John Wayne was driving east on the Wyoming highway when he saw the survey stakes in the field and the family standing at the gate and the railroad company truck in the road. He pulled over because he knew what survey stakes meant and he knew what the expression on the woman’s face meant and he had seen that combination before and it never ended the way it should without someone intervening.
Here is the story. The Henderson ranch sat on 640 acres of mixed grass and sage 40 miles east of Casper, Wyoming on a section of eastern basin land that Frank Henderson’s grandfather Elias had homesteaded in 1903 with a land patent, a team of horses, and the particular conviction of men who go to new places that what they are building will outlast them.
Elias had been right. He had built a house and a barn and a windmill and a stock pond and had run cattle and a small wheat operation on the lower acres and had sent his son to school in Casper for 2 years and had died in that house in 1931, which was a bad year to die in, but no worse than the years before after it for the people he left behind.
Frank Henderson was 52 years old in October of 1956. He had taken over the ranch from his father in 1938 and had run it through the war years when the cattle prices were good and the labor was scarce and through the dry years of the early 50s when the grass came in thin and the stock pond dropped 2 ft and held at that level for three summers.
His wife Alice had been beside him for all of it, the way ranch wives are beside their husbands, which is to say completely and without ceremony because there is no time on a working ranch for ceremony and the work does not stop for feelings. Their son Robert had gone to the Pacific in 1943 at age 19.
He had been a good rider and a better mechanic and had taught himself to read the weather the way his grandfather had taught himself to read the land by paying attention to the same things every day until the pattern revealed itself. He had not come back from the Pacific. He was buried in the north field of the Henderson Ranch in the small family cemetery behind the iron fence that Elias had put up in 1908 to enclose his wife’s grave and that had been added to in 1931, and 1933, and 1944.
Seven graves in total. The survey line, Wyoming Northern Spur Railroad staked in October of 1956, ran 18 ft from the iron fence on the west side of the cemetery. 18 ft was within the right-of-way easement the railroad’s engineer had specified for the track bed and the maintenance access road. The Wyoming Northern Spur Railroad ran 140 mi of track through the eastern Wyoming Basin.
It was not a major line. It connected a series of cattle shipping points and two small coal operations to the Union Pacific main at Casper, and it had been doing this profitably, if not spectacularly, since 1921. Its board of directors was five men who met quarterly in a Casper hotel room. Its majority stockholder was a Cheyenne Holding Company called Basin Land Associates that had acquired 61% of the railroad’s shares in 1948 as part of a larger real estate transaction and had never thought much about them since because the quarterly dividend was small but consistent and there was no reason to sell. In September of 1956, the railroad’s board voted to extend the eastern spur line by 14 mi to reach a new coal operation south of Glenrock. Three possible routes had been surveyed. The southern route, which crossed mostly federal land, was the most expensive by
$40,000 due to terrain grading. The central route, which crossed the Henderson Ranch, was the cheapest. The board voted for the central route. They sent a lawyer named Aldis from Cheyenne to handle the right-of-way acquisition and a survey crew to stake the line. Aldis arrived at the Henderson Ranch on a Wednesday morning in October with the survey documents and the compensation offer.
The offer was $3,200 for the right-of-way easement across the southwest corner of the Henderson property, which the railroad’s appraiser had determined was fair market value for the land affected. The offer did not account for the family cemetery or the 18-ft clearance from the iron fence or the fact that a maintenance access road running 18 ft from Robert Henderson’s grave would run 18 ft from Robert Henderson’s grave every day for as long as the railroad operated. Aldis gave his speech on the Henderson front porch with Frank and Alice on one side of the threshold and himself on the other. He had given it 18 times before for this railroad and he gave it in the same order with the same language because the order was logical and the language was precise and he had found that precision was a form of respect even when the message was unwelcome. He said the railroad had eminent domain authority under Wyoming statute. He said the compensation offer was fair and had been
independently appraised. He said if the family did not accept the offer voluntarily, the railroad would proceed through the county court, which would result in the same outcome with additional legal costs on both sides. Frank Henderson looked at the survey documents. Alice Henderson stood beside him with her hands in her apron pockets and looked at the staked line visible across the field, the small orange flags running southwest to northeast passing 18 ft from the iron fence of the family cemetery. She said, “That line goes past my son’s grave.” Aldis said he understood that was difficult. He said the appraised value reflected the full market impact of the easement. A Alice looked at him for a long moment. She said nothing else. John Wayne had been in Casper for 2 days to look at a quarter horse operation that a friend had recommended. He had not bought any horses. The operation was not what the description had suggested. He was driving east on the Basin Highway
toward Douglas, where he had agreed to look at a second operation the following morning, when he saw the railroad company truck on the road and the orange survey stakes in the field beyond and the three people standing at the gate. He pulled over on the gravel shoulder and got out. He walked to the gate.
Aldous turned when he heard the footsteps on the gravel. He looked at Wayne and placed the face and his expression did the thing faces do when they are placing a very recognizable face in a very unexpected location. Wayne looked at the survey stakes in the field. He looked at the family at the gate.
He asked Frank Henderson what the situation was. Frank told him. He told it plainly and without heat, the way a man tells a situation he is angry about but has decided not to be angry about because anger does not change survey lines. He said the railroad wanted the right of way. He said the line ran past the family cemetery.
