Elva Webb, saddened and confused, stood on her wooden porch April 19, 1983, and watched neighbors place her belongings on the back of a flatbed truck. An hour earlier, state emergency officials told the 75-year-old Thistle woman that rising waters were rapidly approaching and she'd have to evacuate her home immediately.
"I couldn't believe it," Webb said. "I didn't know what to do. It was an awful and helpless feeling."Webb lived in the once-thriving railroad town for more than 40 years. Mother Nature forced her to leave, forever.
"I knew then that I'd never live there again. I could see by what was happening that it just wouldn't be livable again," said Webb, now 85 and living in Spanish Fork.
Webb is just one of many who have much to remember as they travel along U.S. 89 to Sanpete County gazing at ruined rooftops plastered along Thistle's surrounding mountainsides. Once a major crossroads leading to southeastern Utah, the town is now nothing more than a few foundations and scattered landmarks covered with mud.
Even though Thistle is remembered most for the 1983 mudslide and 150-foot-deep lake that destroyed 22 homes and uprooted about 50 residents, the town has a history that goes back more than 100 years. It had lived and died long before rising water washed it away.
Located about 15 miles up Spanish Fork Canyon at the junction of U.S. 6 and U.S. 89, the area was first called "Camp Thistle" in the early 1870s by Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad and Utah Railway Co. workers constructing the first rail line from Denver and eastern Utah's coal country to Salt Lake City. The area was later called "Thistle Junction" when the Marysvale rail line to Sanpete and Sevier counties was constructed.
Helper engines were kept at Thistle to help trains make it up the steep grade at Soldiers Summit to the east. The area eventually developed into a major railroad maintenance stop, and workers settled in the area to be closer to their jobs.
By 1917, Thistle had more than 600 residents. It had three general stores, a pool hall, a saloon, a post office, a school and a barbershop. Residents held dances and parties in an abandoned tunnel that was drilled by early railroad workers in Billies Mountain to the north.
The town's demise began in the early 1950s when more-powerful diesel engines replaced steam engines and helper engines were no longer needed. During the next 10 years, workers were relocated, and the railroad companies began tearing down abandoned structures. Only retired railroad workers and a few farmers stayed behind, most because they couldn't make enough profit on their property to relocate to Utah Valley.
About 50 residents were living in Thistle on April 13, 1983, when railroad tracks and U.S. 6 just west of the town began to buckle as the earth, soaked by an unusually wet winter and warm spring, started to move. Railroad workers and state emergency officials worked feverishly to keep the highway and rail line open and Spanish Fork River flowing, but the ground rose at an alarming rate. What emergency officials originally expected to be about a two-day project turned into one of the biggest natural disasters in state history.
In less than a week, a 1,000-foot-wide, 240-foot-high, and mile-and-a-half-long mudslide pushed against Billies Mountain, destroying the rail line and highway, and blocking off the river. The natural dam formed a lake several miles long that submerged Thistle's remaining structures for more than a year.
Webb said many former Thistle residents now look at the flood as a blessing. Most living there at the time were in poor health who needed assistance and closer medical attention.
"Maybe the good Lord was saying `these people won't move to where they can get help so I'll give them a nudge,"' Webb said.
With U.S. 6 now going over Billies Mountain, the eastbound rail line going through Billies Mountain and the Marysvale line not operating, Thistle is no longer considered a crossroads, a junction or a town. The area is used only by farmers, ranchers and those fishing Thistle Creek - one of the state's top brown trout fisheries.
Only one man is still trying to keep his Thistle dream alive. In 1975, Shirrell Robinson Young purchased Thistle's original red brick schoolhouse and three acres from the railroad companies. He later purchased another 40 acres in the area.
He wants to develop his land into a private family resort, but Utah County officials rezoned the area in 1976. The new zoning does not allow such a development. Young, 77, spends much of his time these days fighting county planning officials with the hope of someday being allowed to develop his land.
"I'm trying to take $100,000 in lemons and make $1 million in lemonade," Young said.
Several Spanish Fork residents are not trying to revive Thistle, but they want its history remembered. The group is raising money to erect a landmark that will summarize the town's rise and fall. Donations can be made to the Spanish Fork Chamber of Commerce.