Benge, Washington — Railroad Survey Went Through the House

Frank and Mary Benge had already built a ranch when railroad surveyors arrived.

The proposed route went directly through their house.

The railroad paid them to move, and the family built a larger stone home using rock excavated from a nearby rail cut.

A townsite followed in 1907.

The railroad was not the first major transportation project across the same ground; John Mullan's nineteenth-century military road had passed nearby decades earlier.

Wheat gave Benge a reason to persist after construction crews left.

Grain farms used the station to reach larger markets.

Benge never became large.

That almost improves the story.

Two transportation eras crossed the same patch of Adams County, and one politely paid to move the house.