The first whites in the Crystal Valley traveled on the Ute Trail, as well documented by the Hayden surveys in 1873. Whites brought with them the wheel, and no sooner than the first homesteads were staked, petitions began flowing into the nascent Pitkin County clerk’s office requesting a wagon road. 

Think about it. Homesteaders had persuaded the fledgling county to turn the Ute Trail into a wagon path with free use to all. Homesteads were appearing and a muscle-powered economy was beginning to flourish. Along comes a wealthy robber baron who, without any communication with the county or the residents, knocks down a critical bridge and constructs a private railroad, which, of course, would haul freight for a price. Class warfare? Perhaps. It was certainly an enormous affront to the commoners’ life in the Crystal.