the north bank.
Upon the creation of Burlington Northern, the SP&S line along the Snake was abandoned in favor of the alternate Northern Pacific route over Providence Hill. The roadbed along the river's north bank is still plainly visible in the 21st century, and the several towering steel bridges remain in place, markers of a history now mostly forgotten.
Also along the north bank, closer to water level, is the right-of-way of the former Northern Pacific Low Line from Snake River Junction to Riparia, abandoned after the construction of Lower Monumental Dam.
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| This screen shot from Bing Maps shows the abandoned lines of SP&S and NP, plus the active UP line. |
Years later, the UP abandoned the portion of the line through Umatilla, Oregon, with the creation of the McNary Dam, and built a new connecting track north from Hinkle Yard to intersect the Seattle route near the Oregon-Washington border. The new line was constructed on a moderately steep grade (0.5%) as it climbed out of the Columbia River Basin.
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| Southbound grain is climbing out of the Columbia River Basin on its way to Hinkle Yard. |
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| More southbound grain, minus crew, parked in the siding near Page, Washington. |
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| Another southbound leaving the river. (Lake Wallula.) |
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| A meet at water level. (Lake Wallula.) |
To reach Spokane, the line from Hinkle eventually had to turn north and cross the Snake River, and it chose to do so on the spectacular Joso High Bridge. Built in 1913 and 1914 by the OR&N, the bridge contains 55 spans and is 3920 feet long -- the longest and highest in the Union Pacific system. It once stood about 260 feet above the Snake River, but when Lower Monumental Dam was built in 1968, water submerged part of the bridge piers, leaving only about 195 feet between the top of the bridge and the newly created reservoir.
The name "Joso" comes from the nearby Joso Siding, an Anglicized version of the last name of Leon Jussaud, a local sheep rancher.
At Ayers Junction, southwest from the bridge, the tracks north to Spokane diverge from the branch line leading to Riparia along the Snake River. The short Riparia branch runs underneath the Joso Bridge, while the bridge line turns northeast onto the towering steel structure, crossing the Riparia Branch, then over the Snake River and Washington State Route 261.
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| Northbound mixed freight on the Joso High Bridge. (Lake Herbert G. West.) |
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| Southbound on Joso High Bridge. |
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| The Joso High Bridge at sunset. |
Steel was unloaded by train at Hooper, about twelve miles north, then transferred to the river by a small locomotive and derrick, which unloaded the material upon a platform where it was picked up by a large derrick that erected it in place.
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| The original deck girder spans and post towers on the north side of the Snake River. This image and the two immediately below were taken before the Snake River was dammed. (https://historicbridges.org/bridges/browser/?bridgebrowser=washington/josohighbridge/) |
The truss spans were erected as whole cantilevers, except the first span had a temporary tower at mid-length. In December, 1913, the contractor started erecting the traveling crane that would inch across the structure as each span was placed. The crane was assembled on shore, then secured on the completed half of the first truss.
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| Erection of the truss spans with the traveling crane at the edge and the large derick behind it. Just visible at the northern edge of the bridge is the small derick. (https://historicbridges.org/bridges/browser/?bridgebrowser=washington/josohighbridge/) |
The steel for the truss spans and the west approach was unloaded at the bridge site, then transferred to flat cars and run out to the large crane by the small engine. The towers for the truss spans were completed before the trusses were lowered, though as the above image demonstrates, after completion of the first truss, only one tower was needed before a truss could be lowered.
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| This image shows all three cranes used to construct the bridge. https://archive.org/details/sim_enr_1914-11-19_72_21/mode/2up) |
Trains roll across the bridge in isolated splendor, very slowly, the bridge clattering and occasionally whining, but nevertheless standing tall and proud above the blue water. I imagine that one's first trip across the structure is as intimidating as one's first dive off a ten meter olympic platform. (You author did it twice as a much younger man and will never do it again.). I suspect that even the most veteran crew still gets a thrill as their train creeps across the steel cross spans and towers, with nothing between them and a tragic demise except the engineering expertise of men long departed.
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| Northbound grainer. |
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| Southbound grainer. |
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| Northbound. |
The Oregon Railroad and Navigation Company's line north from the Joso High Bridge terminated at Spokane, Washington, the last town of any size south of the Canadian border. The Canadian Pacific viewed Spokane as a potential doorway to America's Pacific Northwest if it could find some way to open it.
Enter the drama in the person of Daniel Chase Corbin, a local Spokane businessman and promoter with the same visions of grandeur as other railroad potentates. He believed that a railroad could be constructed northeast of Spokane into Idaho to interchange with the CP at what became the tiny border settlemet of Eastport. Through the mere power of words, he convinced the Canadian Pacific to fund his dream. More specifically, the CP bought his company's construction bonds.
Called the Spokane International Railway, the approximately 150 mile line was chartered in Washington January 1, 1905. Construction began immediately. The first train ran between Spokane and Canada November 1, 1906, mostly paralleling the route of the Great Northern northeast out of Spokane to Sandpoint, Idaho, where the GN crossed Lake Pend Oreille on a lengthy bridge. The SI navigated west of the lake, crossing the Pend Oreille River on a much smaller structure, continuing north between the Selkirk and Cabinet Mountains, through heavy forest, still paralleling the Great Northern to Bonners Ferry, Idaho, where the GN turned west along the south side of the Kootenai River. The Spokane International crossed the river, then followed its northern bank to Moyie Springs, where it turned north to Canada, about 15 miles distant.
Following the north bank of the Kootenai, the railroad slowly climbed from west to east the side of the huge embankment overlooking the wide valley so that when they reached Moyie Springs, the tracks were several hundred feet above the river and out of the valley altogether.
The line immediately saw significant Canadian Pacific traffic. Even so, the Great Depression forced the railroad into receivership. It emerged with a new name -- Spokane International Railroad. In 1958, Union Pacific took a controlling interest but did not formally merge the operation into its corporate structure until December 1, 1987.
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| A short Union Pacific local is climbing the steep bluffs above the Kootenai River on its way to the forest products plant at Moyie Springs. |
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| A grainer with CP power at same location. |
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| Loaded local coasts downgrade to Bonners Ferry. |
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| This mixed freight is preparing to turn away from the river to Moyie Springs. |
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| Southbound grain turning downgrade along the Kootenai River. |
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| Another grainer in early morning fog. |
In the Pacific Northwest, the Union Pacific runs beside many rivers not discussed here: Burnt, Moyie, Umatila, Powder, Palouse, Pack, Pend Oreille, Spokane -- and a plethora of creeks too numerous to count or mention. Why, you may ask, do we concentrate on only three? Primarily because we either lack images along these other splendid water courses or else (in the case of the Burnt, Powder and Pend Oreille) we have discussed them in other articles.
As I write, I am 75 years old. When younger, I wondered if, should I live long enough, I would run out of locations to photograph. Now in my dotage, I realize that should I live to 150, I would never run out of new places to visit and explore. However, I have no desire to see 150 years, so I will just keep chugging along as long as I am able to chug, then retire to the shadows.
To see my other posts, go to waltersrail.com.
To see my photographs on Flickr, go to https://www.flickr.com/photos/jpwalters/.
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