Pueblo-Summit County CO Archives Biographies.....Carlile, James N. 1836 - 
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Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 December 27, 2008, 9:16 pm

Author: R. M. Stevenson (1881)

HON. JAMES N. CARLILE.

    The Hon. James N. Carlile was born in Carroll County, Ohio, October 17,
1836. His school advantages were the same as those of the majority of the
district school scholars in our free American Republic until he was fourteen
years old. During his school attendance, he acquired only a vague and indistinct
knowledge of the text-books he studied, and owes more to his inherent ability
than to education for being one of the widest known railroad cantractors in the
United States. At the age of fourteen, he began his railroad experience by
driving a cart on the Pan Handle Railroad, which has proven to be the
stepping-stone to the pinnacle which he has attained. He successfully farmed in
Iowa, mined two years in French Gulch, Colo., and freighted four years with
wagon teams in the Territories of New Mexico, Colorado-then a
Territory,-Wyoming, Idaho, Nevada and Montana. In 1868, he again began
railroading, as a member of the firm of Moore & Carlile, railroad contractors
and builders. They built from Cheyenne out forty miles of the Denver Pacific
Railroad in ten months, and in four months built the Colorado Central Railroad
between Denver and Golden; built the larger part of the Kansas Pacific Railroad
from Sheridan to Denver, a distance of two hundred and thirty miles, the only
important contractors besides themselves being Fields & Jones, and William
Wheeler & Co. They contracted to build, and built nearly all of the Denver & Rio
Grande Railroad between Denver and Pueblo, and between Pueblo and Canon City. In
1874, Messrs. Orman & Co. became members of the firm, and the title was changed
to Moore, Carlile, Orman & Co., who built ninety-seven miles of the Atchison,
Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad. Mr. Moore withdrew from the firm in 1877; William
Crook was admitted, and the firm name changed to Carlile, Orman & Crook. They
built the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe" Railroad from Pueblo to El Moro, and to
Alamosa, with the exception of a few short distances, which were built by
sub-contractors. They built at least one-half of the Denver & Rio Grande
Railroad, between Canon City and Malta; and all of that road from Leadville to
Kokomo-twenty miles; also built between thirty and forty miles of the Denver &
South Park Railroad. In partnership with others, he has built over five hundred
miles of railroad. At the time of the taking of this short biography, he was
interested in a contract to build thirty miles of the San Juan extension of the
Denver & Rio Grande Railroad from Alamosa to Del Norte, and in a contract to
build the Utah extension from Tennessee Pass to Red Cliff. He is a fancier of
blooded stock, and an extensive dealer in horses and cattle. In company with his
brothers, W. K. and L. F. Carlile, he owns several herds of high-priced stock.
He was sent from Pueblo County by the Democratic party, in 1876, to the first
Legislature convened in Colorado after it became a State, and was elected County
Treasurer of the same county in 1880. The above denotes the popularity and
far-reaching financial vim of the subject of this sketch, and it only remains to
add-to complete the sketch-that in his beautiful residence on the mesa at South
Pueblo, he is a hospitable gentleman and a kind husband and father to an
affectionate family.


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

History of the  Arkansas Valley, Colorado
By J. Harrison Mills

O. L. Baskin & Co.
Chicago
1881


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