The district is representative of the huge sheep industry that was once a dominant economic force in Wyoming, particularly in the south central and southwestern part of the state. The Headquarters Park Historic District played an integral role in the yearly grazing cycle in which sheep wintered at the lower elevations and trailed to a summer range high in the mountains. For over 65 years, the district served as the summer headquarters for the Leo Sheep Company and Rocky Mountain Sheep Company, both established in 1903 by Lee Emmit Vivion.

The Rocky Mountain Sheep Company focused on wool production while the Leo Sheep Company concentrated on lamb products. Forest Service records show that a permit for 18,000 sheep was issued to the Rocky Mountain Sheep Company in 1907 for the Medicine Bow National Forest.

The Wolf Hotel is a two and a half story, brick and frame building which opened to the public in January 1894. Saratoga, probably named for the famous spa in upper New York State, was a particularly popular focal point because of its hot springs, which were believed to have curative properties.

Frederick G. Wolf was a native of Germany who came to America in 1869 and eventually found his way to Rawlins, Wyoming where he became a foreman for the Union Pacific Railroad. Suffering from rheumatism, Wolf went to Saratoga in 1887 seeking relief for his illness at the hot springs. There he became involved in establishing the Wolf Hotel. The hotel is significant as a prominent piece of local architecture and as an early commercial establishment.

Shively Hardware is a business anchor for the downtown commercial area and a dominant structure along Bridge Street in Saratoga, Wyoming. Shively Hardware actually consists of two buildings constructed in different years.

The original one-story mercantile/hardware was built in 1888 while the two-story portion was constructed in 1889. The building is significant because of its historical association with the development of the community of Saratoga and the subsequent settlement of Carbon County. It embodies distinctive characteristics that represent typical commercial architecture for a small Wyoming town in the late nineteenth century. Pioneer merchant and developer William B. Hugus constructed this building that housed a mercantile, saloon, and bank on the west side of the Platte River. Edward Shively acquired the property in 1925 and it grew as a family business to fit the needs of the community.

The Jack Creek Guard Station is significant because it is an excellent example of a popularized vernacular architectural style for typical early Forest Service overnight cabins. It is representative of structures associated with early Forest Service administrative activities and is also associated with an individual of local importance who contributed significantly to local history.

The cabin was built in 1933-1934 by Evan John Williams, Encampment District Ranger. ''Evy'' Williams served his entire Forest Service career on the Medicine Bow National Forest. He entered service May 24, 1916 and retired December 29, 1950. He began work during the era when Forest Rangers spent weeks out in the woods, isolated from civilization, riding horseback or hiking to administer their duties. It was during this era that Evy Williams built the Jack Creek overnight cabin as a Forest administrative camp.

The single room log overnight cabin was constructed from a standard Forest Service plan. Its styling--of sawn logs with half-dovetail corners, milled lumber framing, wood shake, gabled roof, and deep, snow-protected porch--is typical of Forest Service guard stations from its era. It is typed as the Rocky Mountain Cabin style, a vernacular log cabin style popularized in the West by the Forest Service

The Jim Baker Cabin, which for years was located in Frontier Park in Cheyenne, is now located at Savery, Wyoming, not far from its original location. It is a weather-beaten, two-story structure constructed of rough-hewn cottonwood logs. The lower story was the former living quarters of the Baker family. The small second story was used for storage. Early pictures of the cabin reveal a railing which once was affixed to the base of the second story.

There was at one time, also, a turret or watchtower cupola on the roof of the second story, but it was removed by Baker in 1881 four years after the completion of the cabin. Baker's log house stood by a spring and was located approximately midway across the Little Snake River bottomland, in a place where a commanding view of the area could be had and where no sniper's bullet could be effective from the cover of the surrounding hills. At the time Jim Baker began construction of his cabin fortress in 1873, this scenic valley was not only the home of Baker and his family but also contained the teepees of the Snake or Shoshone Indian tribe which adopted him. Not far away were Ute Indians who were not reconciled to the white man, even by 1879. It may have been with that fact in mind that Baker built his fortress-cabin.

The early life of Jim Baker is obscure because of the lack of documentary material. It is known that at the age of twenty Baker was recruited by the American Fur Company for a trapping expedition led by the famous mountain man, Jim Bridger. Baker signed a contract for an eighteen month period and he and ninety-one others embarked on May 25, 1839 on a Missouri River steamboat bound for the Mountain West. Baker began a career of trapping and hunting which lasted until 1852, when he is reported to have gone on his last trapping expedition with the famous scout, Kit Carson. Baker and his family settled in the Little Snake River Valley of Southern Wyoming in 1873 and he spent the remaining years of his life there, passing away in 1898. Jim Baker was representative of a group of individuals who have been termed Mountain Men.

