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Several years ago I was
helping a friend who worked for the Page Land and
Cattle Company gather a few cows on the old Weeks’
cow outfit west of the Apache Trail in the Goldfield
Mountains.
We were working near the old Government Well Highway
Yard on the west side of the road. I was moving four
or five cows along an old abandoned section of the
Apache Trail when I spotted an old concrete pillar
in a thicket of Broombush. The post was about four
feet high, triangular in shape, made of concrete and
had the numbers “23” and “37” engraved on it.
My curious nature dictated that I should step down
from my horse and examine this old concrete mile
post used by stagecoach drivers of the old Apache
Trail. One side of the post had the number “23”,
meaning twenty-three miles to the Mesa railhead. The
other side of the post had the number “37”, meaning
thirty-seven miles ahead to the construction site of
Roosevelt Dam.
This discovery was made in the summer of 1960. I
left the old marker as I found it.
I returned to the site during the winter of 1973. At
the time I was teaching a class, “Prospecting the
Superstitions,” for the Apache Junction Community
School. I was absolutely amazed to find the old
concrete mile post marker still intact and
undisturbed. The mile post marker had stood for 66
years when I revisited it in 1973.
I had totally forgotten about the old mile post by
the spring of 1990. It was by accident I came across
it again while photographing the Goldfield Mountain
one evening. Again I was surprised it had survived
so long.
 It
was at this time I decided something should be done
to protect this old mile marker from vandalism or
destruction. I contacted the Tonto National Forest
district ranger who eventually arranged for the
removal of the mile post marker and the placing of
it in the Superstition Mountain Museum at Goldfield
Ghost Town in 1991.
My friend and close associate, Greg Davis, brought
me an article about the Apache Trail. The mile post
was mentioned in this article, The Nile of America,
and carefully identifies this particular concrete
mile post. The article was published March 21, 1908.
The following is quoted directly from the article:
“About a mile from Mesa the government road begins,
and one of the first things noticed was the neat
cement mile and half mile posts. Each mile post
gives the distance from Mesa to the dam, and the
observant teachers soon made up their minds to
commit to memory all the combinations of sixty that
can be made by using two numbers at a time, 0-60,
14-45, and ’30 all’ were correctly anticipated, and
each found the figures corresponding to the mile
post of his life, though not all in the same half
day. At the eight mile post Desert Wells is past,
where Mesa and Roosevelt stages change horses.”
The article continues, “Gradually swerving toward
the north, at twenty miles the foot hills are
reached and soon the beauties of a thoroughly
constructed mountain road are appreciated.
Passing the ranch (Weeks’ Station) where water is
sold at ‘ten cents a span,’ and the deserted mines
at Goldfields in the corner of Pinal County, we
returned to Maricopa County and stop for dinner at
Government Well, near the 23 mile post. This also
was a changing station for the stage and here you
could change a ten dollar bill. Only one family
lives here and neighbors are not within call,
although three or four miles south at the foot of
Superstition range can plainly be seen the camp and
gold mine of two Scandinavians who are said never to
allow a
 visitor
to set foot on their claims.”
Today the named sites along the Apache Trail are
difficult to recognize. Old Government Well is
located opposite the Needle Vista Point and the old
mine mentioned as belonging to two Scandinavians,
Silverlocke and Goldleaf, can still be found if one
searches the slopes of Superstition Mountain
southeast of First Water Road.
This interesting article pointed directly to this
old concrete road marker that now resides in the
Superstition Mountain Museum 3.8 miles northeast of
Apache Junction on the Apache Trail.
When they lowered the waters of Apache Lake this
Spring (2007) another road marker (Three Mile Wash
marker) was found along the old Apache Trail
roadbed. Only a portion of this marker was saved and
returned to the forest service for preservation.
These markers where placed along the Apache Trail
every mile between Mesa and Roosevelt Dam. Only a
few survive today. The most amazing one to survive
was the Government Well marker. It remained
undisturbed for more than eighty years. |
