Laramie Downtown Historic District

The Laramie Commercial District is significant for its association with and representation of the arrival and impact of the Transcontinental Railroad in the west. Wyoming's settlement represented the first time in history where civilization arrived with the railroad rather than after it. The arrival of the Transcontinental Railroad, established in southern Wyoming by the Union Pacific, insured the early growth and prosperity of Laramie and other important communities along the route. Four of Wyoming's six largest cities are located along this corridor. The railroad chose Laramie as its Mountain Division Headquarters, insuring its survival and dramatically influencing the broad patterns of Laramie's and southeastern Wyoming's settlement, political and economic history. The essential facilities and associated construction provided permanence and prosperity for the city and the state.

The railroad and the financial incentives it supported and generated offered Laramie access to the best goods money and taste could afford as well as easy access to eastern markets. Hotels and general stores were the first substantial structures to be built. The next permanent structures included businesses dealing with trading and shipping, housing for laborers and support staff and support businesses for cattle barons whose fortunes were intricately linked to the railroad. As the cattle industry grew so did their influence.

The cattle barons supported the railroad and because of their power and influence became active in local and regional government. When municipal and county governments were established in Laramie it met the needs of the cattle and rail interests and significantly influenced the eventual political development of Wyoming Territory and state government. Additionally, the development of energy resources in the area was also tied to the railroad, as the relationship between the two industries intensified, so did the power and influence of the men involved. They too contributed to Laramie's commercial development, utilizing office space and patronizing local merchants.

The year 1870 was chosen as the beginning of the period of significance because it represents the construction date of the first permanent structures built within the district. 1938 was chosen as an arbitrary ending date for the period of significance to avoid including dates within the past fifty years. The patterns of historical development, established during this period, have in fact, continued their evolution to the present.

At first glance, the Laramie Plains appear to be a forbidding area in which to locate a town. Surrounded by mountains on three sides and at an elevation exceeding 7,000 feet above sea level, this locale is arid, windy, and cold for much of the year. And yet, in spite of the rugged high altitude climate, the city of Laramie became one of the oldest permanent settlements in Wyoming. While the Union Pacific receives credit for providing the impetus that led to Laramie's founding, a few small settlements had reached the Laramie Plains prior to the railroad's arrival. On May 10, 1868, the Union Pacific Railroad reached the future site of Laramie.

The actual location of the Laramie town site came about almost by accident. Grenville Dodge, Chief Engineer of the Union Pacific between 1866 and 1870, reported the company desired to build the railroad line up the South Platte to Denver, over the Rocky Mountains, and on to Salt Lake City. This decision was changed as the result of an event that occurred while Dodge was still serving in the military. During the Civil War, Dodge attained the rank of Major General. Following the conclusion of the war Dodge was sent west to lead campaigns against the Indians. In 1865, while returning from the Powder River expedition, he began exploring the Laramie Mountains (which stand between the present towns of Cheyenne and Laramie) for a possible railroad route. Dodge and his men stumbled upon an unbroken ridge leading over the Laramie Range. He remembered this discovery and later used his knowledge to persuade Union Pacific officials to build across the relatively small Laramie mountains rather than attempt to construct a route over the precipitous Front Range of the Rocky Mountains encountered directly west of Denver. Union Pacific officials surveyed the area several months prior to the arrival of the railroad. This survey resulted in an initial townsite consisting of one hundred blocks with all streets neatly laid out at right angles. The new locality was named Laramie in honor of an early nineteenth-century French-Canadian mountain man, Jacque Laramie, who had been trapped extensively in the region.

According to J.H. Triggs, who wrote the History and Directory of Laramie City in 1875, the Union Pacific commenced selling town lots on April 20, 1868 -- three weeks before the railroad actually arrived in Laramie. Triggs reported that over four hundred lots were bought during the first week of sales. The Frontier Index newspaper, the renowned "press-on-wheels" which followed the Union Pacific construction camps across the West, offered an even more enthusiastic version of the lot-selling story. On April 28, 1868, its editor wrote, "Its growth is more than wonderful. The town is only a week old and -- think of it-- there are already over a thousand lots taken." The arrival of the railroad gave birth to the town of Laramie.

