Backstory

Every garden railroad needs a good backstory which you'll find below. While the Palouse, Elberton and Ainsworth is completely fictional, the places it ostensibly connected were quite real. For more on the real history of its eastern Washington namesake towns, see my History Snapshot" blog posts:

• Ainsworth
• Elberton
• Palouse

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The Palouse, Elberton and Ainsworth Railroad history

The boom town of Elberton, Washington Territory, was platted in 1886 when the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company built a line between Colfax and Farmington. As the town grew local farmers became dissatisfied with high shipping rates due to the monopoly the OR&N had on the town. Local business leaders raised funds to build a short line railroad to provide a competitive service. The Palouse, Elberton and Ainsworth Railway was chartered in 1897 with the intention of running a line from an interchange with the Northern Pacific Railroad in Palouse northwest to Elberton, then continuing on to the southwest where the hope was to eventually meet the Northern Pacific again at Ainsworth Junction, near the confluence of the Snake and Columbia Rivers. The PE&A would make it less than halfway to its goal.

Grading began in early 1898 and by the end of the year had proceeded as far as Union Flat Creek. A timetable from late 1898 shows trains were operating as far as Parvin. The following year grading and track work was completed as far as Hooper Junction. At this point construction stopped as funds had been exhausted.

The primary transported commodities were grain, finished lumber and dried fruits from the world’s largest fruit dryer in Elberton. But traffic volumes never lived up to hopes. After the sawmill in Elberton closed in the early 1900’s and a devastating fire in 1908, the PE&A Railway found itself in receivership. The Northern Pacific bought the assets at auction in 1909 for a fraction of the construction cost, in part to keep the line out of the hands of the Union Pacific, and also because the line would provide a connection between NP at Palouse and the Spokane, Portland and Seattle (partially owned by NP) which had just built its mainline through the town of Hooper at the far end of the PE&A.

Under NP ownership the PE&A was reincorporated in as the Palouse, Elberton & Ainsworth Railroad. It continued to operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of the NP until being absorbed along with the NP into Burlington Northern when it was formed in 1970. Theline was abandoned in its entirety in 1980.

Click on the image below to see a PE&A route map, or click here to view the PE&A route map in Google Maps