Tonopah and Tidewater Railroad (T & T)
The T & T was the last of the major lines to be completed and the last to be abandoned. During construction in the summertime heat, progress was excruciatingly slow-barely 1 mile per month. The last train ran on June 14, 1940. Of all the Death Valley Area Railroads, remains of this line are the most abundant along much of its route.
Railroads that might have been.
Several other railroads that would have penetrated into Death Valley were proposed. All reached the official paperwork stage, some issued bonds, and a few began actual construction. These railroads are as follows:
Amargosa Valley Railroad, Bonnie Claire and Ubehebe Railroad, Ely and Goldfield Railroad, Greenwater Copper Mines and Smelter Company Railroad, Los Angeles and Independence Railroad.
MOVING ONTO THE CACHE:
In Furnace Creek, exist one of the locomotives that was used on the Death Valley Railroad.To gain credit for this cache, you must email me the answers (To email me, go to my profile and click that then go to “send message”. That is the only way I am going to be able to reply to you because if you do it differently, it will mean that I will have to search for your profile to email you if you were correct or incorrect, and I don’t want to do that.)
Answer these 3 questions:
1) The serial number of the train (located on the right and left sides of the front of the locomotive).
2) The builder and the year it was made.
3) Provide the year that the locomotive was donated to the museum.
And for extra credit (and this is SO SIMPLE!!),
***Give me the name of the second Director of the National Park Service who later became the vice president and general manager of Borax Consolidated's new subsidiary, U.S. Potash. ***
If you can't figure it out, go to the Museum that this cache is part of and ask around. If that doesn't work, go to the NPS visitor center and ask one of the Rangers (And if the Ranger doesn't know, make him/her get the answer because they will be impressed by the connection). You know you want this extra credit (Which doesn't mean anything, but how can you pass up something that is so simple and promises extra credit). And just so you will know, when my daughter and I were there in April (2014), I discussed this geocache with the man behind the counter of this museum and reminded him who the 2nd director was. I then went over to the NPS Visitor Center and played head games with the staff to see if they knew the answer (I apparently was brought up in another era of the NPS where we were required to know these things). One bit of warning, you might want to confirm this Extra Credit answer before you send it because if you send the wrong name, I will send you the correct name, and no extra credit.
Remember to email all that to me (Don't post it here).
While here, if interested, and if they are offering it, check out the evening Ranger slide show about the Death Valley Railroad (It's pretty good).
If you are into trains, also visit our other two geocaches in this area:
Lego Dan's Carson Colorado RR cache 1
Lego Dan's Carson Colorado RR cache 2
And if you're in the San Diego area, visit out other train related cache "I could eat a cow!"