History Snapshot: Ainsworth

This morning we stopped by Ainsworth, Washington. Or, more precisely, we walked across the site that was once known as the town of Ainsworth.

Ainsworth was established as a supply base by the Northern Pacific Railroad in 1879 on the Snake River just upstream from its confluence with the Columbia River. River boats moved supplies up the river from Portland to allow the NP to push the transcontinental railroad eastward from this starting point. On October 2, 1879, the NP began grading northeastward from Ainsworth toward Lake Pend d'Oreille, about 200 miles distant, and then east up the Clark Fork where it would eventually meet up with the Northern Pacific crews building westward from Minnesota in August, 1883.

Ainsworth quickly grew to a population of around 1500, but it completely disappeared a few years later once the NP bridge across the Snake River was completed in 1884. At that point the town's remaining residents picked up and moved, buildings and all, to the town of Pasco about three miles to the Northwest, where the NP was preparing to bridge the Columbia.

Interpretive sign near the townsite of Ainsworth, including a drawing of the original 1884 bridge.

Today, the only remains of Ainsworth are a few building foundations most of which are underwater. Nearby one can find Ainsworth Street, although not where Ainsworth was located. And the railroad junction just north of the bridge is still known as Ainsworth Junction.

The current BNSF bridge at Ainsworth, which has been substantially rebuilt since the original bridge in 1884. This picture is taken from the location of Ainsworth.

So if the Palouse, Elberton & Ainsworth was ostensibly chartered in 1897 (see the backstory), why did I include the name of a town that would no longer have existed by then? Why not a more historically accurate name like the Palouse, Elberton & Pasco? Three reasons for this intentional anachronism:

1. Ainsworth is a much cooler sounding name than Pasco.
2. Like Elberton, Ainsworth is a ghost town that is nothing more than a spot on the map today (more about Elberton in a future blog post).
3. I really liked the reporting mark PEA as it happens to describe one of the common commodities that the railroad would have carried.

Click here for some more information on Ainsworth if you're interested (external link).