The unique structure which is the Jim Baker Cabin is one of the few things associated with the man which remains. It is a symbol of Jim Baker himself, and also of a frontier period which is not forgotten to those who trace the history of the American past.

The JO Ranch represents a rare and well-preserved example of late nineteenth and early twentieth century western sheep ranching operation in southwestern Wyoming. Established in 1885, the ranch reflects the growth of the sheep industry after the devastating livestock losses suffered in the winter of 1886-1887 that crippled the cattle industry and ended the open range system of ranching. The decline of the cattle industry allowed the fledgling sheep industry to grow especially along the Union Pacific Railroad corridor in southern Wyoming, which provided a means for sheep to be efficiently shipped to distant markets.

The JO Ranch also represents traditional Spanish sheep management practices that developed in Wyoming rather than the English system employed in the early Atlantic colonies. In Wyoming, large heards of sheep were grazed by individual herders across the public domain rather than in fenced pastures. JO Ranch sheep were driven to the nearby Sierra Madre Mountains in summer, and then wintered at lower elevation in the Great Divide. Herders and their flocks radiated out from the JO Ranch headquarters in all directions, grazing freely on the public domain, until the Taylor Grazing Act of 1934 required permits and grazing fees on public lands.

The log, stone, and wood frame buildings and structures reflect vernacular architecture using locally available materials. Considerable craftsmanship is exhibited in the stone architecture of the oldest buildings built in ca. 1890. The ranch headquarters reflect a practical layout for maximum efficiency of use that was specifically adapted to the sheep ranching industry. In addition, the engineered irrigation system used to develop the hay meadows along the creek assured proper water distribution. The hay meadows were key agricultural components that provided additional winter feed and seasonally provided more nutritious forage for horses, sheep, and cattle.

Built in 1912-19, the Medicine Bow Depot is a classic example of the type of train station built in Union Pacific towns. While Medicine Bow's history seems to be inextricably linked to the book, The Virginian, and the romance of the American cowboy, in actuality Medicine Bow is a product of the railroad. Founded 20 years before author Owen Wister visited the town, Medicine Bow began as a general store and saloon in July 1868. Both structures anticipated the coming of the Union Pacific Railroad by a short time and when the railroad finally pushed across the Laramie Plains, a five-stable roundhouse, service facilities and a watering tank for the locomotives were built there. Medicine Bow developed into an important freight center and in 1912, after the first depot burned, the Union Pacific constructed a new one.

This structure served the Medicine Bow area for 68 years until the railhead closed in 1981. The Medicine Bow Depot remains as a reminder of events and people which made a significant contribution to our history, and also embodies the distinctive characteristics of plains railroad construction at the turn of the twentieth century.

The Medicine House site (48CR2353) is an Early Archaic habitation site located in the Hanna Basin near Hanna, Wyoming in Carbon County. The site contains one of the largest and best preserved pithouses known to exist in the basin as well as a surface scatter of lithics, hearths, and fire cracked rock. Early Archaic period dates of 5360±80 BP and 5160±120 BP were obtained from features with the pithouse. The inhabitants of the site invested considerable labor in constructing the pithouse structure and in arranging the internal features to best utilize the available space. The dwelling not only housed the residents but also served as a storage facility for subsistence resources collected from the surrounding area. The storage features contained thousands of Indian ricegrass (Oryzopsis hymenoides) seeds, suggesting a long term winter occupation. Construction and use of this facility demonstrate a viable adaptation to a semiarid intermountain basin during a period of climatic stress. An estimated 30 to 40 percent of the pithouse remains unexcavated, allowing for future research. The Medicine House site also has the potential to contain additional pithouse features. The site is eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places under Criterion D at the statewide level of significance.

The site of the former Midway Stage Station is located in the valley of the Upper North Platte River, about six miles east of the river, and about ten miles south of the Union Pacific Railroad. Midway Station was named for its geographic position--midway between the town of Saratoga and a railhead on the Union Pacific Railroad called Walcott--on a stage and freight road that received heavy use around the turn of the twentieth century. 

