Carbon Canyon Historical Artifact #58: A Rare Photo Attributed to Carbon Canyon, ca. 1910s

This is a great and very rare cabinet card photograph that looks to be taken in the early part of the 20th century and is simply labeled "Carbon Cañon."  It is interesting that the Spanish form of "cañon" with the tilde over the first "n" is used, which almost seems like a Latino or at least someone well-versed in the language wrote the inscription.  Otherwise, there is no information about the scene, the people, or why the photo was taken.

It shows a large hay wagon parked on a dirt road with a gent at the top pulling a bale to the fourth layer with the previous ones laid in a cross-hatch pattern.  Three other workers stand or sit next to the wagon and one of the workers, holding his face in his right hand, sits on a sack of an unknown product, of which there are stacks, largely covered in canvas.

These sacks rest against a plain wood fence and in the distance to the left below some hills is a large structure, probably a barn.  Behind the wagon are harnessed horses unhitched, probably, from the vehicle and other horses are further in the distance.  In front of the wagon at the lower right are two buckets.  Note the number 37 placed under the wagon on the negative.

Click on the image to see it enlarged in a separate window.

Most intriguing, potentially, is on the right.  It appears that the road has been cut partially into the low hillsides and this cut is buttressed with horizontal boards kept in place by vertical posts.  Behind the worker at the right, who leans against a front corner of the wagon, are stacks of what might be wooden forms. 

Could this be Carbon Canyon Road in construction and maybe the ranch workers were loading hay and grains to take either to Chino or towards Orange County?  The road was built through from Chino to Brea in 1914-15, so the timing appears to be reasonable given that cabinet cards were common from the 1880s to the 1920s or so. 

Unfortunately, we're not likely to get any answers to these questions, but, if this is Carbon Canyon, it is a very unusual document of the area a century or more ago.