Ghost Towns, Dirt Roads, and Abandoned Mines

On Tuesday, my husband and I were in Idaho Springs for a late afternoon appointment and decided to take a ride on a route that I'd not been on in almost 30 years.  So you know what that means - pictures!

Not too far up the road, the first of the mines appears. The mountain in the middle is where we are going, and down the other side - all the way to the top.

Mine, over mine, over mine.

Rainstorm on the distant hills.

The old mine, and out of the picture is the new workings of the same mine.  I respect the privacy - some miners get upset about pictures.

This used to be a home and working mine - I don't know when they left the building, but it is clear it has been quite some time.

Quite some time.

The house and mine building are still rather intact, but the garage has seen better days...

The original mine tracks that com from inside the mine and out to the road or loading area.  The house and deck of the house were clearly  built over a part of the rail.

The rail continues inside the building.

Sleeping quarters at the top of the mine, usually used by someone on guard duty.

Looking down into the mine building.  I did not go past this doorway, cause sometimes, I'm a chicken.  The stairs seemed firm, but no telling what was on the next level.  Looking through this doorway, it became clear that several people have used it to dump all manner of things.  The mine entrance was not readily visible, but it was on a much lower level than I was on.

You can see the rail continue across the next level, and a section out the door to let the carts dump the tailings.

Perhaps someday we'll go look in there more closely, but a guy who drove past us twice, once in each direction, convinced us it was pretty much time to move on. 

The left side of the mine building.

The right side of the mine building - you can just see the dumping platform on the back.

Standing on the deck of the house, this is a mine across the valley.  I decided to see just how far my camera would zoom in.

Not too bad.

Actually, pretty darn good!

Russel Gulch - once a thriving town, even just 30 years ago, now, sadly, mainly a ghost town.  That is the old school in the distance.

Looking down the old business district.

One thriving business.

Others, not so much.

IOOF building is still in excellent condition.

The school and some mining equipment.

I do not remember what this building used to be - I'm going to have to look it up - it burned, apparently.  But not all of it.  Looks like someone is living in the far end.

Now, we actually drove through here twice.  The first round, we went to the next town over - a rather thriving community - and then drove back, since I was looking for the cemetery.  When I was younger, it was my favorite cemetery. However, we didn't find it this trip.  We did, however, find  some other interesting things. But first, more pictures of Russel Gulch, from a different direction than we first came in on.

Back side of the non thriving business.

One thing the town does have is a frisbee golf course - appropriately named.

The school from the upper road - it looks like someone is fixing it up, which makes me very happy.

Interesting property with several cabins on it.

First time I've seen indian paintbrush flowers in several years.

And then, up on the far hill,  we saw this.

Truly baffled,  tried the close up picture.

Looks like a grain barn, but that's not something we'd have up on the mountain.  Likely something to do with mining - and yet another thing to look up.

We found the road going up to it, but seeing as it was already around 7:30pm, we left it for another day.  Thank goodness for long summer days.

Never did find the cemetery - left that for another day as well.

And I'll continue our trip in the next blog post!

Post Card Series: Scenes of Evergreen

A bunch of the postcards are various scenes of Evergreen, the lake, and the dam.  This one is from pre highway 74, showing what is now considered the back way past the Church of the Transfiguration, and what is now named the Highland Haven hotel. As last time, some are hard to date, but we can get a general idea of the time periods based on things in the pictures.

This is probably the oldest one in the bunch.  This is the original road, pre Highway 74, that runs out in front  of the Church of the Transfiguration (That has been there since 1899) This road still exists, running around the point and coming out at the far end of Downtown Evergreen.  The buildings in the picture are still there.

If you look to the right hand side of the first post card, you can see the start of this rock that is in the left hand side of this picture.  That lodge is still there, and is now called the Highland Haven. There is, however, a nice cement bridge over the creek now, and this road opens onto Hwy 74 as it heads into town.  Based on the car in the picture, this postcard is from the 1920s-1930s.

