 The Sayre Narrow Gauge, the railroad's original name, was constructed in 1889 to move the virgin timber that was being harvested south of Reader, which is on the Nevada-Ouachita County border, for a sawmill at the St. Louis Iron Mountain & Southern Railroad located in Gurdon (Clark County).In 1910, the line was purchased by the McVay Lumber Company and, in 1913, was taken over by the Valley Lumber Company, which extended it to tracts of timber in lower Nevada County.A.