TRANSPORTION THROUGH TIME
The early mode of transportation was horseback.
The Pioneers settled the west using covered wagons including freight was pulled by oxen or horses.
As town were settled, the Stage Coach was the next means of travel. 
The Pony Express (The names of the first Pony Express in Montana will be listed soon.)
The contruction of forts to protect the settlers used the rivers to carry freight and people shorter distances.
The Railroad was built and changed the way the west did business. Each of the above involved many of your ancestors.
They will be named as the page grows.
A RailroadTown:
In 1901, encouraged by Buffalo Bill, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy (CB&Q) railroad laid the first tracks into the BigHornBasin to connect Cody with southern Montana.
Four years later top officials of the CB&Q decided the time was right to begin linking their rails at Billings, Montana, with rails that served Denver.
The first phase of this project began in 1906 when tracks were built from Frannie, on their Cody line, southward to Worland. In order to promote settlement and secure shipping revenue along the new line, the CB&Q directed their real estate partner, the Lincoln Land Company, to lay out six new towns beside the tracks.
One of the town sites selected was John Borner’s ranch, located just a mile below where the Greybull River flowed into the Big Horn. Lincoln Land paid Borner $3750 for his 280-acre ranch, and announced the town to be built there was going to be named “Greybull.” After the tracks were built across the former Borner ranch in June 1906, the town of Greybull was surveyed, and the first lots were sold in July 1906. A few days later a 12x14 tent was put up to house the town’s first business, the Grey Bull Saloon. According to Ira Sherard, they “Just had a workbench in there, and sawhorses with boards on it for their bar.”
Since the first work train pulled into Greybull in 1906, the railroad has played an important role in the town’s economy. In 1907, a small 3-stall roundhouse and a large “Coal-Chute” to fuel the locomotives were built here. Beginning in 1911, while rails were being laid south from Thermopolis through Wind RiverCanyon, the CB&Q began stationing train crews in Greybull. In 1913, the new line reached Casper, and the CB&Q built a larger roundhouse in Greybull. They made Greybull the major “Division-Point” on the Billings-Casper line.
Even though the railroad provided many jobs, the town only had a population of 421 in 1915. But that all changed in September 1915 when the first “oil-gusher” was struck in the south part of Greybull. By January 1916, after many gushers had come in, Greybull’s population had doubled and a small “six-still” refinery began operating. Soon, Midwest Refining Company from Denver purchased the Greybull Refinery, and expanded its size. Then in June 1916, Standard Oil of Indiana announced plans to construct a large 20-still refinery in Greybull. By 1921, just before a nationwide economic recession started, Greybull had exploded to 5279 people (unofficially), and was the 6th largest town in Wyoming, with a very busy 20-stall roundhouse.
The Greybull oil field proved to be shallow, but pipelines were built by the Illinois Pipeline Co. from both the Grass Creek and ElkBasin fields, and the local refinery continued production until 1948. Crews working for Ohio Oil Co., later named “Marathon,” operated the pipelines from Greybull until 1971. In 1974, the CB&Q donated a caboose, called a “way-car’ by railroaders, to our town, and today it can be viewed standing in front Library/Museum building located in downtown Greybull.
Days of ‘49
In 1945, a group of Greybull’s young men attending a Junior Chamber of Commerce meeting found they had talked themselves into sponsoring a western celebration. They decided the celebration should feature a parade with a western theme and also have many “games of chance” running day and night at the Community Hall. Since a few of those gamblers had a chance to “strike it rich,” the Jaycees thought those attending would be like those who rushed to California hoping to strike gold in 1849. Hence, they decided to name Greybull’s celebration, “The Day’s of ’49.”
In 1946, the Jaycees added a rodeo to the celebration, and thought it would be fun to roundup wild horses to use. So, local cowboys went all the way to McCulloughPeaks, just east of Cody, saddled up and started gathering dozens of unbranded horses. Then, with the help of a couple of airborne cowboys flying Piper Cubs, the wild horses were driven all the way to the GHS football field, where the rodeo was held. Using horses that had never been ridden, and in many cases had never even been handled by humans, that first 49er rodeo was long remembered as perhaps the best rodeo ever held in the Big Horn Basin. It was said that the arena was always full of totally unmanageable horses— and the sky was full of cowboys!
For many years the Days of ’49 celebration drew several times the then 2,200 population to Greybull for two days and three nights of western fun. Today, the Day’s of ’49 is celebrated during the second weekend of June each year, still drawing big crowds, and retaining much of the flavor of those early years.
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