How the railroad shaped Palm Springs history at the turn of the century

The discovery of gold in 1848 focused much of the country’s attention on California and the Pacific Coast region. People all over the country rushed to the “Golden State” to find their fortunes. After California was admitted to the Union in 1850, the movement to link the East and West Coast by rail became a priority. In 1853, the United States Congress appropriated $150,000 authorizing Secretary of War, Jefferson Davis, to determine the most practical and economical railroad route to run from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean.

On May 10, 1869, locomotives coming from both sides of the country met nose-to-nose at Promontory Summit in the Utah Territory.  A ceremonial 17.6-karat gold spike was used to connect the rails of this first transcontinental railroad. The United States of America was now united and Manifest Destiny was a reality. This event significantly impacted travelers to California because now the six-month trip was reduced to two weeks.

Southern Pacific Railroad planned to offer customers a Sunset Route running from Los Angeles through Southern Arizona, New Mexico and Texas to New Orleans. To complete this route rails had to be set down across the desolate Colorado Desert of Southern California.

The combination of intense heat and lack of water took its toll on the workers who labored in the hot sun laying track. By 1877, the trains were running regularly from Los Angeles to Yuma with many stops along the way including a stop in Garnet, then known as Seven Palms, about five miles north of Palm Springs.

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In 1883, John McCallum and his family arrived at the Seven Palms Station. Hiring a Cahuilla man with a wagon to take the family and their belongings across the desert through wind and sand to the hot springs oasis located in the protective shadow of Mt. San Jacinto.

McCallum purchased land and by 1884 moved his family into an adobe house located close to a Tahquitz Canyon stream. He built an irrigation ditch to bring water from the Whitewater River into his ranch at the base of the mountain and planted crops.  That same year the Sunset Route was completed from Los Angeles to New Orleans.

When the Santa Fe Railroad reached Los Angeles in 1885 the Southern Pacific determined not to relinquish its control started a rate war. A ticket to Los Angeles could be purchased for $1 in Kansas City. In its advertising, the railroad company promised health, happiness and instant riches in real estate to all who came to California. One promoter for the Southern Pacific Railroad claimed to have said, “We sold them the climate and threw in the land.”

On Nov. 1, 1887, special trains from San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Gabriel, Puente, and Pomona were set up to bring eager prospective purchasers to attend a land auction in the budding Palm Valley development hosted by McCallum.

Prospective customers were met at the Seven Palms station and driven by a horse-drawn wagon into the new township. In one day, McCallum sold over $50,000 worth of land and 137 parcels. After they made their purchases, the satisfied customers were then loaded back on the wagons and were escorted back to the train station where they boarded the special trains and headed home in comfort. 

By the mid-1890s patients with tuberculosis and respiratory problems were also attracted to Palm Valley (later Palm Springs) by the railroad’s advertising. Many people came seeking health just as others had come seeking wealth. Sanitoriums and hotels opened offering rest and relaxation with treatment for respiratory or arthritic disease in the therapeutic hot mineral springs.

In 1893, devastating torrential rains flooded the mountains and desert floor for 21 days straight. The McCallum’s Ranch was destroyed so the family rebuilt their irrigation ditch, replanted crops and repaired the damage to fences and buildings only to be faced with the severe drought that followed.

Water slowed to a dribble and crops died. Settler after settler gave up their property and left the desert. People who purchased parcels of land began to pack up their things leaving the desert exactly as they had arrived, by train.

McCallum died on Feb. 5, 1897, from a weakened heart.  According the McCallum Saga, John McCallum died believing himself to be a failure because his work and dreams of creating a desert paradise had collapsed into “nothingness.”