Meany Ski Hut area saw An Early Epic Struggle

by Keith D. Goodman - "The Mountaineer Annual" 1955

Anyone subject to seeing apparitions might well stay indoors and away from windows at night whenever visiting Meany Ski Hut and environs. This precaution especially is necessary in the dark of the moon when the air is still and a light fog or mist is present.

Ichabod Crane saw the headless horseman many years after that unfortunate individual met the sword. Likewise an imaginative visitor to the area not only has the opportunity to witness all that Ichabod saw, but in addition many more ghosts such as a dozen maimed men, 400 horses and mules, scores of pigtailed Chinamen and a fugitive from justice vainly trying to escape death from a sheriff's gunfire.

The cause of the possible ghosts was the construction of the Stampede Tunnel and switchback over the nearby pass during the years 1886 to 1888. The bore, completed after a dramatic struggle, was at the time the second longest for railroads in the United States, exceeded in length only by the Hoosack in Massachusetts.

From the earlier days of railroads, a line was proposed for the Northwest, but it was not until 1870 that the Northern Pacific started building from Duluth to Puget Sound. The last spike was driven in 1883. The trains, after leaving Pasco, ran over tracks of the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Co., down the south bank of the Columbia River to Portland thence by car ferry from Goble to Kalama and finally on Northern Pacific rails to Tacoma, the terminus. Travelers to Seattle had to complete their trip by boat.

Plans were completed in 1884 to build a line directly from Pasco through some mountain pass to Tacoma. George B. McClellan, later the general of Civil War fame; and Isaac I. Stevens, the territorial governor, made scouting trips in the late '50s for suitable routes.

Virgil G. Bogue, assistant engineer for the railroad, discovered four passes near each other three of which he designated by numerals. The fourth he called Cedar Pass because it led to the Cedar River. He selected Pass No. 1 which he had located in March of 1881. The Northern Pacific had practically chosen Naches which was favorable to Tacoma.

Seattle's choice was Snoqualmie. Bogue proceeded from Ellensburg in April of 1883 and located the present tunnel site.

In Herbert Hunt's Tacoma, Its History and Its Builders and in a magazine article written in 1884 by Eugene V. Smalley, a Northern Pacific publicity man, can be gleaned the story of how the pass was named.

A party of trail cutters was encamped at the lake in the pass in the summer of 1880. A dispute arose between the axemen and their foreman. All of the men quit their jobs and hurriedly left the camp with the exception of a Johnny Bradley from Pierce County. He fastened to a nearby tree a piece of board, marking it with pencil, "Stampede Camp," because the dissenters stampeded down the trail.

Nelson Bennett, once a brakeman but later a railroad and mining contractor, was notified January 21, 1886, that he had been awarded the contract to build the proposed Stampede Tunnel. The figure, not clearly stated by writers of the day was around $1 million.

Bennett lost no time in getting underway. With the rail-head at Yakima, he had to construct a road over ridges, valleys and streams, some 92 miles of it, to the future Tunnel City -now Martin-plus five more winding miles to the west portal. The contractor appointed his brother, Capt Sidney J. Bennett as general superintendent.

Hauling a ton of supplies from Yakima to Meany Ski Hut with a four-horse team in January would be quite a chore on the roads of today. It would take at least four or five days in summer and perhaps three times that long in winter.

According to the Tacoma Ledger of May 26, 1886, the Bennetts began work at the east portal on Lincoln's Birthday, in snow that was from six to ten feet deep. The bore was to be 9,850 feet long, 22 feet high and 16½, feet wide or a total of about 122,000 cubic yards of volcanic rock to be removed.

A cut had to be made opposite the spot where the present employees now live; a 700-foot approach filled and leveled; hand drllls, hammer and blasting materials had to be hauled in; cookhouse, bunkhouse, warehouse and other wooden structures had to be erected before tunneling could begin. These preliminary operations involved an expenditure of $125,000.