Although no station buildings remain, the station site is marked by at least two shallow depressions in the ground, surrounded with greasewood and sagebrush, typical vegetation in this high altitude intermontane environment. More obvious than the site of the station are ruts of the Overland Trail that are cut deeply through earth and sage thirty yards south of the station, and ruts of the Encampment-Walcott or Saratoga-Walcott stage and freight road that approach the station from a low hummock to the south, intersecting the Overland Trail before reaching the station site.

The Muddy Creek Archaeological Complex is a Late Plains Archaic bison kill, processing, and residential area composed of three sites in Carbon County. The sophistication of bison exploitation and the presence of diagnostic projectile points identify the site as belonging to the Besant Cultural Complex.

The Besant culture was prevalent on the Northern Plains extending from southern Canada to Wyoming and adjacent states. The Muddy Creek Archaeological Complex is one of the southernmost Besant sites currently known to exist, but more importantly, the complex exhibits all identifying features of the Besant Cultural Complex, which include a bison drive line, bison pound, religious features associated with the bison pounding operations, and a habitation area consisting of numerous tipi rings.

Sinclair, Wyoming, first known as Parco, is ''truly an oasis in an otherwise drab desert territory,'' reported the Rocky Mountain News in August of 1925. The town of Sinclair was a company-built town designed by the Denver-based architectural firm of Fisher and Fisher. It was financed by oil magnate Frank Kistler to house workers for a large Producers and Refiners Oil Company refinery built in 1922-1923 at this location. Sinclair was constructed in 1924-1925 and consists of numerous public buildings set around three sides of a central east-west plaza, fountain and park. Residences are located along streets and blocks in a grid pattern running north, west and east from the plaza area.

In order to foster a sense of community spirit commonly absent in company towns, as well as to maintain an architectural cohesiveness, the architects designed residential and public buildings using Spanish Colonial motifs with unpainted stucco, polychrome clay tile roofs, and dominant masonry construction to accurately simulate the appearance and form of many southwestern adobe missions. There are a total of ninety three buildings included within the district boundaries, forty nine of which are contributing elements of the district.

The most prominent public building is the impressive Parco Inn which dominates the plaza and establishes the overall architectural theme. Although Kistler's firm was forced to sell the PARCO holdings in 1934 when crude oil reached an all-time low price of ten cents a barrel, the oil market improved as a result of increased demand during World War II. The refinery and town, renamed Sinclair in 1942, prospered under the management of the Sinclair Refining Company. From its inception, Sinclair remained one of the most important refineries in the State of Wyoming.

The forty bridges in this thematic study are the best of their types which were still in use on the state and county road systems in Wyoming when the study was completed in 1982. Selected from a statewide survey of all functional vehicular trusses and arches using a specific evaluation criteria and methodology, most represent superlatives of their generic engineering types (i.e. truss configuration and connection types) while typifying bridgebuilding and transportation trends in the state. All were built in the first three decades of the twentieth century (1905-1935).

Although bridges were put up during the earlier periods of overland wagon emigration, they had not begun to proliferate in the state of Wyoming until the early twentieth century with the emergence of the automobile as a principal form of transportation. All the listed bridges display a remarkable homogeneity of construction and operational histories. Generally, county-built trusses were contracted through competitive bidding among several Midwestern bridge erectors and built from standardized designs using prefabricated components.

After creation of the Wyoming Highway Department in 1917, the role of the counties in truss bridge construction diminished. The later highway department bridges were typically designed from standard plans maintained by the department and built by local contractors from components fabricated in the same Midwestern foundries. One feature that all steel truss bridges shared was their versatility. Quickly erected, they could also be dismantled and moved if necessary. Many county road bridges in Wyoming had begun service as railroad bridges, sold or given to the counties as obsolete structures. Similarly, early highway bridges which had become unsuitable to handle increasing volumes of traffic were sometimes replaced with new trusses, with the older bridges demoted to places along less traveled roads.

After World War II, new trussbuilding was rare in Wyoming. Today trusses have been largely superseded by more sophisticated engineering designs and are seldom erected. The remaining highway and roadway truss bridges are remnants of past technologies, whose numbers are continually dwindling through attrition.

Pine Grove Station was in the 1860s one of thirty-one stopping points or waystations in Wyoming along the Overland Trail, the major western transportation route in the United States between the years 1862-1869. The station site is near Bridger's Pass straddling the Continental Divide. Pine Grove Station and Bridger's Pass Station west of it were built by Robert Foote of Fort Halleck at a cost of $1500.00.

