Table of Contents  [ Hide]

Statistics
Population
Towns
Well-known residents of Carbon County
History
Military Forts
Vigilantes and Big Nose George
Little Snake River Valley Outlaws
Booms and Busts
Creation and Organization of Carbon County
First County Courthouse and Jail
County Borders
Second County Courthouse
New County Courthouse

Statistics

Population

Towns

Well-known residents of Carbon County

	George Ferris	miner and entreprenuer
	August Grimm	businessman and builder of the Virginia Hotel in Medicine Bow
	Dr. Lillian Heath Nelson	first woman to be granted a medical license in Wyoming
	Dr. John Osborne	physician, Wyoming governor, and U.S. Representative
	Dr. Thomas Magee	physician who pioneered plastic surgery
	T.T. Thornburgh	soldier

History

In microcosm, the history of Carbon County is the history of the western frontier. Located in south central Wyoming with a topography of rugged plains, soaring mountains, fertile river valleys, and the arid Red Desert, the county has had all the historical aspects of life on the western frontier in its past.

Mountain men roamed the region, trapping furs and trading with Indians. After the fur trade played out, emigrants crossed Carbon County on their way to Oregon, Utah, and California. Then came the Pony Express, with stations established east to west across the county, to be followed a year later, 1861, by the transcontinental telegraph. Following the same general route as the Pony Express and the telegraph lines, the Overland Trail came into use in 1862.

Military Forts

To protect the telegraph line and travelers and freighters on the Overland Trail from marauding Indians, the federal government established Fort Halleck at the base of Elk Mountain, rising to over

11,000 feet from the broken plains. The fort, manned by the 11th Ohio Volunteer Cavalry, would be occupied for only four years, July 20, 1862 to July 4, 1866. The troopers who had enlisted to fight the confederates in Virginia or elsewhere in the south found themselves chasing attacking Indians and suffering through blizzards and frigid Wyoming winters. One trooper reported that not only did the men suffer with severe frostbite, but whiskey left out overnight in the bachelor officers’ quarters froze solid.

A year after Fort Halleck was abandoned, the Union Pacific Railroad reached Wyoming. As the railroad tracks advanced westward, the army built forts to protect the railroad crews. In the late spring of 1868, Fort Fred Steel was laid out on the west bank of the North Platte River, about ten miles east of Rawling's Spring (Rawlins), the future county seat for Carbon County. The mission of the fort was to keep both the Indians and the railroad construction crews in line. It was difficult on both accounts.

The railroad's construction crews included a lawless element, and the railroad's camp followers, preying on the workers were worse. Trying to maintain a semblance of law was not easy, but the army at Fort Steel worked at it. The Union Pacific went quickly through Carbon County during the summer of 1868, taking most of the undesirables west with it. Some remained, however, settling in Rawling's Spring, which had been platted and established by the railroad in the spring as a division point. Although the stable citizens of the county struggled against it, the lawless element attracted more of their kind, and sporadic episodes of violence and lawlessness plagued Carbon County until the turn of the century.

Vigilantes and Big Nose George

By 1879 things were so bad in the county that citizens took law and order into their own hands. In June of the preceding year, following an aborted attempt to hold up a Union Pacific pay car, two deputy sheriffs, Robert Widdowfield and Tip Vincent, were ambushed and shot down by the outlaws. Two of the perpetrators were identified as "Big Nose George" Parrot and "Dutch Charlie" Burris. They were later captured in Montana. Both were returned to Carbon County, apparently separately, as Dutch Charlie was pulled off a train at Carbon, a coal mining camp founded by the Union Pacific and abandoned about 1886, and strung up to a handy telegraph pole by irate miners.

Big Nose was taken to Rawlins, tried by a jury, found guilty of murder, and sentenced to legal hanging; but before the execution could take place, he attempted to escape. This was too much for the good people of Rawlins. Big Nose was dragged from jail and hung from a tree - some say a telegraph pole (legend has it that Big Nose was later skinned, his hide tanned, and made into coin purses for souvenirs). Carrying on their good work, the Rawlins vigilantes informed 24 undesirable residents that their presence in the town would no longer be tolerated. The next morning, with Big Nose still hanging on Main Street, 24 tickets were purchased from the railroad's ticket agent.

