Hogg Rock is named after Colenel T. Egenton Hogg. He has aspirations to build a transcontinental Railroad from Yaquina Bay, over Santiam Pass and on towards Chicago. The railroad was first called the Corvallis and Yaquina Railroad, but was later called the Oregon Pacific. Col.Hogg has successfully built a railroad from Yaquina City, east of Newport, thru Toledo, Philomath, Corvallis, Albany, Mill City, Detroit and ending by Idanha.
The railroad ran into trouble when it steam boat that linked Yaquina City with San Francisco was wrecked. However, the railroad was promised a large land grant if it built a railroad over the Cascade Mountains. Hogg sent a crew of railroad worked to build a right-of-way over Santiam Pass along the side of what is know called Hogg Rock. The Right-of-way was isolated, not connected to any rail line on either side. But to secure the pass, they shipped up a boxcar piece by piece, then had a horse pull the car on to the newly laid track. But that was all that would happen. Hogg could not make payroll, so all worked was stopped, and the large dreams of a transcontinental railroad was stopped.
Today there are remains of the old RoW about 150 Feet or so above Hwy-20 at this location. As you come up Hwy-20 eastbound you can see the ledge that was cut in the side of the hill. At the cache spot, if you walk about 100 feet on the safe side of the eastbound guard rail and look up you can see the RoW. Parts of Col Hogg's Railroad still exists.
The line from Toledo to Albany still exists, and part of the line from Albany to just west of Mill City is still there. The line past Mill City did help to build Detroit Dam, but that also spelled doom the the railroad east of the dams.
Enjoy the scenery...