Ned Beale
Born in 1822 and named Edward Fitzgerald Beale, Ned Beale led an adventurous life which gained him fame throughout the nation. He is now all but forgotten. Beale was a personal friend of Ulysses S. Grant and Buffalo Bill Cody. He was both a general in the army and a Lieutenant in the US Navy, serving with distinction in the Mexican War in California, where he became friends with explorer Kit Carson. He left the Navy in 1851, after making six coast to coast trips carrying dispatches to Washington. He then settled down to be a property manager in California.
In the late 1850s he was appointed by President Buchanan to build a road from Fort Defiance, in New Mexico, to the Arizona-California border. Beale’s Road, which was built in part using camels, ran over 1,000 miles. Beale’s Road was so well planned and followed the shortest possible route that it was used as the basic layout for the famed Route 66 and later Interstate 40 for much of its distance. In Beale’s day it was widely used by wagons, even after the coming of the Transcontinental Railroad, a project to which Beale had previously contributed.
Beale had been selected to serve as the Superintendent of Indian Affairs in Nevada and California by President Fillmore in 1853, and on the way to his new post he was tasked with surveying Colorado and Utah for a route for the then proposed Transcontinental Railroad. Beale was appointed as a brigadier general in the California State Militia, allowing him to negotiate treaties between the Indians and the federal troops from a respected military rank, rather than as a civilian.
The Transcontinental Railroad was a treasured project for later President Lincoln, who appointed Beale as Surveyor General of California and Nevada, undoubtedly with plans for the railroad. Beale used Chinese workers to widen a pass used by a stagecoach line which operated between San Francisco and St. Louis. He succeeded in widening the cut at the same time he reduced the grade, easing the burden on mules and horses.
Beale’s work as a surveyor alone required extensive exploration of terrain from Colorado to California and south to Mexico. He led or accompanied many of the work parties dispatched on the missions which he set out to accomplish. After the United States Army gave up on its experiments with camels (they scared the horses) Beale purchased some and kept them on his Tejon Ranch.