Since we talked about the Church of the Transfiguration already - there it is, on the left hand side.  I'm guessing this postcard is 1940s, 1950s - the highway is paved, and the original road starts in the parking lot of the church there - that has not changed.  However, Meadow Drive running off to the right, is still a dirt road, and there is no sign of the old grocery store complex - it doesn't exist yet.  Not sure where the grocery store was? In the past, it's been a carpet store and is currently The Place at Evergreen.  Across from where the 7-11 used to be.

Here's Evergreen before the lake.  That makes this illustrated card predate 1927.

And look! The cabin is gone, and the lake is there.  This one was postmarked 1935.

And another illustrated one with the lake.  No date, but one thing I can tell you - if you are on this mountain looking down, the town looks almost exactly the same from the 1920s to today.  You want to see some really interesting pictures, when the road was very low and all the buildings were up on the hillsides?  Check with Hiwan Homestead - they have many.

Since we're talking lake, how about some 1930s fishing?

Or how about a picture of the dam?  This colorized postcard is from the 1930s- 1940s - I bet some car enthusiasts could actually give me a better year.  The punp house shown on the lower left lasted through the 1980s. Now, trails go through there, allowing you to walk around the lake without using the really old steep staircase above the pump house. (They still exist, BTW.)

Early illustration of the dam, pre trees being planted on the island/sandbar/grassy area shown here. The parking area does not look this nice anymore.

Back to the other side, with this illustration.  The house on the far side of the lake on this postcard and the one above? Still there as well.

So here is round two of the reunion based postcards of Evergreen.  Enjoy!

Postcard Series: Bear Creek Canyon

I thought this would be a good way to start with the postcards, especially given my 30th high school reunion.

Bear Creek Canyon was the main way into the Evergreen area; it is the canyon the very first settler of the area came up, and it became the main thoroughfare long before the state highway was put in on the other side.  It's still a very popular road, running from Morrison, through Idledale, Kittredge, and finally Evergreen, where the creek comes over the dam as part of the lake. (The creek continues on the other side, running up into Clear Creek county - I will be honest and say I actually do not know were it starts.)

This canyon was used by most of us on our weekend forays into the Denver area; I remember many probably all too speedy trips up the canyon to meet my friend's curfew while still in high school -in those days, yes, we could make it up the canyon in 11 minutes - and often did.  Later, in college, we would come home in the early morning hours on Sunday, after having spent most of the weekend in the Denver area, usually on no sleep.  My friend Chuck and Moody Blues were accompanied me most.

Today, I still drive it on occasion for a change of scenery. It's no longer close to where I live, but it is still beautiful.

So these cards are views of this popular and still used canyon.  The truly lovely thing is most of the views seen in these postcards still exist - the canyon is mainly unchanged.

Here they are, in order of date when I could decipher it.  I did NOT put them in order of from Morrison to Evergreen - I could, but not feeling retentive enough tonight!

late 1800s

postmarked `1910

postmarked 1951

postmarked 1956

Postcard Series: How It Begins

My mother loved Colorado history, and after she could no longer work at the small town newspapers like she'd done before, she still collected history books on Colorado, read as much as she could, and she also started this collection of postcards.

Obstensibly, the postcards were for my father.  But after she passed, we kept finding more and more of them in her things.  We are STILL finding postcards in my dad's house.

Dad and I decided to share the postcards, and what better venue than this blog? So, with some exceptions (which I'l explain in a moment) you, my lucky readers, will get a postcard a week from around Colorado.  I will try to give you a date on them when I can; some have been mailed and have a postmark, others you can tell by the picture type, the paper type, and so forth.

The first exception is this:  my 30th high school reunion is coming up in just a couple of weeks.  So in honor  of that, over the next two weeks, I will be doing postcard montages of the area our high school is in -Bear Creek Canyon, Troutdale Lodge, Evergreen, and Evergreen Lake Dam.

After that, we'll start the one at a time, from all over Colorado.

And who knows? Dad and I may add to this collection.

Enjoy!

P.S. Please do note that as I share these, I have watermarked them in a way so that they can be enjoyed, but still marked as ours. I usually don't mind sharing the pictures I take (I would just like to have the credit for taking them), but these DO belong to my dad, and he'd like to keep it that way.  If you truly enjoy the postcards, there are many sellers on EBay with reasonable prices.  Thanks for respecting me and my dad.