The Structures

A 35 mm photograph of the now-collapsed log cabin mentioned in the original 1881 survey of the Jimmy Mack Mine. (September, 2000)

A digital photograph of our N scale model of the cabin at the Jimmy Mack Mine, complete with "tar paper" roof.

We have constructed some buildings that would be unique to a railroad, including a clapboard passenger depot (based loosely on the abandoned D&RGW depot at Wagon Wheel Gap, Colorado) and a two-stall engine house. We've also put together kits representing a water tower, coaling tower, freight depot, and a yard storage building. We've also scratch built an N-scale replica of the Brunswick Mill, and are in the process of building renderings of the Blistered Horn and Jimmy Mack Mines. We have been unable to locate photographs of either mine showing actual operations, but have been able to put together a mental picture what what they might have looked like based on the remains of the buildings and structures. In acquiring the 1881 mineral survey documents and the plat and patent for the Jimmy Mack Mine, we found reference to a two story log cabin being located in the approximate center of the claim at the time of the survey. Imagine our surprise, in September of 2000, to find that the cabin is still there, although the roof and the back had both collapsed. We took measurements of the cabin, and have built what we think is a fairly accurate model of the cabin that will sit on the layout at the Jimmy Mack.

The Tin Cup town hall was completed in 1905 and, today, remains as a Tin Cup landmark. It is frequently mistaken for a church, although Tin Cup never had a church. It was, and still is, however, used for worship services. (Denver Public Library, Western History Collection)

Our version of the town hall. From this, it's eastern side, one can observe its location relative to the tracks. The passenger depot will sit directly in front of the town hall (on the left side of this photograph), and directly across the street, the same location as the proposed D&RG passenger depot from the 1883 survey. That same lot, incidentally, remains vacant to this day.

During our trips to Tin Cup, we have taken many 35mm and digital photos and some video, and discovered that virtually all the buildings are made of wood (logs, board and batten, planking, clapboard, or some combination). We saw no evidence that any were built of brick or stone, although some had visible stone foundations and/or stone fire places. We've begun the process of scratch-building N-scale replicas of the buildings that would have existed around 1910, although we're still trying to gather more information. Included in our completed construction efforts is a model of the Tin Cup Town Hall, mistaken by many to be the community's church (the town never had a church, but the town hall is used for worship services). In starting the construction, we had only two dimensions - that the structure was 36 X 65 feet. We built the model based on those dimensions and on photographs that we had found in the Denver Public Library's Western History Collection. When we visited Tin Cup in September of 2000, we measured the building and found that the dimensions were actually 36 X 66 feet, and that we were, thus, one N-scale foot (.075 inches) off in our dimensions. Since the building will be sitting at about mid point on the module containing the town, we doubt that anybody will notice the error. We trust that you won't spoil things by pointing it out to those that don't notice.

A 35 mm photo of Phil Korn's cabin, which sits in Tin Cup just south of town along the east side of Grand Avenue, just below the Town Hall. Korn was a prospector and cobbler. The door at the left is reportedly the entrance to the family residence, while the door on the right admits entry to the cobbler shop. The cabin was built in 1893. (September, 1999)

Scratch-built version of the Korn cabin. Round (party) toothpicks were used for the cabin logs, then painted with an acrylic wash to get the desired effect. Doors, shutters and window frames are made from strip styrene plastic, while white cotton threat is used to represent the individual sections of the windows' glass panes. All paints are acrylic.

There were two major fires in Tin Cup (1906 and 1913) which resulted in the loss of the business district. We have found photographs of the town taken in 1905 and 1906, so can see which buildings survived the first fire. We have also discovered ealier photographs of the business district which show some of the buildings present during the town's pinnacle of operations. Dimensions are difficult to extract since the photos are all taken at oblique angles, but there are enough observable details to permit construction of replicas, knowing that the lack of more definitive information will prohibit the building of scale models. We have been unable to locate any photographs showing which, if any, buildings survived the 1913 fire, but we have found a hand-drawn copy of the town's plat which labels at least some that were destroyed. Lacking more specific information, and knowing the date of the 1913 fire (May 24), we will attempt to represent the town as it may have appeared prior to that fire.

A 35-mm photograph of West Gold Hill and the valley in which Tin Cup sits, looking north from the summit of Cumberland Pass. The Brunsick Mill, and Blistered Horn and Jimmy Mack mine sites are annotated. Tin Cup sits at the extreme northern end of West Gold Hill and is not visible in this image. West Willow Creek runs north in the "clear" section of the valley below (left edge, center of photo), and merges with Taylor River about nine miles north of this location. (September, 2000)

