We have included some of each type. All were true ghost towns once, and all had ghostly reminders still extant in 1960. But if you, as you visit them, should fail to leave everything as you find it, there will soon be nothing left for anyone to see. A sad and forlorn example of what can happen in only a short time is the formerly beautiful Lee House at Capitol City. When I first saw it in 1955, the house was still a true mansion, and its atmosphere eerily evoked the great and pretentious dreams of its builder. But in 1960 despoiling tourists had changed it to a horrid ruin.
So go forth in the true spirit of adventure to see and to enjoy, and may this little book add to your enjoyment!
A plan for touring the whole state and a large folded-in map of Colorado serve as introduction to the special towns and separate tours that follow. On the large map, the towns suggested for starting points are shown as black dots and are numbered to correspond with the numbers of the individual tours. The ghost towns appear as red dots. On the smaller maps the starting points are shown as squares, and the ghost towns as solid circles. Dan has drawn them all with the double purpose of being accurate and helpfully clear.
But however clear the plan and maps, real enjoyment in visiting these sites can only be had if the viewer has adequate knowledge of the people who built these towns and the times they lived in. Before setting out on the trips recommended here, some general knowledge of the state’s history is a must. To this end no quicker method exists than a reading of Colorful Colorado, a good companion volume.
The photographs, employed throughout the present booklet as illustrations, carry credit lines which should be plain to all except where initials have been used. DKP stands for Daniel K. Peterson; CHS, for Colorado Historical Society, and DPL, for the Western History Collection of the Denver Public Library.
My own part in the production of this work needs no explanation. My first visit to a ghost town was in 1904 when, as a toddler, I was carried on horseback by my father to Alice (then a thriving little spot). Alice was my father’s headquarters for building a reservoir system from five high mountain lakes that emptied into a sixth. These lakes (one, Lake Caroline) lie some four to six miles beyond Alice.
Since that distant day I have never ceased to travel to Colorado’s mountain towns, and I frequently describe myself as a “hillbilly.” No matter where I have been, it has always been the mountains of faraway lands that have had the greatest drawing power for me—the Jotunheim range of Norway, the Highlands of Scotland, the Alps in France and Switzerland, the Apennines in Italy and the Himalayas in India.
Yes, I can say along with Keats:
Much have I travelled in the realms of gold,
And many goodly state and kingdoms seen....