Carlton attempted to revive the railroad's fortunes, but his stewardship of the road coincided with the entry of the United States into the First World War.

Especially noteworthy was the work of W. H. Jackson, particularly the photos circa 1890 showing the rise over five levels and the massive wood trestle leading to the final tier.

The railroad was difficult to operate at the best of times, and in winter it was often nearly impossible: the 1899 blizzard closed the line over Hagerman Pass for 77 days and cost the company more than $73,000 (approx $2 million in 2013).

Carleton bought the CM, he planned to remedy this situation by extending the railroad across Utah to Salt Lake City, but he was unable to do so, relying instead on his business connections to obtain cars consigned for shipment east at Grand Junction.

Ironically, the situation reversed itself abruptly after the government took control of the railroads, and the USRA decided to route all trans-Colorado traffic onto the Midland.

The railroad suddenly found itself handling a swelling volume of interchange traffic at Colorado Springs and Grand Junction.

The line had neither the motive power nor the physical facilities to deal with this sudden change, and yards and even on-line sidings rapidly filled with cars waiting movement to one of the terminals.

At the outbreak of the First World War, the road's chief mechanical officer proposed the immediate construction of a new class of engines to handle the surging traffic, but the state of the road's physical plant (which urgently needed both maintenance and upgrading) was such that he limited his proposal to a copy of the D&RGW's C-48 class locomotives, a design that was thirteen years old and approaching obsolescence.