USA > Colorado > History of the State of Colorado, Volume III > Part 36
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56
Colorado Springs boasts in her militia, the oldest permanent organization in the State, and the second company formed in the National Guard. Her company is known as " A, troop," and was formed in July, 1876, by Captain T. H. Burnham. During the Ute war of 1887, this company assisted in driving the Indians out of the State. Troop A occupies an armory built for the company, and Captain Wm. Saxton has been in com- mand for the past six years.
The Social Union rooms, on Nevada, just north of Pike's Peak avenue, are sup- ported by the different church organizations as a free reading room and library. The Union receives over thirty papers weekly, and seven monthly magazines. In 1889 25,550 people visited these rooms, an average of seventy per diem.
Grace Episcopal Church reading room contains a library of 500 volumes, and news- papers and serials are supplied. In connection with the library is a parlor furnished with piano, games, etc.
A Woman's Exchange was established in 1887. A well-selected circulating library has been established by Mrs. M. A. Garstin.
Clubs, Lodges, Militia, Etc .- The El Paso Club was formed October 23d, 1877. the objects of which were "to furnish billiard, card and reading rooms, for the purpose of social enjoyment among its members," the original membership of which was limited to thirty. Its original officers were Major William Wagner, president; Dr. Jacob Reed, vice-president; C. E. Wellesley, secretary and treasurer, and Messrs. E. P. Stephenson and Charles Clark, committeemen. Rooms were rented over the "Gazette " office. The club was reorganized September 30th, 1878, fifty-nine new members were admitted, and it was decided to accept a proposition made by Charles Walker to erect a club)- house, which was occupied from 1879 to 1882, when a larger building was especially erected by Mr. A. F. Carpenter, which, during the past eight years, El Paso Club has occupied, prospering beyond expectation. In September, 1890, the club bought the Kerr property (northwest corner of Tejon street and Platte avenue) for $25,000, upon which it proposes to remodel the present large brick edifice and make additions costing several thousand dollars. Its present officers are, president, S. E. Solly; vice president, George Rex Buckman; treasurer, C. H. White.
The Colorado Springs Club, similar in purpose, was founded in 1888, with A. D. Craigue as president, and occupies the main portion of the second floor in the Opera House Block. Dr. B. P. Anderson was elected president in 1890, and the club's mem- bership now includes some eighty names.
Other clubs are the University Club, and the Colorado Springs, organized in 1888, tennis and polo organizations. The Colorado Springs Athletic Club, organized in 1888,
365
HISTORY OF EL PASO COUNTY.
has nearly one hundred members, a large gymnasium, and directs semi-annual sports and games for which it offers prizes and medals. John Scott is its president.
Dairy Ranches .- At the north and at the south of the city are situated two dairy ranches, from which the city largely is supplied. That longer established is the Broad- moor Dairy and Live Stock Company, lying two and one-half miles south. This com- pany owns two thousand six hundred acres of land on the Fountain and has five hundred and twenty-five acres under cultivation, also possesses valuable water-rights. Large crops of alfalfa are harvested. Broadmoor owns a herd of three hundred cows and a large and complete equipment for cheese and butter making.
At the foot of Austin's Bluff, where was the " Merriam Ranch " in early days, has been established by Messrs. I .. R. Ehrich and Frank White, the Colorado Springs Garden Ranch, comprising three thousand acres of fertile land. The fine stock con- sists of Holsteins and Jerseys of purest breeds, and some two hundred fine graded cows. Their Lady Baker (Holstein-Friesian) has a record of thirty-four pounds six ounces of butter made in seven days, from five hundred and twenty-four pounds thirteen ounces of milk. In addition to its stock interests Garden Ranch will devote large tracts of land to cultivation of vegetables and small fruits.
