Field Engineer’s Report – Valuation Section Washington #5 Northern Pacific Railway – September 23, 1917
[This was written describing the Northern Pacific Line between Tenino and Lakeview (near Tacoma)]
The entire country covered by this Valuation Section ass indicated above as gravelly flat, the soil is so stony and the country so dry that there is but little productive farming country along the line. While there are several streams on this Valuation Section they are fed by glaciers from Mt. Rainier and the drainage of the west slope of the Cascades Mountains. The district is covered with a growth of small pine and fir trees but not completely, the timber being more or less scattered.
The classification on this section consists almost wholly of cement gravel, taking a loose rock classification, loose gravel and boulders, the latter taking a percent of solid rock. . . .
The farming industry from a traffic point of view amounts to very little or nothing. The main traffic along the line is lumbering and this is on the wane on timber immediately accessible from this district mostly been cut.