Our trips to Tin Cup have not necessarily been intended to limit our understanding to the town itself, although that was our original intent. Our first visit included the cemetery south of town. While parked at the loop near Boot Hill, we saw the road up Middle Willow Creek and discussed the possibility of driving up to take a look at what might be left of the Gold Cup Mine. Unfortunately, the road is accessable to off-road vehicles only. So much for the Gold Cup. We have also driven the gravel Cumberland Pass Road up West Willow Creek to the summit of the pass. About three miles south of Tin Cup, just short of the first hairpin turn in the road, we found the collapsed remains of West Gold Hill Mill and what we think was the pump house across the road and down by the creek. It was after this encounter that we began paying more attention to the mines, mills and their out buildings, and making plans to replicate them to the extent possible. Although we know the location of the major mines, and have acquired the survey documents, plats and patents, we have seen little photographic evidence of the buildings. We therefore don't necessarily know where individual buildings may have been located on the claims. As for the mills, we know that the Brunswick Mill was owned and operated by the Brunswick Mining and Milling Company of Brunswick, New Jersey, and that the mill supported both the Jimmy Mack and Blistered Horn mines. We've also been able to determine that an aerial bucket tram moved raw ore from the Jimmy Mack to the mill, and that, in 1902, an inclined trestle was built between the Blistered Horn and the mill so that raw ore could be transported in ore cars. Since the Jimmy Mack and Blistered Horn mines ultimately played such an important role in Tin Cup's mining history, we have decided to include renderings of both, and the Brunswick Mill, on the layout. We've made five visits to Tin Cup, including the one completed this past summer, to more closely examine the mines. Of special interest is what might remain of the bucket tram between the Jimmy Mack and the mill. Our research reveals that the tram was removed in 1947 to facilitate the construction of a ski lift at Crested Butte. But we think that the log and stone platforms constructed to provide a level base for the towers remain (at least in part), and our intent is to hike down the side of West Gold Hill with a GPS receiver in an attempt to locate them.

Also included in our plans for West Gold Hill is an effort to model what's come of our research of the West Gold Hill Mill and the three mines that supported it. Our trip this past summer revealed some things that we hadn't seen or noticed previously, including the fact that the bucket tram extending from the Golden Treasure Mine entered the mill from the south side. As stated, we have found the remains of that tram, complete with towers and cable. About half a mile to the northeast lie the Iron Bonnet and Carbonate King lodes, which were also linked to the West Gold Hill Mill by bucket tram. Two structures located on one of the claims (we think the Carbonate King) are visible from the Cumberland Pass Road at the base of the hill. We ventured out to those buildings along the road near the summit of the hill and crawled/walked/tumbled our way down to their location. Although they are both suffering from weather degradation, they are sufficiently complete to determine how they worked. We found that, like the tram line from the Golden Treasure, the cables extending down to the mill were still in place. We haven't been able to determine if the towers remain, but we hope to hike down both tram lines next summer to find out.

We tried to be somewhat creative with the passenger cars that we acquired. The small collection consists of 34-foot Overton combination cars and assorted coaches. We originally had the idea of getting away from the "Union Pacific Yellow" that seems to dominate passenger car color schemes. The road numbers and lettering were to be gold (over a forest green background). Unfortunately, we found that gold was out of the question because of printer limitations. The result? Bright yellow with black roofs, and black lettering and numbering. Almost Union Pacific, but not quite.

We found it wasn't necessary to be as creative with the remainder of the rolling stock, although we did take some liberties with the cabooses (cabeese?), box cars and stock cars. Cabooses are painted box car red and are of the two-axle Bobber variety common on the old narrow gauge Denver, South Park & Pacific/Colorado & Southern. The box cars and stock cars are all from Roundhouse (old time, wood-sided) and also painted box car red. The lettering and road numbers will be white over a black background.

A digital photo of three HO Roundhouse 30 foot, fish belly gondolas, which were used as prototypes in scratch building the gondolas and flat cars employed by the Tincup & Western.

The gondolas turned out to be somewhat problematical in that we couldn't really find anything satisfactory in N-scale, although there were several excellent examples in HO. Having grown up in Denver, we knew about the railroads, the mines, and the mining towns (including Tin Cup). And of course, any kid growing up in Denver in the late '40s and early '50s remembers the radio program on KOA radio at 7:00 each morning when Pete Smythe would broadcast "live" on the "Bob Wire Network" from Pete Smythe's General Store in East Tin Cup. Unfortunately, Pete's version of reality led the naive (that's me) into believing that, despite its "ghost town" status, Tin Cup's demise was not that far removed. Based on that premise (apologies to Mr. Emery at Merrill Junior High), we worked on the assumption that Tin Cup "went bust" in the late 1930's. After all, if other silver mining towns (like Silverton) lasted until 1937, what's to keep Tin Cup from going out at about the same time? So we purchased 20 Atlas steel box, drop bottom gondolas from the late 20's and early 30's figuring that we could characterize our road as it may have been in the mid 30's. They were all painted a medium gray, had black road numbers and road names applied to the sides, and were heavily weathered. And they looked pretty good, too. That is, until reality set in. Our research indicated that the gold and silver mines in the Tin Cup area had largely played out by the beginning of World War I, with everything apparently "going bust" by 1917 (we were only off by 20 years). Worse, we couldn't use the gondolas. Consequently, we used as a prototype the Roundhouse HO 30 foot gondola/stake side fish belly flat car kit. The resulting N-scale 30 foot gondolas and flat cars are all scratch built. The frames of the gondolas and flat cars are painted engine black, while the wooden sides on the gondolas are painted with Model Master Schokoladenbraun (we don't speak German, so have no idea what that means) to replicate aged wood. The completed HO cars were individually weathered by sprinkling them with dirt obtained from a local golf course (FORE!), then sprayed lightly with DulCote. We'll use the same method to weather the N-scale versions.

The Future

The Tincup & Western Railroad is a project in the works. We envision it as a long term effort with results realized in fits and starts - typical of most big projects. But we plan on continuing the research and planting the seeds for ideas that we hope will germinate in the future. In the meantime, we'll continue to work on this web site, refining our historical knowledge (both actual and fictional) and periodically updating our progress via the Internet. We'll include photographs taken on our periodic trips to Tin Cup, and we'll continue to add photos of locomotives and rolling stock that will be used on the railroad. We'll also include photos of our buildings, both as they come off the "assembly line" and as they appear when in place on the layout. We'll also document progress on the layout itself. We hope you'll come back and visit from time to time to see what progress we've made.