Colorado Springs' Resorts .- Seven short miles south lies Cheyenne Mountain. This was named after the tribe of Indians, the Cheyennes (in the original form Chiennes.) The French title was early bestowed by some horrified spectators of their Baked Dog Festival. The mountain's name early found its way into print as Chiann, Shyann, Chiaun, etc., but the spelling at present accepted is Cheyenne. Over this mountain is built a toll road, and from it are to be obtained some of the most sublime views in El Paso. Helen Hunt Jackson has described these in that most charming of her Colorado sketches-"Our New Road." In Pine Hill Forest, on Cheyenne's northeastern slope she lies buried. The mountain is seamed by two canons, North and South Cheyenne. The latter cleaves the mountain to its base with a narrow ravine cut down thirteen hun- dred feet in the solid red rock, by the mighty hand of the centuries. The cañon is thickly wooded, and terminates in an amphitheater of rocks, down which leaps Chey- enne Creek in a succession of seven falls, from a height of seven hundred feet. North Cheyenne's rock walls are more widely severed; its stream is broader and more sunny, and the awe melts with which one has glanced up at the lofty buttresses of South Cheyenne. This cañon, too, has pillars, towers and pyramids, but they alternate with grassed slopes. It imprisons falls in its darker cloisters, broken and foaming as they dash over boulders and crags. Beyond, the Cheyenne widens out of the limits of an orthodox cañon, and falls in with its neighbor of Bear Creek.
On the southern slopes of Cheyenne is a pine clad, purple spur christened by Helen Hunt Jackson " My Garden." Here is to be found the " Procession of Colorado Flowers."
To the south of Cheyenne Mountain is situated " Dead Men's Canon," the scene of Fitz Mac's thrilling story of the phantom man, horse and dog of Dead Man's Cañon.
Mount Washington, a rounded knoll lying east of Colorado Springs, over which a horse may gallop with ease, is the same height above sea level as Mount Washington in . the White Mountains.
Colorado City .- The early records of this city were the history of El Paso County,
366
HISTORY OF EL PASO COUNTY.
up to the founding of Colorado Springs in 1870. On the 27th of October, 1871, when the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad was completed to Colorado Springs, the settlers of Colorado City feared that "old town " was doomed to experience a Rip Van Winkle- like lethargy, from which it did not awaken until the Colorado Midland Railroad entered the sleepy hollow in 1886. One factor which paralyzed competition with Colorado Springs, was the difficulty of obtaining clear titles to land in Colorado City. Otherwise, it is not unlikely the towns would have grown side by side in common prosperity.
There was a slight stir and bustle felt when Leadville's mines were opened from 1877 to 1880, for freighters en route through Ute Pass frequently purchased liquor and other supplies at Colorado City. But with the radiated depression of 1882, the old Territorial capital remained unmindful of the activity displayed by her younger and more fortunate neighbors, and was not thoroughly aroused until the iron horse brought in the new era of steam connection with civilization.
In 1872 the question of removal of the county seat to Colorado Springs agitated the community, and a remarkable address was circulated by Anthony Bott, C. J. Aerchinvole, postmaster, W. H. Robbins, W. H. Johnson, John Lauder, G. N Barlow, C. W. Meyer, and some dozen other residents of Colorado City, calling upon the voters of El Paso to stand by the old town "which has struggled hard against Indians, grasshoppers, drouth, hard times and adversities of all kinds for the last thirteen years," rather than to vote for Colorado Springs, "the recently started point of operation of a speculating railroad company, the lottery stake at which this company wants to enrich itself at the expense of poor humbugged emigrants." The circular goes on to advance Colorado City's claims, saying, "It is a place chosen by the pioneers of 1858, who, after prospecting both places, found the one an efficient spot to dwell in during life, and the other only fit to be buried in after this world's troubles are over," and again, "Colorado City is a free-lawed place, where one can engage in any business he chooses as long as it is an honorable one, even selling liquor," and "those who are of good temperate habits will have a better chance to prove their virtue by abstaining from drink, when it can be obtained openly, than by not taking any there, where it can only be obtained by telling a false- hood to a druggist." Colorado Springs replied with figures and satire and promise to build a courthouse, gaining a victory in 1873, the second year of the county vote on this question.
The Denver & Rio Grande Railroad built a branch line from Colorado Springs to Colorado City and on to Manitou in 1880, giving the village all benefits of the through lines.
In 1886 the Colorado Midland ran its cars through here, on the way up Ute Pass to the mountain mines. Inducements were offered this railroad, in the way of special privileges and land, which brought about the location of the Midland shops at Colorado City, and from this time the town, which had within the foregoing ten years fallen away to a village of one hundred and fifty souls and two stores, has sprung with renewed life into a busy little city of about two thousand, five hundred people. It is now the first city in El Paso County in manufacturing importance, and second in population. There being no public debt of importance, taxation here is low. Besides two railroads, it has electric street car communication with Colorado Springs and Manitou. Telephone wires run from here to Denver, and an electric light plant has brought its lines from
367
HISTORY OF EL PASO COUNTY.
