Twins, Separated by 3 Years

The pictures on these two post cards are exactly the same; one isn't even a

copy of the other. Notice the moon in the upper left-hand corner. It has the same cloud shadowing on both cards. The round front of each train are identical; the headlight shines in the same manner. There is nothing extremely obvious that is different from one post card to the other at first glance. I can see two differences: 1) the border on the top one is smaller and darker than the second, and 2) the number and title at the bottom, while the same wording, are in different font size and style. Also, one is a bit lighter than the other - but that could just be age. The top card was mailed in 1911 and the bottom one in 1914. The reason that these two cards are the same is because they were both published by the same company.

On the top post card the publisher's name is very difficult to read because the author of the message went out of the borders. The printing going up the side of the post card reads: "PUBLISHED BY BARKALOW BROS. DENVER, COLO. MADE IN U.S.A." The second post card, however, shows the publisher very clearly. I guess that after 3 years in the publishing business, they made some money, figured they would be around longer and paid to have a logo developed for them. It is the circle in the upper left corner of the bottom card.

The Royal Gorge (also Grand Canyon of the Arkansas) is a canyon on the Arkansas River near Cañon City, Colorado. With a width of 50 feet (15 m) at its base and a few hundred feet at its top, and a depth of 1,250 feet (380 m) in places, the 10-mile-long canyon is a narrow, steep gorge through the granite of Fremont Peak. It is one of the deepest canyons in Colorado. On April 19, 1878, a hastily assembled construction crew from the Santa Fe began grading for a railroad just west of Cañon City in the mouth of the gorge. The D&RG whose end of track was only ¾ of a mile from Canon City raced crews to the same area, but were blocked by the Santa Fe graders in the narrow canyon. By a few hours they had lost the first round in what became a two-year struggle between the two railroads that would be known as the Royal Gorge War. The railroads went to court with each trying to establish their primacy to the right of way. After a long legal battle that ended in the U.S. Supreme Court, on April 21, 1879, the D&RG was granted the primary right to build through the gorge that in places was wide enough at best for only one railroad. On May 7, 1879 the first excursion train traveled through the Royal Gorge after years of court battles between the Denver & Rio Grande and the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe (AT&SF or Santa Fe) railroads.