Jay Em is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

in northern Goshen County,

Wyoming Wyoming ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States, Western United States. It borders Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho t ...

, United States, just below the headwaters of the

Rawhide Creek Rawhide Creek is a stream in Douglas, Washington, Dodge, and Colfax counties, Nebraska, in the United States. According to legend, Rawhide Creek was named in about 1849 on account of a man who was skinned to death there by Indians, his hide was ...

, on the old

Texas Trail The Texas Trail, another name for the Great Western Cattle Trail, was used to drive cattle from Texas to Ogallala, Nebraska. This emerged as an alternative to the Chisholm Trail. Near Imperial, Nebraska are portions of a dry stone corral wh ...

. It lies along

U.S. Route 85 U.S. Route 85 (US 85) is a north–south United States Highway that travels in the Mountain and Northern Plains states of the United States. The southern terminus of the highway is at the Mexican border in El Paso, Texas, connecting w ...

, 35 miles north of the city of Torrington, the

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or parish (administrative division), civil parish. The term is in use in five countries: Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, and the United States. An equiva ...

of Goshen County. Its elevation is 4,590 feet (1,399 m). Although unincorporated, Jay Em has a

post office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letter (message), letters and parcel (package), parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post o ...

, with ZIP code 82219.

History

The site of the town was a watering hole on old Texas Trail. The land around the watering hole was claimed by Jim Moore in the 1860s. By 1869, Moore had the second largest cattle ranch in the

Wyoming Territory The Territory of Wyoming was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from July 25, 1868, until July 10, 1890, when it was admitted to the Union as the State of Wyoming. Cheyenne was the territorial capital. The ...

, under the brand "J Rolling M", from which the community and "Jay Em Creek" would take later their names. The town was established to support ranchers in the surrounding area by Lake Harris between 1912 and 1915, and by 1915 a

was established. A newspaper, the weekly ''Jay Em Sentinel and Fort Laramie News'' (circulation 300) ran from 1917 to 1921. The town thrived with a number of businesses growing up, including a lumber yard and general store, and the Jay Em Stone Company, which made gravestones and building products from stone quarried in the

Rawhide Buttes Rawhide Buttes l. is a mountain range in Wyoming Wyoming ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States, Western United States. It borders Montana to the north and northw ...

area. In the 1930s, a gem cutting workshop was established. By the 1930s and the advent of the automobile, the town began declining somewhat, and beginning in the 1980s, most of the few remaining residents gradually moved to more modern accommodations scattered around the edges of town, eventually leaving the old, historic center of town for the most part abandoned. One of the remaining buildings is the old Shoults Garage, which operated from 128 to 1945; and then as the Wolfe Garage from 1946 until 1960. Also still standing are a gas station, a lumber mill, the general and hardware stores, the stone cutting business, and a bank. The town hosted thousands of visitors who came to view the

solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 The solar eclipse of August 21, 2017, dubbed the "Great American Eclipse" by some media, was a total solar eclipse visible within a band that spanned the contiguous United States from the Pacific Ocean, Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic c ...

Historic district

The center of the original community is included in the Jay Em Historic District, and listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

Education

Public education for the community of Jay Em is provided by Goshen County School District #1.

Main highway

* U.S. Highway 85

References

External links

{{authority control Unincorporated communities in Goshen County, Wyoming Unincorporated communities in Wyoming