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This being the last of the original Pony Express stations on Bolivar Roberts division, was most likely built by his crew in the spring of 1860. The Transcontinental Telegraph was rapidly being constructed in 1861. As fast as outer stations were established, the important news of the day was sent to them by wire and transferred to the Pony Express. This meant that, so far as telegraphic communications were concerned, the Pony Express was playing a constantly lessening role. The newspapers, in introductory lines which were significantly descriptive, told of the progress of the telegraph across the country. Thus the San Francisco Bulletin of August 13, 1861 said the Pony Express rider was leaving his dispatches for the Bulletin and other Pacific Coast newspapers at Dry Creek station.
Dry Creek was used by the Overland Stage & Mail Company as a way stop from 1861 to 1869. It was from Dry Creek west that the stage route and Pony Express route differed slightly. The Pony traveled almost directly westward from here to the north of Eagle butte and on to Simpson Park. The stage went south around Cape Horn and then west. An additional station on the Overland, Cape Horn Station, was built on this longer route, that was not needed by the Pony.
(Expedition Utah)
Sources generally agree on the identity and use of this station by the Pony Express during its entire existence. Men under Bolivar Roberts probably established Dry Creek in the spring of 1860, which possibly served as a home station as well. Dry Creek, like several other stations, experienced Indian troubles in May 1860. Indians killed Ralph Rosier, the stationkeeper, and badly wounded his partner, John Applegate, who soon thereafter committed suicide. Two other men escaped to the next station. On October 11, 1860, when Richard Burton visited Dry Creek, he noted the grave of Rosier (a.k.a. Loscier) and Applegate and identified the stationkeeper as Col. Totten. Hubert Howe Bancroft indicated that because of Indian troubles, every station as far east as Dry Creek and Simpson Park, were broken up during the Pyramid Lake War.
The Overland Mail Company stage line also stopped at Dry Creek from 1861-1869 but reportedly used a separate structure from the Pony Express station.