the "palace" depot

Twenty-five years of filling oil lamps at the De Smet Depot had soaked the thick pine floors and sidewalks until oil actually oozed from between the planks when heavy carts of freight were rolled over them. So, in 1906, when a lighted match-head snapped off and blew beneath the depot, the crawl space was an inferno in seconds. Someone rushed upstairs to tell the Depot Agent's family to GET OUT, and they escaped by the back stairway.

The Depot Agent suddenly remembered a half dozen boxes of dynamite inside, and men formed a "bucket brigade" to get them safely out of reach of the fire. The dynamite was all that was saved. After the fire, nothing was left of except embers and railroad tracks warped by the heat of the fire. The Agent and his family considered renting the house formerly owned by Laura and Almanzo Wilder, who sold it before moving to Mansfield. They decided it was too small, and rented elsewhere.

During the six months it took for the current "new" depot in De Smet to be built, a railroad bunk car served as the Depot. It was called "the Palace" - a combination bunk, storage, and office car. One could stand in the middle and reach anything without moving. Unfortunately, passengers had to wait for trains out in the elements. Note that "De Smet" is written on the side of the Chicago & North Western Railway car.

This wasn't the first Boxcar Depot in De Smet. Remember that Jim Woodworth worked out of a boxcar while the first depot was being built.

The "new" depot is shown in an early photograph below. At right is the Station Agent, who was seated in the bay window facing the tracks. The photo above is of the depot today (the bay is on the other side of the building), currently the Depot Museum.

- posted by pioneergirl at 10:17 PM