Calaveras was served by three railroads: the Stockton and Copperopolis Railroad, the Sierra and San Joaquin, and the Sierra Railway.
The Stockton and Copperopolis Railroad, originally planned to access the copper mines in Copperopolis, was completed to Milton in July of 1871. The copper boom, which ended in 1867 with the cessation of hostilities after the Civil War, coupled with the expiration of federal funding allocated to encourage the building of railroads during the 1860s, sounded the death knell for completion of the line. From Milton, however, stage lines were quickly established with Copperopolis, Tuttletown, Sonora, Angels Camp, Murphys, and other points east.
Impetus for the construction of the San Joaquin and Sierra Nevada Railroad (later the Southern Pacific), was the growth of the timber industry in the higher elevations. Planned in 1880 to reach Calaveras Big Trees, financial difficulties set the new terminus at Valley Springs in 1885, turning the community into a supply and railroad town. As a land-grant railroad, the company was given alternate sections of land for ten miles on each side of the rail line and in lieu lands at even greater distances from the tracks. As a result, lands near the rail line were developed by farmers as part of a small land boom, and the towns of Burson, Wallace, and Valley Springs were created along its route.
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the railroads played an important role in maintaining the economic stability of the region. A steady flow of stage lines, ore shipments (gold and copper), and freight haulers kept the branches busy, if not profitable. In 1902, the Sierra Railway constructed a branch line from Jamestown, hoping to access the timber stands in the Big Trees, but the line stopped short in Angels Camp. The advent of the automobile in the 1920s soon brought about the demise of railroading in the county, except for the branch line to the Calaveras Cement Plant in San Andreas.