He said the compensation was $3,200. Wayne looked at the orange flags. He looked at the iron fence visible in the north field. He looked at Aldous. He said, “Who owns the railroad?” Aldous said the Wyoming Northern Spur Railroad was a corporation with a board of directors. Wayne said, “Who owns the majority shares?” Aldous said that was a matter of corporate record available at the Wyoming Secretary of State’s office.
Wayne looked at him for a long moment. He said, “I’m going to find that out in the next 2 hours.” He said it the way a man says a thing that is a statement of fact rather than a threat because there was no threat involved. He said, “I would ask you to hold your survey crew here until I have made some calls.
Aldous said the survey crew was operating on the railroad’s authority and was not subject to Wayne’s requests. Wayne looked at the survey stakes. He said, “That is fine.” He turned and walked back to his truck. He did not look at the survey stakes again. He had seen what he needed to see. He drove east to Glenrock 7 miles and pulled into a Conoco station that had a payphone on the outside wall in a metal hood that rattled in the basin wind.
He called his business manager in Los Angeles. He told him to find out who held the majority shares of the Wyoming Northern Spur Railroad, incorporated in Wyoming, and to find out if those shares were available for purchase and at what price, and to call him back at the Glenrock gas station number within the hour.
He sat in the truck in the station lot with the engine off and watched a freight truck pull in and out and watched a woman with two children cross the street and go into the hardware store and waited. His manager called back in 52 minutes. He said the majority shares, 61%, were held by Basin Land Associates of Cheyenne, a holding company.
He said he had located the principal officer of Basin Land Associates and had spoken to him. He said the man had confirmed that the shares were not currently for sale, but that he was willing to discuss a number. He said the number the man had mentioned was $85,000 for the 61% stake. Wayne said that was fine.
He said to agree to the number and draw up the transfer documents and have them ready to sign by Friday. He said to call the Basin Land Associates principal back and tell him the sale was proceeding and that he should notify the railroad’s board that the majority stockholder position was transferring and that pending the transfer, no further right-of-way work on the Henderson Ranch route should proceed.
His manager said, “You are buying a railroad.” Wayne said, I am buying enough of a railroad to stop a survey line. Where are you watching from? Drop your state in the comments. I want to see how far this story reaches. He drove back to the Henderson Ranch. It had been just over an hour. Aldis was still there, leaning against the company car reading documents.
The survey crew had put in four more stakes while Wayne had been on the phone. Alice Henderson was standing at the kitchen window watching them. Wayne told Aldis that the majority share position of the Wyoming Northern Spur Railroad was in the process of transferring to a new owner and that he would recommend Aldis call the board before doing any further work on the Henderson property.
He said the new majority stockholders position on the Henderson route would be communicated to the board within 48 hours. Aldis looked at him. He looked at his folder. He said, “Sir, I have no way to verify that.” Wayne said, “Call the board.” He gave him the name of his business manager and a Los Angeles telephone number to call if the board wanted to speak with the incoming majority stockholders representative.
He said he would be at the Douglas Holiday Inn tonight if anyone needed to reach him. He walked back to the gate. He shook Frank Henderson’s hand. He shook Alice Henderson’s hand. He said, “Someone will be in touch with the railroad’s board today.” He said, “Stay on your land.” He drove to Douglas and checked into the hotel.
The railroad’s board chairman called the Los Angeles number the following morning. Wayne’s manager confirmed the share transfer in progress and communicated the incoming majority stockholders position. The Henderson Ranch route was canceled. The southern route across federal land was the only route the new majority holder would authorize.
The board chairman called back in the afternoon. He said the southern route cost $40,000 more than the Henderson Central route and that the board had approved the Henderson route specifically for cost reasons. Wayne’s manager said that the new majority holder understood this and considered it the appropriate cost of not running a track line 18 ft from a family cemetery.
The share transfer completed on Friday. Wayne held the 61% stake in the Wyoming Northern Spur Railroad for 14 months until he had confirmed the spur extension had been rerouted south through federal land and the Henderson right-of-way acquisition had been formally withdrawn. He then sold the shares back to Basin Land Associates at the same price he had paid.
The southern route spur line opened in April of 1958, 14 months behind the original schedule and $40,000 over the original budget. It ran through federal grazing land 3 mi south of the Henderson Ranch through terrain that required more grading and longer culverts and additional switchback work that the engineers had correctly estimated would cost more.
And that was now built and in service. The Henderson property was undisturbed. The orange survey stakes were pulled by a railroad crew in November of 1956, the same week the board authorized the southern route. Frank Henderson died in 1974. He is buried in the north field behind the iron fence beside his son Robert and his father and his grandfather Elias, who had come to this section of Wyoming Basin in 1903 and built something that had outlasted him the way he had intended.
Alice Henderson lived until 1988. She was 81 years old. She had never left the ranch. Their daughter Carol, who had been 16 at the time of the survey stakes and had watched from the kitchen window, inherited the property. She ranched it with her husband for 30 years and passed it to her own children.
In 1997, Carol donated two items to the Wyoming State Museum in Cheyenne. The first was the railroad’s formal withdrawal of the Henderson right-of-way easement dated November 1956, signed by the board chairman and notarized. The second was a copy of the share transfer document showing the 61% stake of the Wyoming Northern Spur Railroad transferring from Bassinland Associates to a California production company in October of 1956 and transferring back 14 months later.
The placard reads, “The Henderson Ranch, Natrona County, Wyoming, established 1903. In October 1956, a railroad staked a line 18 ft from the family cemetery. The line was never built. These documents explain why the ranch is still in the family. If this story reached you, pass it on. Share it with a veteran in your life.
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