Colorado Springs. Its location is happily at the outlet of Ute Pass-the highway to the mountains and their precious stores. In addition, Colorado City has abundant natural resources,-rich deposits of material suitable for the manufacture of glass, of white gypsum, of marl, and splendid and inexhaustible building stone of red and gray sandstone.
The Fountain Creek flows through the city; and its water supply is obtained by the mere tapping of the mains which were built by Colorado Springs to fetch its hydrant supply from the pure mountain stream above. An addition to the city in 1877, induced Mr. Anthony Bott to add to this supply, and waterworks costing $30,000, bring through iron pipes the melted snows of Sutherland Creek.
For years school was held in the old courthouse building, but the sudden growth of 1886 naturally made these quarters too small, and in 1888, Colorado City erected, at a cost of $17,000, one of the best schoolhouses in the county. It is heated by steam, well lighted and ventilated, and it now has an attendance of some two hundred pupils.
During 1889 its number of churches was increased from the one Methodist edifice to four, so that now the Roman Catholic, Episcopalians and Baptists, have houses of prayer.
Early in 1886 business lots could be bought here for $50, and residence lots for Sto, which properties, four years later, are worth from $1,000 to $3,500. It is most fortunate for Colorado City that her sister cities, Colorado Springs and Manitou, feel no jealousy because of her rapid growth as a manufacturing center. These resorts realize that local establishment of large manufactories would harm their reputations as health homes, and therefore encourage such enterprises there.
The Midland Railroad shops, built here in 1877, at a cost of over one hundred thousand dollars, employ one hundred and eighty-five hands, and the pay rolls amount to more than ten thousand dollars per month.
The quarrying of stone is the most important enterprise, perhaps, and is carried on near the city's limits. In Red Rock Cañon is a ledge of beautiful red sandstone which is popular not alone in Colorado, but as well East and South. The board of trade building of Fort Worth, Texas, and the Union depot at Des Moines, Iowa, are con- structed of this material. Four firms are now engaged in taking out this stone-blocks have been quarried weighing twenty-five tons. The pay rolls at the quarries exceed $6,000 per month during a portion of the year.
Glass works put up at a cost of $40,000, began the manufacture of bottles in the spring of 1889. This establishment produces over a million gross of bottles per annum, employs one hundred hands, and its pay roll exceeds seven thousand dollars per month. Adolph Busch of St. Louis, is president of the company, and the other stock- holders are men of local prominence-Louis R. Ehrich and J. A. Hayes, Jr. of Colorado Springs, General Charles Adams of Colorado City, W. F. Modes and Jerome B. Wheeler of Manitou.
A company was recently established, using native products, and manufactures a superior cement; and a mineral paint plant has been erected at a cost of $20,000, grinding, and mixing mineral paint ores which the Midland Road brings down the pass.
Manitou .- For how many years the Indians had resorted to the Springs which seemed to them the visible manifestation and beneficent gift of the Good Spirit, no
368
HISTORY OF EL PASO COUNTY.
historian will affirm. To these " medicine waters" they brought their aged and sick for cure, and the earliest explorers found their arrow heads in the rocky basins, and their votive offerings of wampum hung in the trees. Their council fires blazed in the close-crowding mountains, and in the cottonwood groves they camped with exceeding delight.
Zebulon Pike and Major. Long were not far from these natural wonders, but left no description of them. The first white man's camp of which mention is made, is that of Colonel A. G Boone, who sojourned at Manitou during the winter of 1833, for the health of his two sons. He had good right to a stake in the wilderness, being a grandson of Daniel Boone. During this time he was unmolested by Indians, but had ample opportunity to observe the reverential rites by which they approached the sacred waters. In 1843 Fremont came, drank of the springs, made an analysis and departed, leaving them to be known as Fremont's Soda Springs for many years thereafter. In 1847 George F. Ruxton, an Englishman, and member of the Royal Geographical Society, journeyed up alone from Mexico, and wrote the nrst graphic account of Manitou, published in " Life and Adventures in Mexico," some account of which ap- pears in our first volume.
