Celebrate at real spike site

The recent promotion of a May 10 golden spike-driving event at This Is the Place Heritage Park has left me discouraged and dismayed.

We have here in northern Utah the actual site of the driving of the golden spike, within easy driving distance at Promontory Summit, 30 miles west of Brigham City. You can see the meeting place of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific Railroads, complete with wood-burning locomotives and splendid historical re-enactors at the Golden Spike National Historic Site on May 10 and every Saturday during the summer. The "spike" must now compete with the "park" for revenue on its single biggest day of the year. Going "commercial" seems to have cost the management of the "park" a bit of integrity.

I, for one, would rather see the real iron horses, the "Jupiter" and the "119," on the spot of earth and sky where history was made, rather than the ersatz version the Heritage Park is offering up.

Tracy Mutter

Magna