Denver, Southpark and Pacific Railroad Company

The Denver, South Park and Pacific Railroad (DSP&P) filed its incorporation papers on June 14th, 1873. Its founders, who included such political and financial luminaries as John Evans, David Moffat and Charles Kountse, charted an ambitious future for the infant railroad. Plans called for a route to South Park via the Platte Canyon and the Arkansas River, from there to Salida, through Poncha Pass, across the San Luis Valley to the mining claims of the San Juan Mountains, and as was the goal of nearly every western railroad of the period, on to the Pacific. The company chose to build its rail network utilizing a the three-foot narrow gauge spacing between rails. Narrow gauge construction allowed steeper grades, sharper curves, and cheaper cost materials and rolling stock than did standard gauge construction.

Track laying began in 1874. Not long after the first rails received their first spikes, the emerging silver mining boom in Leadville caused company directors to redirect their planned route towards this new source of economic vitality. By 1879 track was advancing rapidly towards Leadville. At the same time, Jay Gould, financier and railroad accumulator, assumed control of both the DSP&P and its main competitor, the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad (D&RG). In a step designed to limit profit reducing competition between his two Colorado railroads, Gould forged what came to be known as the Joint Operating Agreement of 1879. Under its terms the Rio Grande would lay track from Buena Vista into Leadville with the DSP&P being granted equal traffic rights over the D&RG tracks. The DSP&P would build into the Gunnison Basin with equal traffic rights extended to the Rio Grande. The DSP&P turned away from the San Juans and Leadville and set its sights for the Continental Divide and the lucrative Gunnison mining district beyond.

Over the next few decades the DSP&P operated under a series of names. In November, 1880, it became the Union Pacific Railway, Colorado Division. An 1889 bankruptcy and reorganization resulted in the Denver, Leadville and Gunnison Railway. Finally, in December of 1898, the railroad became part of the newly organized Colorado and Southern Railway under which name it operated until abandonment.