Since the mid-1900s, southwestern Wyoming has been a thoroughfare for travelers--along the emigrant and overland trails of the 1840s and 1850s and the Transcontinental Railroad of the 1860s, then the Lincoln Highway in the 1910s and 1920s, and today's busy Interstate 80. Born when the tracks of the Union Pacific reached this corner of Wyoming Territory in 1868, Evanston has a rich history of railroading, ranching, and mineral extraction. Over the past 150 years, the community has been home to European coal miners and Chinese laborers, railroad workers and oil-field roughnecks, cattle and sheep ranchers, business owners and entrepreneurs, and families whose roots are five generations deep. Its residents have developed a lively social life and a strong sense of identity grounded in Evanston's historic downtown and the surrounding landscape of the Bear River and the Uinta Mountains. In the 21st century, Evanston has become a regional model for historic preservation, ensuring that its past will survive into the future.
