He remained the controlling mind in the institution until his death, being elected to the presidency in 1880. He instituted policies and methods which led to the growth and success of the bank for years to come. The construction of the Denver Pacific Railway linking Cheyenne and Denver was widely credited at the time for reviving the city of Denver, which had been founded less than a decade before during the Colorado Gold Rush. The decision to build the transcontinental railroad to the north had left the Denver area stranded from the major transportation routes. As a result, Thomas Durant, vice president of the Union Pacific, pronounced Denver "too dead to bury." Colorado Territorial Governor John Evans declared that "Colorado without railroads is comparatively worthless." As a result, Evans, together with other local business leaders, including David Moffat, William Byers (founder of the "Rocky Mountain News"), Bela M. Hughes and others partnered with East Coast investors to form a railroad company that would link Denver and the Colorado Territory with the national rail network. The company was incorporated on November 19, 1867 as the "Denver Pacific Railway and Telegraph Company". The company broke ground on its Cheyenne line on May 18, 1868, at a spot near where the Denver Coliseum now stands. The line took approximately two years to complete. It followed the South Platte River through present-day Greeley. The Denver, South Park and Pacific Railroad got its start in 1872 when a group of Denver businessmen headed by Colorado Governor John Evans, David Moffat, other local business leaders to form a railroad company that would link Denver and South Park and the mining country. It was a historic narrow gauge railway that operated in Colorado in the western United States in the late 19th century. The railroad opened up the first rail routes to a large section of the central Colorado mining district in the decades of the mineral boom. The railroad took its name from the fact that its main line from Denver ascended the Platte Canyon and traversed South Park. The company operated as an independent railroad from its founding in 1872 until it was sold in foreclosure proceedings in 1889. Its lines later became part of the Colorado and Southern Railway. The Denver and New Orleans Railroad, later to be known as the Denver, Texas & Gulf Railroad and would become part of the Colorado and Southern Railway, was started by Colorado Governor John Evans, David Moffat and other associates in 1881 to give Denver an outlet to the Gulf. They built from Denver to Pueblo, when the work was taken over by General Dodge and others and completed to Fort Worth.