Narrow gauge rails in southwestern Colorado at one time formed a 675-mile circle extending from Salina and Alamosa on the east to Durango and Montrose on the west, with the 163 mile Rio Grande Southern forming the final link in the circle. Operating in an area where the minimum elevation was over 6,000 feet and encompassing a plurality of Colorado’s 14,000 foot peaks (the “fourteeners”), it served places whose incomparable beauty, vast mineral resources, and scant population created a setting unmatched on the North American continent and whose names even today connote the glories of both railroading and mining. This book is the story of that celebrated railroading circle.