NNevada - Palisade

Palisade started as a railroad town along the original transcontinental route, and up into the early 20th century was thriving reasonably well, with at one point as many as 300 inhabitants. A narrow-gage line came in from the south, from the mining district at Eureka, Nevada, so Palisade was a transshipment point as well as a maintenance center. But activity dropped when the mines closed and the narrow-gage was torn up, and then the maintenance shops moved to Carlin or Elko or even Sparks, outside Reno. With the advent of diesel locomotives beginning in the late 1940s, with their considerably lower maintenance and operational requirements, lots of traditional railroad infrastructure became obsolete, and Palisade suffered accordingly. The post office was finally closed in 1963. (The opening--and closing--of a post office is a classic measure of a town's prosperity!) At present there remains a working ranch (center of this pic) but little else. The insets show some ruins. Of particular interest is the cabin made of old railroad ties (inset at lower right). This was a common "quick'n'dirty" construction technique in treeless areas in the West from the latter 19th thru early 20th centuries. Btw, the river visible at left is the Humboldt, a landlocked river that both rises and ends in Nevada. The transcontinental route, as well as the California trail, followed the Humboldt across Nevada, as does (largely) modern Interstate-80.

Along the Humboldt River on the original US transcontinental route. The route of the Western Pacific (Feather River route) also comes thru this canyon (it's on the other side), and in fact parallels the transcontinental route for 100 miles or so. Of course, it's all Union Pacific now, but even back before the railroads had merged there was a joint operating agreement along the parallel tracks, such that one side was westbound and the other eastbound.