SWEETWATER COUNTY — A new YouTube video about the long-vanished community of Bitter Creek is now available online, according to the Sweetwater County Historical Museum.
About 34 miles east of Rock Springs, Bitter Creek once was home to a railroad depot, stockyards, huge sheep shearing sheds, a school, a post office, housing for Union Pacific employees, and the Varley Mercantile, but nothing remains now but a concrete water tower base, a tall, deteriorating water softener tank, and a few foundations.
Varley and his wife Rae Dell are long-time Point of Rocks residents. He was born in 1936, grew up in Bitter Creek, and attended school there through the eighth Grade. After that, he attended the Rock Springs High School, graduating in 1954. He is the author of two books: Bitter Creek Kid, and Grand Pa’s Stories – A Local History. Museum Executive Director Dave Mead and Public Engagement Coordinator Aidan Brady interviewed him at his Point of Rocks home. Afterward, Varley provided them a guided tour of the Bitter Creek site.
The interview made possible a rare, and very personal, account of life in the little hamlet from the 1930s through the 1950s. By the early to mid-1970s, Bitter Creek was in its twilight – the Post Office there was discontinued in 1971, and the Union Pacific depot was torn down in 1974. Little remains now but memories, like those of Ed Varley.
A History of Bitter Creek, As Told by Ed Varley is part of the Smithsonian Institution’s “Museum on Main Street,” project, co-hosted by the Sweetwater County Historical Museum, Wyoming Humanities/ThinkWY, and the Green River Chamber of Commerce.
A History of Bitter Creek, As Told by Ed Varley, can be watched below.
