Building the Million-dollar Road

Highway 12's most dramatic stretch was blasted, not graded. Before it existed, Boulder and Escalante were linked only by canyon wagon trails and the summer-only Hell's Backbone road the CCC had cut in 1933. In 1935 Civilian Conservation Corps crews started the Lower Boulder Road, dynamiting through slickrock ledges down to the Escalante River and up Calf Creek Canyon — five years and many tons of explosive to earn its nickname, the Million Dollar Road. It opened June 21, 1940, the first all-season link, and became this run of Scenic Byway 12.

What the plaque says

Skill, Sweat, and Dynamite Before the Highway 12 route was built, traveling through this region was slow, hard work. As late as 1940, Boulder still received its mail by mule train for part of the year. The Civilian Conservation Corps had completed the Hell's Backbone Road between Escalante and Boulder in 1933, allowing vehicle traffic in summertime. But when winter snows closed that road, the only routes between the two towns were wagon trails through the canyons before you. In 1935, Civilian Conservation Corps crews began to build the Lower Boulder Road, now part of Highway 12. Nicknamed the "Million Dollar Road," the road took five years, backbreaking effort, ingenuity, and many tons of dynamite to complete. Crews blasted through sandstone ledges down to the Escalante River and up Calf Creek Canyon. On June 21, 1940, jubilant community members celebrated completion of the first all-season automobile road between the two communities. What was the CCC? During the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt created the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), to provide work to young, unmarried men. Recruits fought forest fires, planted trees, and built roads, trails, dams, and recreation facilities on public lands. Between 1933 and 1942, roughly three million men received work and training through the CCC. Cream Cellar Route Used between 1924 and 1940, the Cream Cellar Route began near here and traversed the slickrock canyons to Boulder. Three times a week, Boulder farmers shipped as many as 50 five-gallon pails of cream by postal service mule train, bound for a Bryce Valley creamery. The Boulder mail carrier stored the cream in a dugout cellar near here, to be picked up by the Escalante mail carrier. In summer, pails of cream occasionally fermented en route, blasting off their lids and coating the mail bags with sour cream.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Lower Calf Creek Falls — 3.6 mi
  A 126-foot waterfall hidden in a desert canyon
• Upper Calf Creek Falls — 5.6 mi
  A remote 88-foot cascade reached by a rugged trail
• Kiva Koffeehouse — 6.5 mi
  A hand-built cliffside coffee shop with canyon views
• The Hogback — 7.6 mi
  A knife-edge ridge with 1000-foot drops on both sides

More markers nearby

• The Longest Shortcut — 4.5 mi
• Old Boulder Mail Trail — 7.1 mi
• Old White Church — 8.2 mi
• L.D.S. Tithing Office — 8.2 mi