The foregoing edition of the Tacoma Ledger described in flowery language the waterfall at entrance of the proposed tunnel. The height given was 180 feet with a beauty exceeding that of Multnomah Falls near the Columbia River. This Stampede cascade of water gave trouble. A dam constructed to divert it gave way and the workmen below were flooded out. Before repairs could be made the water froze at the portal causing a long delay until could be removed.

By May 26, so the Ledger stated, 200 men were working at the east portal on three eight-hour shifts, There were 156 men on the west side plus six families.

To reach the west portal, a trail, at first through 12 feet of snow, had to be dug out to transport equipment by mule back.

The article in the Ledger stated there was a saloon, restaurant and hospital in Tunnel City. With the absence of suitable flat areas even to this day around Martin, one wonders where these edifices stood.

As fast as the bore was cut, timbering was resorted to on the east side. Twelve by twelves were segmented every two to four feet to hold up the ceiling. Timbers were cut for the west side, stacked near the portal but apparently never were used. Two sawmills, one at Teanaway, a new town 20 miles west of Ellensburg, and the other at Cabin Creek, eight miles east of the tunnel, furnished the big squares.

The first round-trip train from Pasco to Ellensburg made the run Sunday, April 11, with railroad officials aboard according to the Ellensburg Localizer in its edition of April 17, 1886. The paper stated the wagon road to Tunnel City had been much improved and that a Mr. Wisner was working on a contract to haul by team supplies and light machinery to the tunnel. During the preceding week he had hauled 3,400 pounds to within four miles of the job. President Wright of the Northern Pacific arrived in Tacoma April 30, 1886, and stated a switchback would be built over Stampede Pass to be completed if possible by November or Christmas with through trains by that time. A proposal had been made to make it a cog-wheel line over the steepest grade. The rail fficials figured it would cost $300,000 to build the switchback which would save the road $100,000 a year until the tunnel was completed; then it would be used as a road for tourists and "scientific investigations."

Although Bennett was opposed to Chinese labor, an order was placed in mid July of 1886 for 2,000 of them to work along the line. These laborers all wore pigtails and in the event of death the contractor was obliged to ship the body back to China.

It was nearly two years before the two crews in the tunnel began hearing each other's blasts, the latter part of March, 1888. Finally on May 3, the shot that produced daylight Was fired. The job was completed 11 days later.

Two locomotives, Ceta and Sadie, pulled the first train, through the tunnel, seven days ahead of schedule. Ceta and Sadie were Nelson Bennett's two daughters. In all the history of railroading before or since that time, very few cars or locomotives bore feminine names.

Meantime, the switchback which was started In July of 1886 was completed with all its zigzags and the first train, pulled by the largest locomotive ever built, puffed over the line on June 6, 1887. On the 25th the first vestibuled coach in Washington territory passed over the line carrying 30 tourists.

Very little remains to remind one of the epic struggle that took place in the late '80s. The old grades of the switchbacks have been all most entirely obliterated by power lines their access roads. The lake still is in the pass, half surrounded by brush. The charred and blackened snags left by the fire of 1884 have been bleached white by snows.

One can guess where the Chinese village stood near the small body of water. To the southeast on a knoll is a modern weather station and a forest service lookout tower. Acres of huckleberry and mountain ash bushes in season color the landscape in every direction! The berries furnished food and cash for the Muckleshoot Indians during depression days. The pickers, squaws and all, made the trip from near Auburn through the courtesy (?) of Northern Pacific "side-door Pullmans."

The waterfall at the east portal still spills over the tunnel's end and a snow shed protects the approach as it did in construction days. Tunnel City with its workshops, warehouses, hospital, restaurant and saloon are gone. A station house labeled "Martin" and few employees' cottages have replaced the town.

The writer would not be so brash as to say that Meany Ski Hut stands on the site of the old saloon, or that whiskey bottles, collection item-class, of course, rest hidden in the nearby weeds.