Nostalgia & History > Location and Photographer of Picture 1, Trip to New Mex

On the Calisphere website there are seven pictures titled Trip to New Mexico D. & R.G.R.R. Colo. but no other information on the pictures.

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,3671295

I found a picture on the Denver Public Library that was identical to picture 1 on the Calisphere picture 1. The Denver Public Library picture had the title, “Trip to New Mexico, D.& R.G.R.R., U.S.A.” and the location and the photographer.

Picture 1, “Call Number: Z-3341. Title: Trip to New Mexico, D.& R.G.R.R., U.S.A. Creator(s): Kilburn, B. W. (Benjamin West), 1827-1909. Summary: Men in suits pose beside Denver and Rio Grande Railroad cars and tracks in Rio Arriba County, New Mexico. Shows two steam engines, passenger cars, and San Antonio Mountain in the distance. Date: between 1886 and 1900? Notes: Condition: stained, pin hole. Photographer's stamp printed on verso. Title and ‘5605’ printed on front of stereo card. Physical Description: 1 photographic print on stereo card: stereograph, albumen; 9 x 18 cm. (3 1/2 x 7 in.).”

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I did a Google search for Benjamin West Kilburn and got a Wikipedia website for Benjamin W. Kilburn.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_W._Kilburn

“Benjamin West Kilburn (December 10, 1827 – January 15, 1909) was an American photographer and stereoscopic view publisher famous for his landscape images of the nascent American and Canadian state, provincial, and national parks and his visual record of the great migrations at the end of the nineteenth century. Visual historian of immigration and international tourism.”

“Kilburn was a sergeant in Company D, 13th New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry, and participated with his unit in the Civil War Battle of Fredericksburg, Virginia. A mountaineer, Kilburn was active on Mount Washington in New Hampshire; in Ouray, Colorado; and in the Sierra Nevada of California, including Yosemite in 1872.”

The Wikipedia had a copy of picture 1 that you could enlarge. I enlarged the picture as much as I could and then cropped the train and the men from the picture.

Picture 2, “Train and men.”

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Thanks to Evan Werkema for information that the train may have possibly passed through Sapinero, Colorado.

Picture 3 is a portion of the 1893 Poor’s Map of the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. Perhaps the men on their trip to New Mexico passed through Sapinero, Colorado, on east to Mear’s Junction, south to Antonito, Colorado and then south to Santa Fe, New Mexico. On the Denver Public Library website there are two pictures of a train and men at the Toltec tunnel by Kilburn. Perhaps the men at Antonito took a side trip through the Toltec tunnel to Chama, New Mexico and back.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/06/15 11:38 by flynn.

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Picture 4, “Call Number: Z-3365. Title: Toltec gorge, D.& R.G.R.R. U.S.A. Creator(s): Kilburn, B. W. (Benjamin West), 1827-1909. Summary: View of Denver and Rio Grande Railroad tracks and a steam engine near a tunnel at the edge of Toltec Gorge, Rio Arriba County, New Mexico. Shows rock formations and telegraph poles beside tracks. Date: between 1886 and 1900? Notes: Photographer's stamp on verso. Title and number: ‘5606’ stamped on stereo card. Library owns additional iterations of this image in various formats: 1 copy negative; 10 x 13 cm. (4 x 5 in.). Physical Description: 1 photographic print on stereo card: stereograph, albumen; 9 x 18 cm. (3 1/2 x 7 in.).”

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Picture 5, “Call Number: Z-3342. Title: Toltec Gorge, D.& R.G.R.R., U.S.A. Creator(s): Kilburn, B. W. (Benjamin West), 1827-1909. Summary: View of a Denver and Rio Grande Railroad engine on a trestle in Toltec Gorge in Rio Arriba County, New Mexico. Men pose beside the engine or on steep rock walls. Date: 1890. Notes: Condition: edges worn. Photographer's stamp printed on verso. Title and: ‘5605’ printed on front of stereo card. Physical Description: 1 photographic print on stereo card: stereograph, albumen; 9 x 18 cm. (3 1/2 x 7 in.)”

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Photo Bob took the picture when he was 16. Not bad. He has improved over the years=)

Nudge

flynn Wrote:

> Picture 1, “Call Number: Z-3341. Title: Trip to
> New Mexico, D.& R.G.R.R., U.S.A. Creator(s):
> Kilburn, B. W. (Benjamin West), 1827-1909.
> Summary: Men in suits pose beside Denver and Rio
> Grande Railroad cars and tracks in Rio Arriba
> County, New Mexico. Shows two steam engines,
> passenger cars, and San Antonio Mountain in the
> distance.

There was some discussion of this picture when you posted it in 2009:

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,2025988

I agree with the consensus that the mountain in the background is much too steep-sided to be San Antonio Mountain, the lump that rises out of the plains just across the New Mexico border south of Antonito, CO, but I don't know where the photo was actually taken.