Fitz Hugh Ludlow, fifteen years later, wrote a glowing and imaginative picture of Manitou, given in an earlier volume of this history. The residents of to-day felicitate themselves that Ludlow's prophecy has been more than realized. In 1871 the Fountain Colony purchased two-thirds of the "villa sites," on four hundred and eighty acres near the mineral springs, with the exception of one hundred acres reserved for the springs proper. In the general drawing of lots, these were included. The Soda Springs were originally pre-empted by N. G. Wyatt & Co., in the early history of Col- orado City. The new town was named "Villa La Font," an artificial title, which happily fell speedily into disuse.
General R. A. Cameron was vice-president and superintendent of the Fountain Colony. Born in Illinois, and successively physician, politician and soldier, he brought back from the war immense energy to be directed into the quieter channels of coloni- zation. He was largely interested in the Greeley Colony, and it was now his mission to lecture on "Colorado and Colonization" through the East. The fame of the springs and the climate spread afar; the latter being favorably contrasted with "Cuba and Florida," the health resorts of the day, instead of the present comparisons with the Engadine.
We have already spoken of the strenuous efforts made by the pioneers to open a road to the mining country through Ute Pass. Now there were three prospective cities to be benefited by such a highway, and in June, 1871, the commissioners were autho- rized, by the people's vote, to issue bonds for $15,000, to build the road. Judge E. T. Stone had fathered the project, and to his efforts were due the success of its preliminary organization.
E. T. Colton was the contractor for the road-building,-a much more formidable work than it at first promised to be, owing to the difficulty of removing the tremendous masses of syenite rock. Ute Pass road crippled Mr. Colton financially, but was an immeasurable benefit to the towns of El Paso.
In the meantime, Manitou Springs were being developed, and under the charge of
369
HISTORY OF EL PASO COUNTY.
Mr. Blair, a Scotch landscape gardener, the natural and picturesque features of the place were brought out, without an appearance of artificiality. Indian trails became "Lover's Lanes;" rustic bridges spanned the streams, rustic pagodas rose over the mineral basins, gnarled tree trunks became rural seats; and the clematis vines, whose unstinted wealth is one of Manitou's beauties, were trained to embower every nook.
In the winter of 1871-'72 the Maniton House was completed. Before this, how- ever, Manitou had entertained its first party of distinguished guests. In the autumn of 1871 the "press of the Territory " was tendered an excursion to "La Font." The party arrived in time for a midday dinner at Captain Dick Sopris' eating house, cele- brated under his management, and also under that of Mrs. McDowell, and were afterward driven through the Garden of the Gods to La Font, where they were accommodated for the night in "the temporary hotel." .
From the reports of the colony company we cull the following notices, which make up (officially) the early history of Manitou:
" 1877 .- Manitou has a population of 350. It can scarcely receive any additional aid from man, since nature has done so much for it. It can, and doubtless will become the watering place to which all who visit Colorado will gravitate, as a matter of course.
" 1878 .- Manitou had 5,651 hotel arrivals between May Ist and September Ist. Col- orado Springs and Manitou are to-day provided with an abundance of excellent water. The water is taken from Ruxton's Creek above Manitou. The Manitou Hotel has been repainted, repaired and leased for four years. The bathhouse has recently been leased for a term of five years, for a net rental of $400 the first year, and $500 for each suc- ceeding year.
" 1879 .- During the year the company has sold two lots at Manitou for $625. The three hotels have been well filled with guests during the summer months. One of these hotels has remained open throughout the winter. Plans are now being made by the owner for adding about one hundred rooms to one of the hotels, and it is hoped that arrangements may be perfected during the coming year to build the five miles of railroad needed to allow the cars of the Rio Grande Company to run directly into Manitou.
"1880 .- In July last, the Denver & Rio Grande Company completed a short line of railroad connecting Manitou with Colorado Springs, and five passenger trains are now run each way daily. The Colorado Springs company sold the Manitou hotel in June last for $30,000. Since this sale the purchaser has built a large addition thereto, nearly doubling the capacity of the house. The other hotels at Manitou have been enlarged and improved, and several stores, cottages and residences have been built. The total cost of new buildings erected and improvements on hotels at Maniton during 1880, is estimated at $100,000.
"1881 .-- The hotels at Manitou have enjoyed a very profitable season. They are now four in number. A handsome stone station house has been erected by the railway company. It is estimated that the cost of new buildings erected at Manitou in 1881, was $70,000. The Cave of the Winds has been supplied with ladders, and made acces- sible. The town plat of Manitou has been thoroughly re-surveyed.