By virtue of the young town's industrial strength, the years 1870-1900 witnessed the development of a thriving commercial district which grew to encompass an area roughly bounded by University and Custer Streets on the north and south and First and Third Streets on the west and east. During that time, the proliferation of established businesses mirrored the town's cultural advances. Laramie evolved from a frontier railroad boom town that lacked many basic amenities into a multi-faceted commercial center offering a wide variety of products and services.

The construction of several church buildings provided a convincing indication that stability had arrived in Laramie. Between 1869 and 1871, the St. Matthew's Episcopal Church, a Baptist Church, and the Union Presbyterian Church all organized and erected houses of worship. A Roman Catholic Church added a parsonage in 1874. In 1885 a Scandinavian Lutheran Church was built on Laramie's west side. The construction of a German Lutheran Church began in 1887.

The organization of fraternal organizations further underscored the growing civility of the community. The Odd Fellows Lodge was founded in January 1869. In 1875, the lodge was reportedly planning to spend $8,000 on the construction of a hall. The Laramie Masonic Lodge received their charter on September 28, 1870. The Masons owned a hall and furniture worth $3,000 in 1875, but later built a more substantial hall at 403 Ivinson Avenue Construction of the new Masonic Hall began in 1911 and dedication ceremonies were conducted on June 24, 1912.

A courthouse was constructed in 1871 because Laramie was the county seat of Albany County. The courthouse was constructed of cut sandstone and brick on land donated to the county by the Union Pacific Railroad. The $29,500 building included a jail in the basement, offices for county officials, jury rooms on the main floor, and a large courtroom on the second floor. In 1931-1932 a new courthouse was built on the site of the original. The new courthouse was a Works Progress Administration project. The initial plans for the three and one-half story masonry structure were drawn by architect Wilbur Hitchcock. Hitchcock died before completing the plans. The design was finished by William R. Dubois. C.B. Jensen received the construction contract.

Although diversity marked local manufacturing, the Union Pacific Railroad sponsored the town's most significant ventures. The railroad selected Laramie as the headquarters of its Mountain Division. So essential facilities such as a roundhouse and machine shop were constructed there. Other railroad establishments included a hotel, hospital, and depot. The Union Pacific rolling mill, built in 1874, was the most important manufacturing operation during the town's early years. The mill measured over two hundred feet in length and over 100 feet in width. The mill produced tie plates, rails, and bolts and employed as many as three hundred men. Although the mill never reopened after burning in 1910, its presence had an undeniable impact on the development in Laramie. A side benefit of the mill's establishment was the agreement the city made to pay Union Pacific to pipe water across town to the mill. This boosted downtown development because insurance rates fell dramatically when accessible water made fire control easier.

Given a large amount of railroad passenger traffic during the town's early days, Laramie hosted several dining, drinking, and hostelry establishments. The Diamond Saloon and John A. Fischer's Wines and Liquors operated at a spot that has since been covered by railroad tracks. The Johnson Hotel (northeast corner of Grand and First Street) still stands.

The core of the Laramie Downtown District continued to experience moderate development after 1900. Jensen's Furniture opened in 1905. Richard Eberhart and his wife purchased the Gem City Bakery in 1902. In 1924, they constructed a new brick building. However, most of the post-1900 development involved new businesses occupying pre-existing buildings or expanded construction to the east, as in the case of the Masonic Lodge and the new courthouse. The Union Pacific Depot is a prominent local building that was constructed well after the turn of the century. Erected in 1925, at the corner of Custer and First Street, this depot replaced the original Laramie train station which had been destroyed by fire. After the new depot's construction, rail traffic continued to grow in importance with up to fourteen trains per day passing through Laramie during the time of World War II.

Early projections regarding Laramie's impending growth sound rather overblown to the modern observer. Writing almost a century ago, one optimistic editor described Laramie as a town "of about eight thousand people, which in a very few years is destined to contain a population of more than one hundred thousand people and become a great city." Although the local population has yet to surpass the thirty thousand mark, the town and its economy continue to thrive. The economic base no longer rests on manufacturing, but rather on education, medicine and local government. While reflecting the rise of a modern service-oriented economy, this trend also points to the need for National Register recognition of a downtown district whose present character so vividly reflects its nineteenth-century industrial past.