Castle Gate is a

ghost town Ghost Town(s) or Ghosttown may refer to: * Ghost town, a town that has been abandoned Film and television * Ghost Town (1936 film), ''Ghost Town'' (1936 film), an American Western film by Harry L. Fraser * Ghost Town (1956 film), ''Ghost Town'' ...

in the

western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

, located in Carbon County in eastern

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

. A mining town approximately southeast of

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the Capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Utah, most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the county seat, seat of Salt Lake County, Utah, Sal ...

, its name was derived from a rock formation near the mouth of

Price Canyon The Price River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed October 30, 2020 southeastward flowing river in Carbon, Utah and Emery counties in eastern Utah. It is a tributary to ...

. This formation features two sheer

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...

walls on either side of the

Price River The Price River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed October 30, 2020 southeastward flowing river in Carbon, Utah and Emery counties in eastern Utah. It is a tributary to ...

, which appear to open like a giant gate as travelers approach this narrow section of the canyon.

Coal mining origins

The first

coal mine Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from ...

, named the Castle Gate Mine #1, opened around 1886, after the

Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad The Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad , often shortened to ''Rio Grande'', D&RG or D&RGW, formerly the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, was an American Class I railroad company. The railroad started as a narrow-gauge line running south from De ...

constructed its Utah Division over the

Wasatch Plateau The Wasatch Plateau is a plateau located southeast of the southernmost part of the Wasatch Range in central Utah. It is a part of the Colorado Plateau. Geography The plateau has an elevation of and includes an area of . Its highest point in the ...

, from the town of Springville. The mine produced high-quality coal for the steam trains. Castle Gate Mine #2 opened in 1912, and was found to have the finest coal in the region. In 1914, Castle Gate was incorporated as a town, which was owned and tightly controlled by the Utah Fuel Company and the D&RGW; a third mine opened in 1922.

Historic events

The town is most famous for two historic events. On April 21, 1897,

Butch Cassidy Robert LeRoy Parker (April 13, 1866 – November 7, 1908), better known as Butch Cassidy, was an American train and bank robber and the leader of a gang of criminal outlaws known as the "Wild Bunch" in the Old West. Parker engaged in crimina ...

and

Elzy Lay William Ellsworth "Elzy" Lay (November 25, 1869 – November 10, 1934) was an outlaw of the Old West in the United States. He was a member of Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch, gang, operating out of the Hole-in-the-Wall Pass in Johnson County, Wyoming ...

held up an employee of the Pleasant Valley Coal Company in a daylight robbery at the busy railroad station in Castle Gate, making off with $7,000 in gold. On March 8, 1924, the Utah Fuel Company's Castle Gate Mine #2 exploded, killing 172 miners. Fatalities included 49 Greeks, 22 Italians, 8 Japanese, 7 English, 6 Austrians (Yugoslavs), 2 Scots, 1 Belgian, and 76 Americans, including 2 African-Americans. It was the third-deadliest disaster in the history of coal mining in the United States at that time, and remains the tenth deadliest at present.

Deconstruction of the town

Castle Gate was dismantled in the summer of 1974, and residents were relocated to a new subdivision at the mouth of Spring Canyon, west of Helper. The former townsite was cleared and replaced with coal-loading facilities neighboring the railroad line. Image:CastleGateUtah.jpeg, Castle Gate, with the former townsite to the left File:D&RGW Castle Gate steam train approaching.jpg,

locomotive at Castle Gate (circa 1929)

References

External links

* {{authority control Ghost towns in Carbon County, Utah Company towns in Utah Coal towns in Utah Mining communities in Utah Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad Populated places established in 1886 Ghost towns in Utah 1886 establishments in Utah Territory 1974 disestablishments in Utah Populated places disestablished in 1974

Coal mining origins

Historic events

Deconstruction of the town

See also

References

External links