Little Snake River Valley Outlaws

For two decades, the 1880's and 1890's, the Little Snake River Valley, with the towns of Baggs, Dixon, and Savery, was the center of violence and lawlessness in Carbon County. Isolated from the arm of the law, some sixty miles from county government in Rawlins, the valley was a convenient place for the outlaw gangs that hung out in Brown's Hole, in northwestern Colorado, to party after a successful robbery in another state. On one occasion, after a bank holdup in Nevada which netted $35,000, Butch Cassidy and his gang celebrated in Baggs. For ten days they controlled the town, throwing money around and shooting at anything that attracted them. This didn't distress the town's residents too, badly because Cassidy and his men always paid generously for any property they destroyed, but a big collective sigh of relief was always given when the outlaws departed.

Another facet of violence in the Little Snake River Valley resulted from the range wars that swept across Wyoming. The isolation of the valley made it a haven for rustlers, and ranchers dealt with them any way they could. On one occasion, ranchers fired a dry haystack in which they suspected a rustler was hiding. He was, and was incinerated before the fire could be put out. Range detectives were hired and sent into the valley to take care of rustlers and suspected rustlers. The stock in trade for a range detective was a quick trigger, and Tom Horn, Bob Meldrum, and others who rode the valley looking for rumored and suspected cattle thieves were not exceptions. Trials for rustlers were the exception, and the end for most rustlers and suspected rustlers was a bullet and an unknown shallow grave.

Booms and Busts

As more people settled in Carbon County, other aspects common to the western frontier emerged in the county. The livestock industry, both cattle and sheep, became prominent in the county's economy. Mining booms, gold in the Ferris Mountains, copper at Grand Encampment and in the Sierra Madre Mountains, and coal, first at Carbon and later at Hanna, brought more people into the county. With booms came bust, causing a fluctuating population and economy. Through it all, county government functioned effectively, constructing and maintaining a county road system, keeping law and order, and providing other needed services for the county's residents.

Creation and Organization of Carbon County

Carbon County was created by the Eighth Dakota Territorial Legislative Assembly on December 16, 1868. Seven county officers were appointed for the new county, and Rawling's Spring was designated as the county seat by the creating act. The county was bounded on the east by Albany County, created at the same time as Carbon County; on the west by Carter County, created a year earlier by Dakota Territory and later named Sweetwater County; on the north by Montana Territory; and on the south by Colorado Territory. The new county was named "Carbon" for the extensive coal deposits that had been identified within the county's boundaries.

As specified by the Dakota Territory creating act, Carbon County was organized in January 1869. The first county officers were J. C. Dyer, P. L. Smith, and S. K. Swain, county commissioners; James France, county assessor; F. P. Edmond, county clerk and county treasurer, ex­-officio; Smith Foot, county sheriff; and a Mr. Kendall, county superintendent of schools. After the creation of Wyoming Territory and its organization on May 19, 1869, the First Legislative Assembly, Wyoming Territory, passed an act to organize Carbon County, define its boundaries, and appoint county officers again. The boundaries were the same as defined by Dakota Territory, but the county officers were different. Because of a political dispute between the Democratic Legislative Assembly and the Republican Territorial Governor, John A. Campbell, the officers appointed by the act never took office. Supported by the territorial judges, also Republicans, Governor Campbell allowed those county officers appointed by the Dakota Legislative Assembly to continue in office until the county's first elected officers could be sworn in --January 1871.

First County Courthouse and Jail

Shortly after taking office, the newly elected county commissioners, Frank Blake, chairman, C. G. Bingham, and M. Mooney, were considering building a courthouse and were particularly concerned with building a county jail. A courthouse and jail had also been a concern of the county's first commissioners. There is no record of what the county used for governmental facilities in 1869, except that some of the minutes of the commissioners' proceedings during the year state that the meeting was held in the Rawlins Hotel. There is no reference at all as to what the county did for a jail or for office space.