" 1882 .-- Several new stores have been opened, a town hall built, and a weekly newspaper started. A company has been organized to utilize and improve the mineral springs, and to bottle and ship the soda water. Their plans include a new and larger
24 1II.
370
HISTORY OF EL PASO COUNTY.
bathhouse and a park, with pavilions and walks, surrounding the springs, which will be enlarged and developed. Capitalists from the East have purchased a large tract of land adjoining Manitou, and will enter largely into bottling the Iron Spring water for shipment to the East. On July 2d, 1882, a very destructive cloud burst occurred at Manitou, sweeping light buildings from their foundations, destroying vegetation, and killing the little son of C. L. Gillingham, who was swept away by the torrent in Wil- liam's Cañon.
" 1883 .- Manitou has enjoyed a season of unprecedented prosperity. One-third more people were accommodated at the hotels and boarding houses than ever before. Real estate has increased twenty-five to fifty per cent. in value. The Colorado Springs Company has leased to the Manitou Mineral Bath, Water and Park Company, all the mineral springs at Manitou and the park around them, for a rental of $500 per year, and a royalty of one cent for every quart of mineral water sold. This bath company has erected during the year a large bathhouse. It contains twenty bathrooms for mineral baths, and a large swimming bath. It was erected at a cost of $21,000. Ar- rangements have been made to bottle and ship the mineral water.
During the past year surveys were completed for a railroad from Manitou to the summit of Pike's Peak, etc.
The town authorities have completed a substantial irrigating ditch for the purpose of furnishing water to trees which will be planted along the streets and other public places.
In 1883 the National Land & Improvement Co., ceased to exist as a Pennsylvania corporation, in order to reorganize in Colorado. It had previously been subject to the laws of Pennsylvania. It had lived long enough to see Manitou in the heyday of its prosperity; the new enterprises well under way; even to that of bottling the water, concerning which, the first Fountain Colony circular had prophesied twelve years before as to the establishment of a "bottling business."
Manitou lies as in a cradled nest, in a cup-shaped glen which is properly the open- ing of Ute Pass, at an elevation of 6, 123 feet above sea level. The town is shut away from winds by a mountain wall, whose precipitous sides rise alniost from her streets. Pike's Peak trending westward, and just visible above the crowded summits, gleams like a silver hem to the blue mantle of the sky. To this tract of land Colonel Chiv- ington of Sand Creek notoriety laid claim, which was not sustained. Before the railway came, the town followed the course of the Fontaine in a straggling, irregular street.
The Manitou House, Manitou Mansions (or Beebee House) the Cliff, and the old Iron Springs Hotel (long since burned) were the principal hotels. A lumbering stage- coach plied between the town and Colorado Springs, and a horse from Manitou was thrown into convulsions of terror if he heard the shriek of his iron brother at the Colorado Springs depot. Deer and big horn were occasionally shot from the hotel piazzas, and bears wandered down into the cañons. A resident wears upon his watch chain a sharp and significant claw, a token of a victorious tussle with a bear found in his garden patch, bright and early one autumn morning.
In summer the life was that of a mimic and primitive Saratoga ; in the winter,- when a single hotel, or later, two, would decide "to remain open for the season,"-
George It Smucler
371
HISTORY OF EL PASO COUNTY.
the winter visitors donned mountain suits, and with the aid of stout alpen stocks, explored glens and hills, or lingered through sunny days on the rocks near the Springs. The amusements were horseback and burro riding, and the small gayeties which cluster about a hotel center.
Manitou's groups of soda springs lie along the banks of the Fontaine. It is well that a more picturesque nomenclature has replaced the old. The Indians called the Navajo by a name signifying the "Beast," but it was Prof. Hayden, who had at his command a vocabulary more than aboriginal, who named a spring the "Galen," or the "Doctor." The Indian tradition of these springs, dating back to "long, long ago," when the cottonwoods on the Big River were no higher than an arrow, is given at the close of Volume I. The visitor may determine by the aid of his own palate, which spring is sweet, and which is embittered by that primal crime. These springs belong to the general group of carbonated soda waters, their temperature varies from 43° to 56°.
The famous Iron Ute lies about a mile from the heart of Maniton in Englemann's Cañon; a short distance further in the pine grove, is the round basin of the Little Chief. We give in general terms the cases benefited by Manitou mineral water, as stated in a pamphlet written by Dr. S. E. Solly. The springs may be divided into three groups as follows:
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.