February 21, 1999 (Cont'd) Depot From 1C which lies just beyond DDO's boundary. They aren't happy with photographs and written accounts of what was there, and they aren't sure it's just WWII stuff. Local railroad historians have said a section of the original Central Pacific transcontinental rail bed also runs across the property. Pavich said he has heard that it does, but no one has documented exactly where it is because the railroad gave the right of way to the military back in the 1940s. Still, historians contend that in 1870, one year after the Transcontinental Railroad opened. Congress set the junction of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads on a site that is now within the DDO property. It is from that junction for which Ogden received the nickname "Junction City," they say. "Morris said he was a member of an advisory board created more than a year ago to give neighboring residents a place to air their concerns over the redevelopment of DDO. Members of that board asked for information on historically significant sites inside DDO and were told there were none, he said. "Then here's the report, and nobody's been able to see it. We had no idea it existed," Morris said in a telephone interview from Wyoming, where he attends law school. "I was surprised that Ogden wasn't forthright about it. "Ogden's symbol is the golden spike, and yet we are plowing up the transcontinental railway into Ogden," he said. "I think there should be more emphasis on the historical and cultural aspect of that area than what the city of Ogden is giving." According to minutes from a July 29, 1997 meeting of the Restoration Advisory Board - the group that helped determine the direction of DDO's reuse - Pavich's group didn't want the place designated a historic district. The redevelopment authority "has indicated that they do not want the property if it is made a historical district," the meeting minutes say. "If the Depot is designated a historical district, this would impact on the reuse of the Depot." During WWII, 4,700 Italian and German prisoners of war were incarcerated at DDO. It was Utah's largest prison camp and the only one in the country in which German and Italian prisoners worked side-by-side, the report says. Many of the site's features, such as drainage culverts, are marked as having been constructed by these prisoners. The Sagebrush report includes two residences among the 103 historic buildings listed. One is a two-story, WWII dormitory. The other is the commander's house, which is a 1910 farmhouse remodeled specifically for the depot commander and his family. It is among the structures to be demolished, Morris said. The consultants said they found no archaeological or American Indian artifacts on the property. Rather than evaluating each building and historic component separately, the Sagebrush report recommends the entire DDO property be considered one historic district because of its design as a single installation and its insulation from the surrounding community. Even though some preservation plans have been made and are being executed, the overall historic designation should at least have been discussed publicly as a viable part of the redevelopment plans, said Duncan Torr Murray, Marriott-Slaterville city attorney. Having such a district where Ogden and Weber County history could be showcased would be a big draw for visitors and area schoolchildren, and businesses still could move into parts of it and profit too, he said. "There are all these things there, but Ogden just refuses to look at multiple uses," Murray said. "They're just going to bulldoze and trash all this stuff. You just can't replace that. Once it's bulldozed, it's gone." You can reach reporter Susan Snyder at 625-4233 or e-mail SSnyder@standard.net 209