Foote's men were paid $50 or $60 a month for their labor and were supplied with an armed guard to protect them from Indian attack while they were building the stations. According to Foote the stations were plain log buildings about 25 by 60 feet with rooms for passengers to eat and rooms for forage on one side.

Generally attached to or surrounding station buildings was a corral of poles or logs, enclosing a space large enough to hold ten to twenty mules comfortably, or about a quarter to half an acre of ground. Reports indicate that the station was destroyed or partially destroyed in 1865 and again in 1867 by Indians although it is possible that the station was rebuilt and continued to be used as a ranchstead.

Pine Grove Station was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on November 21, 1978 under Criterion A for its role in the operation of the Overland Trail. This revision adds the Pine Grove Cemetery to the boundary and extends the site’s period of significance to 1904. Additional information supports eligibility under Criterion D for its statewide significance in Historic Archaeology. Archaeological investigations at the site in 2017 and 2019 have demonstrated there is potential to answer important research questions pertaining to historically-documented attacks on the station, subsistence, and mortuary practices.

Pine Grove Station (48CR11377) is located in southeastern Carbon County, WY. Pine Grove Station is composed of two sites: the Pine Grove Stage Station (48CR430) and Pine Grove Cemetery (48CR9315). Both sites are related to the operation of the Overland Trail through Carbon County from 1862 – 1869 and as a hub of rural community activity after the stage station era until 1904. The Pine Grove Cemetery overlooks Pine Grove Stage Station to the south. The cemetery contains three definitive and one possible grave(s) marked with small groupings of stones and the remnants of wooden crosses. Historical anecdotes suggest there could be somewhere between five and eight graves on the hill, indicating unmarked graves are potentially present. In 1869, the completion of the transcontinental railroad spelled the quick decline for overland route operations. Despite the abandonment of the Overland Stage Line itself, the rich forage, ample fuel, and fresh water present at Pine Grove continued to draw early settlers and travelers to the site until around 1904, reaching a maximum population of 57 individuals living in the local area. These individuals and subsequent use by early ranching families augmented the stage station era facilities at the site, adding buildings, foundations, and late 19th to early 20th century refuse to the site. By the 1930s, Pine Grove had been abandoned and the buildings fell into disrepair. Today the site is archaeological in nature and exhibits five features interpreted as the remnants of structures and a large number of artifacts. Archaeological investigations at the site have identified two features with cultural materials linking them to the operation of the stage station and three features dating only to later use by early settlers.

The significance of the Platte River Crossing Site rests primarily with its being the location where the Overland Trail reached and passed over the North Platte River, a major watercourse along the Trail. The fording of the river at this point was facilitated by the existence of a large island in the middle of the stream which created two channels of lesser water flow. These river channels possessed firm and rocky bottoms, an essential feature for the passage of heavily laden wagons and stages. Because the site offered an abundance of wood, water and forage, it also became a favored camping spot.

The first whites known to have passed through the area were the members of the William Ashley fur trade expedition in 1825. Next came John C. Fremont on his second Western exploration in 1843, guided by Kit Carson. In 1849 a group of Cherokee Indians passed through the region on their way to California. For years afterwards the trail was known as the ''Cherokee Trail.'' Perhaps the most significant of the early day explorations was the Stansbury Expedition which camped at the Platte River Crossing in the fall of 1850 while enroute east from Fort Bridger.

Emigrants used the Overland Trail for years prior to the establishment of the Overland Stage Line. The desirable qualities of the Platte River Crossing made it a logical location for one of the Overland Stage Stations. The Crossing was approximately 30 miles west of Fort Halleck, a distance of about two days travel by wagon. Fourteen miles further west was Sage Creek Station, the scene of frequent Indian raids. This was considered one of the most dangerous sections of the Trail, but there is little indications that the Platte Crossing itself was ever subject to serious Indian depredations. Although mention is often made of the Crossing in diaries, journals and other writings, there is very little specific information concerning the physical aspects of the site.

The Platte River Crossing was generally good, but like other mountain rivers, it could be treacherous during periods of high water. With this in mind, Ed Bennett and Frank Earnest established a ferry which utilized cables made of buffalo hides anchored to huge piles of stone on either bank. The ferry operated some time after stages ceased to roll, and, until recent times, the stone piles used for anchors were still visible.

The operation of the ferry resulted in the Crossing being referred to by some as Bennett's Ferry.