During March and April 1870, the first county commissioners had received plans for a stone jail from an M. P. Brennan, and for a courthouse and jail from J. A. Brown. Although in both cases, the minutes state that the commissioners approved the plans submitted, no structures were built; and on May 25, 1870, the commissioners' minutes report that "no proposals for a county jail and courthouse had been received." Prior to this, however, apparently in dire need of a jail, the commissioners had agreed to lease a dugout for $20.00 monthly, to be used as the county jail.

The record indicates the dugout was still being used in 1871 when the elected commissioners took office, and certainly would have been a good reason for them to begin consideration of the construction of a courthouse and jail. On April 11, 1871, for $1,950, the commissioners purchased a building to serve as the county's courthouse from a Mr. Daly. Somewhat later a stone jail was built adjacent to the courthouse. There is no record as to when the dugout was vacated and the county's officers moved into their new facilities, nor is there a description of those facilities, which would serve the county until 1883.

County Borders

By 1883, the boundaries of Carbon County had been changed by the Legislative Assembly with the creation in 1875 of Pease County, later renamed Johnson County. This action moved Carbon County's northern boundary from the Montana state line to what is now the northern boundary of Natrona County. Natrona County was created in 1888, moving the northern boundary of Carbon County still further south, to its present day location. In 1886, the legislature made an adjustment to both the east and west boundaries of Carbon County. The mining towns of Centennial, Jelm, and Keystone were originally included in Carbon County rather than in Albany County, and a similar situation existed with the western boundary of Carbon County, as originally the towns of Baggs and Dixon were in Sweetwater County. For administrative efficiency and convenience for residents, the legislature made a western jog in both the eastern and western boundaries of Carbon County, so that Centennial, Jelm, and Keystone would be in Albany County, and Baggs and Dixon in Carbon County.

Second County Courthouse

The second Carbon County Courthouse was built during 1882 and 1883, at a cost of about $25,000, financed by the issuing of county bonds at a rate of 6% per annum. Charles Carson and Company was awarded the construction contract on June 12, 1882, and construction began soon afterward. On July 4, 1883, the new courthouse, including the county jail and jailer's residence, was dedicated. A traditional parade and fireworks display was held during the afternoon and evening, and at 9:00 p.m., a dedication ball took place in ''the large and beautiful courtroom," with two local bands providing the music. The celebration and dancing went on until 3 o'clock in the morning.

New County Courthouse

On August 4, 1938, the Carbon County Commissioners announced that the Public Works Administration had granted the county $130,500 to be applied to the construction of a new courthouse, library, and jail, estimated at a total cost of $290,000. The voters of the county approved the issuing of county bonds to raise the remaining funds needed to build the courthouse, and with funding assured, the commissioners employed architect Frederick Porter of Cheyenne to design the building. The contract for $257,000 for construction of the courthouse was awarded to Spiegelberg Lumber and Building Company of Laramie on March 7, 1939.

Finished and occupied by the county in 1940, the new courthouse, which still serves Carbon County, had three floors. The ground floor housed the county library, community meeting room, justice of the peace court, and some offices. The second floor was composed of offices for the commissioners, county clerk, county assessor, county treasurer, county superintendent of schools, and county sheriff; and the third floor was dedicated to district court facilities, offices for the county attorney and clerk of district court, and jail facilities. With an exterior of light colored brick and terracotta trim, the new courthouse was an attractive and functional building for the county.

Although some remodeling of the courthouse has taken place during the more than seventy years that have passed since it was first occupied, with offices being moved and expanded, the county library transferred to another building, and the sheriff's office and work area now occupying what was originally the semi-attached sheriff's residence, the Carbon County Courthouse is much as it was in 1940. As it did then, the courthouse still facilitates effective and progressive county government for Carbon County's citizenry.