The Everett and Monte Cristo Railway was built to transport gold and silver ores from mines in the central Cascade Mountains to a smelter in Everett, Washington. After the first mining claims were staked in 1889, entrepreneurs began exploring the possibility of building a railroad to exploit the find. Construction began in April 1892 and the first train reached what became the town of Monte Cristo in August 1893. The mining boom ended in 1903. Poor ore quality and quantity played a role in the decline, but the failure of the railway to maintain service to Monte Cristo in the face of floods, landslides, winter snows, fires, and other disasters was also a factor in the collapse of the industry. Nonetheless, the railway hauled out approximately 300,000 tons of ore over the course of its operations.
The railroad found a second set of customers among the timber companies. Logging in Puget Sound began along the shore, where water transport to sawmills was inexpensive. By the early 1900s, however, much of the lowland forest had been cut. The Everett and Monte Cristo tracks gave access to large areas of virgin forest, so the railroad was used to move raw logs down to existing mills. As the railway pushed further into the woods, new sawmills and roof shingle mills were established, and finished lumber and shingles were also shipped out by train.
Tourism was a part of the business from the beginning of the railroad. The mountain scenery was then and still is an attraction. The first tourist excursion to Monte Cristo took place within days of completing the track. Weekend excursions with up to 500 passengers and a brass band took advantage of sunny summer days. A resort hotel, The Inn at Big Four, was opened in 1921 along the rail line for guests who wanted more than a day trip to the mountains.
Choosing the route for the railroad proved a fateful decision. Trying to save money on initial construction, the owners chose the shortest route between the mines and the smelter. This ran the tracks through the steep-sided Robe Canyon, in some places mere feet above the flood-prone South Fork of the Stilliguamish River. This five-mile stretch was costly to maintain and suffered repeated outages. Service was interrupted for hours to years at a time, stranding people, freight, and rail cars. There was never enough money for maintenance. Over time, revenue fell as the mines played out, the easy timber was cut, and the road network extended competition further into the mountains. The railroad lost money, but the final blow was the Great Depression, which collapsed demand for the forest products hauled by the line. Scheduled rail service was abandoned in 1933 and the tracks torn up in 1936. Today, much of the Mountain Loop Highway from Verlot to Barlow Pass runs on the abandoned railroad grade.
Ownership history
Rockefeller years (18921902) Prospector Joseph Pearsall staked the first claim in what was to become Monte Cristo on July 4, 1889. Word of his find set off a minor gold rush and dozens of mining claims were filed in the area. None of them had any real prospect of exploitation because there was nothing but a crude trail into the mining district, insufficient for hauling in mining equipment, construction materials, food, and other supplies, and hauling out ore to a smelter. A consortium of Northwest mining interests led by Fred Wilmans and Judge Hiram Bond, bought out many of the claims and began to explore bringing in a railroad. The Wilmans-Bond group hired John Q. Barlow to survey possible routes. He discovered what came to be known as Barlow Pass which connected the Monte Cristo district to the South Fork of the Stillaguamish River. The pass offered the shortest route to the Puget Sound lowlands and was ultimately adopted as the route of the Everett and Monte Cristo Railway.