Telephone Canyon

The plaque's first conversation came late. In February 1878 instruments hooked to the telegraph wires had already carried talk between Laramie and Cheyenne, with Bill Nye, later editor of the Laramie Boomerang, and Francis E. Warren among those on the line. The canyon line itself was strung in 1882, and that October the Laramie paper reported it up but not yet working. Before it took the telephone's name the canyon had been Evans Pass, for the railroad engineer, and from the late 1910s the Lincoln Highway was routed down it.

What the plaque says

Telephone Canyon The first in the west through which a telephone line was run. The first conversation over this line was held in 1882 between Bill Nye at Laramie and Hon. F. E. Warren at Cheyenne Tablet erected by Jacques Laramie Chapter D. A. R. and S. A. R. of Wyoming 1930

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Vedauwoo — 6.3 mi
  Knobs of 1.4-billion-year-old granite between Laramie and Cheyenne, rough as sandpaper and famous among climbers for its wide cracks.

More markers nearby

• Abraham Lincoln — steps away
• Henry B. Joy Monument — steps away
• Lonetree on the Laramie Range — 8.5 mi
• Tree in the Rock — 8.5 mi