Re: Speculation on the Gilpin Tramway at the Black Hawk Roundhouse.

Posted by Keith Pashina on Feb 04, 2023; 4:08am
URL: http://c-sng-discussion-forum.254.s1.nabble.com/Speculation-on-the-Gilpin-Tramway-at-the-Black-Hawk-Roundhouse-tp18403p18405.html

Chris, you present a well-laid case for the water tank.  As with so many things related to the Gilpin Tram, documentation tends to be sparse, and the water tank at Black Hawk is one of those hard to come by topics. I recall our email debate on this topic a few years ago.

I had originally thought the structure near the warming house had been a mine ore bin.  I took a photo of this structure about 20 years ago, and at that time it looked like this:



A few years later, the structure succumbed to time and weather, and was in poor shape. I thought the sheet-metal lined slide down the hill from the adit to the bin was pretty interesting.  By the way, that's Joe Crea checking out the mine remains.



Now, I don't know when this ore bin structure was built - the photos you posted of the area I think were tank in the early 1900s - a lot of changes could have been made in the following years, including removing the water tank after abandonment and a mine operation emerging sometime after that.

Some railroads had cisterns up in the rafters of the engine house - Dan Abbott had told me he had read this tidbit when he was researching for his Gilpin Railroad Era book. He had extensively researched much of the local newspapers from the era. I know some other narrow gauge railroads, such as the 2' gauge Bridgton and Saco River in Maine, also were reported to have done this. So, I had thought a cistern in the Gilpin Tram enginehouse seemed very likely.

However, your research is very convincing and well presented. If the Gilpin Tram had originally built a cistern in the enginehouse, they could have also expanded the water supply with a larger tank, and as you noted, put the tank out on the mainline on the route to the Black Hawk lower mills. Also, the engine house was expanded in phases from the original single stall to two, then three stalls. A larger tank could have been added in later years, and not been documented in any of the surviving documents.  The Gilpin Tram did change their water tanks over the years - the original Eureka Street tank was replaced with a larger structure, and Dan Abbott's research also found a report that another water tank had been added in Russell Gulch (which I have never been able to find a photo of).

So, as you and I emailed to each other, I think your premise that this structure was a railroad water tank seems very plausible!