C&S Gondola No. 4319 represents the period of construction in the nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries when rail cars were entirely built of wood, before riveted steel replaced wood as a construction material. It is one of the very early examples of the railcars that were built in the railway’s Denver Car Shops, of which only three intact original examples are known to have survived, with No. 4319 being the oldest and the only gondola type. As an open-top freight car, No.4319 is particularly rare for having survived with a high percentage of its original material intact, as such cars are more prone to deterioration from the elements. The gondola would have hauled diverse products into and out of the mountains and valleys of central Colorado, thereby playing an important role in moving goods across the state until the C&S retired it from service in 1941. Today the gondola is housed within the original Colorado & Southern Roundhouse located in Como, Park County, where it operated in the first half of the twentieth century.