Changes

Then came the disastrous decision by the [[United States]] government to promulgate a series of new laws and "directives" that effectively destroyed the boom that had begun in [[Colorado]] after the John Galt Line had opened. John Galt was on the scene, of course, and recruited several Colorado businessmen to join his strike, and to come to the valley where they could build new lives for themselves right away. The most spectacular defection was that of [[Ellis Wyatt]], who had devised a method for extracting [[oil]] from [[shale]]. Wyatt set fire to his entire shale field and left a sign on his property explaining his actions:{{cquote|I am leaving it as I found it. Take over. It's yours.}}

Then came the disastrous decision by the [[United States]] government to promulgate a series of new laws and "directives" that effectively destroyed the boom that had begun in [[Colorado]] after the John Galt Line had opened. John Galt was on the scene, of course, and recruited several Colorado businessmen to join his strike, and to come to the valley where they could build new lives for themselves right away. The most spectacular defection was that of [[Ellis Wyatt]], who had devised a method for extracting [[oil]] from [[shale]]. Wyatt set fire to his entire shale field and left a sign on his property explaining his actions:{{cquote|I am leaving it as I found it. Take over. It's yours.}}

With abundant start-up capital and natural resources ready for the taking, the community now known as Galt's Gulch began to thrive. More and more strikers built homes in the valley and went to work for the most recent defectors. In the last years of the strike, the valley gained an oil field, a foundry, an airstrip, and an [[automobile]] factory, all its own.

With abundant start-up capital and natural resources ready for the taking, the community now known as Galt's Gulch began to thrive. More and more strikers built homes in the valley and went to work for the most recent defectors. In the last years of the strike, the valley gained an oil field, a foundry, an airstrip, and an [[automobile]] factory, all its own. Toward the end of the strike, the valley became almost self-supporting; Mulligan maintained a channel to the outside to acquire the few goods that the valley residents could not produce for themselves. Whether the government could ever have compromised that channel would never be known, because the outside society collapsed before anyone in the government ever knew that Galt's Gulch existed.

== Naming ==

== Naming ==