Utah Centennial Studies

 

Ghost Riders and Rest Stops Packet B

 

BURNT STATION

Dear Students,

Burnt Station was at the head of Deep Creek Canyon in Tooele County where the canyon walls were wide enough for a station house and livestock corrals to be built. It was burned twice in Indian Raids, in 1861 and 1864. No two of the three buildings were in exactly the same place as they had originally been built. This station had been called Canyon Station, but was renamed Burnt Station after the raids. Because it sat in the depths of a narrow, twisting canyon, it was favored for Indian attacks, and at least two soldiers and five station agents and travelers were killed there. The stage driver never knew until he rounded the bend below the station whether he would be greeted by a relief driver or by a smoldering pile of ashes and the war whoops of waiting Indians. The facilities were not good at Burnt Station, although plain meals and rough lodging could be had. Because of its reputation, few stayed there overnight. Above Burnt Station the canyon widens to Clifton Flats, where a few years later the wild mining camp of Clifton would spring to life. From the head of Deep Creek Canyon the trail crossed the Clifton Flats and followed the western edge of the Deep Creek Mountains to Ibapah Station, not far from the Nevada border.