Also known as the Sheep Hill/Capital Hill Historic District, the Rawlins Residential Historic District is adjacent to the north and east sides of the traditional commercial district of the town. The City of Rawlins is located along the first transcontinental railroad route, so that its original focus was the rail yards and depot. The city generally grew northward, and the commercial district lies to the north and west of the brick railroad depot. The residential district represents the natural expansion of early residential needs. Residences within the district share tree-lined streets, uniformity of setbacks, and continuity of vegetation. The district is characterized by both large homes and small simply detailed houses set regularly along streets. Houses date primarily from the late 1880s to the 1930s. The character of the neighborhood was well established by 1915, with a majority of the houses constructed in the first two decades of the twentieth century.

The Historic District contains the homes of many of the city's more affluent and influential residents of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Housing designs within the district reflect influences and simplified adaptations from a variety of design styles.

Through design elements taken from Stick, Italianate, Classic, Queen Anne, Greek and Shingle styles, many homes in the district demonstrate the Victorian talent for borrowing and combining to create a vital expression of the eclectic spirit. Residences are mostly one or one and one-half story wood frame with novelty siding and/or shingled exteriors, interspersed with a few brick homes with similar designs. Only one home is constructed of locally quarried stone. However, a large number of homes retain handcrafted stone retaining walls with ornamental caps and endposts that help unify the neighborhood.

The Rock Creek Crossing and Stage Station was in the 1860s one of many stopping points or waystations along the Overland Trail, a central trail among many Western transcontinental transportation routes. As a stage station known as a home station, Rock Creek became a commercial as well as ''entertainment'' center for immigrants. Joe Bush, owner of the stage station, constructed a bridge at the crossing and lived in a log cabin at the site. To serve the many needs of the travelers, Bush operated a dancehall-saloon, general store, and blacksmith shop from one building. Although travel along the trail declined after the transcontinental railroad was completed, Rock Creek continued to thrive as a supply and social center for growing agricultural and timber interests in the surrounding area. In 1882 a post office known as Rock Dale was constructed at the site and was used as a bunkhouse in later years. The dancehall-store blacksmith shop also served as a school during the 1890s. The owners at Rock Creek station turned to stock raising for economic purposes during the later part of the nineteenth century. Although Rock Creek still served as a commercial and social center, the economic base of the small settlement began to change. Corrals, a barn, milkhouse, and icehouse were built during the 1880s and 1890s. During the early twentieth century, Rock Creek was renamed Arlington but it continued in its dual commercial-agricultural role. Rock Creek's historical significance relates to its evolution from a home station along the Overland Trail to a permanent ranching community. As one of the earliest settlements in Carbon County, Rock Creek contributed in a commercial and social sense to the development of south central Wyoming.

Founded in 1874, the Ryan Ranch is one of the oldest ranches in the Upper North Platte River Valley. Barton T. Ryan, founder of the ranch and a man of many talents, played a significant role in the historical development of this picturesque valley in south-central Wyoming. The structures at the Ryan Ranch headquarters, in size and design, are of a genre typical of many western ranches dating from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The ranch is significant as a pioneer ranch in an area of southern Wyoming that is still primarily pastoral in character.

Sage Creek Station was in the 1860s one of thirty-one stopping points or waystations in Wyoming along the Overland Trail, the major western transportation route in the United States between the years 1862-1869. Sage Creek Station was much like the two stations just west of it built by Robert Foote of Fort Halleck at a cost of about $750 apiece. It is purported to have been built of logs and had an adobe fireplace and a pole and dirt roof. Indications of a foundation of the building is all that remains of the station. Twenty or thirty yards east of the station and on the north bank of Sage Creek was a well, today only a shallow depression in the ground. Some ashes may be found at the station site, indicating that the station was burned at least once. Records show that it was burned on June 8, 1865. It is probable, however, that some sort of station was built again at the site before the abandonment of the Overland Trail as a mail route.

The Saratoga Masonic Hall is a two-story red brick flat-roofed building constructed in 1892. It is representative of late nineteenth century period of construction in Saratoga, when businessmen replaced the log and frame establishments of Saratoga's central business district with investments of brick and stone. On February 9, 1893, one year following the institution of the lodge, the Saratoga Masons moved into their new hall. The lodge used the building's top floor for their meetings, while initially the main floor was leased as a store and later as a school. The building is significant because of its association with the Saratoga Masons, and because of its membership which has included leaders in both community and statewide affairs.