Colorado Things of the Past ... Dolores, Mancos

Thing of the past ...
Mancos Jim
Date [1890-1900?]
Head and shoulders portrait of Native American (Paiute) man, Mancos Jim. He wears his hair in braids, a cotton print shirt, and a jacket with a safety pin in the lapel. Title and "was a bad Paiute Indian. Killed many a cowboy and prospector in the early settlement of the country." hand-written on front of mat board. Vintage photographic print. Western History and Genealogy Dept., Denver Public Library.

Thing of the past ...
Stagecoaches at Dolores
Creator Jackson, William Henry, 1843-1942
Date :1892
Men sit or stand on, in and near stagecoaches on the main street in Dolores (Montezuma County), Colorado. A miner on horseback packs a rifle, gold pan and shovel. Men stand in front of false front buildings with ornate cornices, and a sign that reads: "J.J. Harris & Co." Western History and Genealogy Dept., Denver Public Library.

Thing of the past ...
Dolores, Colorado
Creator Mollette, Rex.
Date [1920-1930]
A girl holding a doll walks along a muddy street in Dolores, Colorado, in Montezuma County. Patches of snow melt on the street, on the sidewalks, and on top of the one-story commercial storefronts along the street. Western History and Genealogy Dept., Denver Public Library.

Thing of the past ...
Christmas party for the kids at Pleasant's House. Bob and Judy Harp, Wayne Carrigan, and a bunch of rug rats, but no rug. My heroes have always been cowboys, Rob Carrigan, (they still are it seems,) Dan Pleasant, Elaine Carrigan (Andersen,) with my Dad is trying to fix something that is not quite working), Tim Pleasant, Andy Pleasant, Robbie Harp on Judy's lap. Not sure who the fellow in background with glasses is, but he's presenting some good arguments. Might be Tommie Thompson?

Thing of the past ...
Ritter Ranch, Main House, Old Dolores Highway, Dolores, Montezuma County, CO
Contributor Names;

Historic American Buildings Survey, creator
Ritter, Frank
Ritter, William & Edith
May, William
Lowe, Jet, photographer
White, John P, historian
Dishman, Linda, historian
Gerhold, Maureen L, historian
Mausolf, Lisa B, historian
Wiesenthal, Steven M, delineator
Insinga, David J, delineator
Brown, Dabra J, delineator
Created / Published
Documentation compiled after 1933
- Significance: The Ritter Ranch is historically significant as the most technologically progressive ranch within the Lower Dolores Valley. The extensive outbuildings and their mechanical devices, including manure tracks for the barn and chicken house, prompted local residents to call this operation a "model farm." The Ritters owned the ranch from 1908 until 1947, raising registered Hereford cattle, Suffolk and Hampshire sheep, and up to 250 chickens.
- Unprocessed Field note material exists for this structure: FN-13
- Survey number: HABS CO-38
- Building/structure dates: after 1930 Initial Construction
Source Collection: Historic American Buildings Survey (Library of Congress)
Repository:Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA

Train wreck: What is worst thing that can happen?

When things go wrong, they go horribly wrong

“And there is the headlight, shining far down the track, glinting off the steel rails that, like all parallel lines, will meet in infinity, which is after all, where this train is going.” __ Bruce Catton

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

It is a characteristic of speech to call almost the worst thing that can happen “a train wreck.” Maybe that is why, when I’m feeling pessimistic, I wonder about them.

Driving to work every day I look at the window. In the distance, I might see a train off to the left, and it offers a sort of comfort. In fact, one day last week, I saw three trains at once, each going about its business, or waiting on a siding while the other passed. There is something about a train traveling down the tracks in its own direction, on its own schedule, that provides its own sort of reassurance.

But when things go wrong, they go horribly wrong.

A few miles from where I lived, in a long-ago time, the worst thing that can happen, did.

“A frightful collision occurred on the Denver and Rio Grande one and one-half miles below Palmer Lake yesterday afternoon about two o’clock, between two extra engines, in which Engineer Hart and Fireman C.F. Fogle lost their lives. The accident was said to have been caused by the carelessness of the two men named and their lives paid the penalty,” according to the Thursday, August 21, 1890, Rocky Mountain News.

“Engine 581, with a pile driver and a caboose attached, left Husted, nine miles below Palmer Lake, about 1:30 o’clock with orders to run through Palmer Lake. At the same time, Engine 258, in charge of Engineer Hart and Fireman Fogle, was given orders to run extra from Palmer Lake to Husted and protect against Engine 581. By the word protect it was meant that they should watch out for the northbound engine and in case where could not see ahead, the fireman was to go ahead with a flag until a clear stretch of track was reached. The track between Palmer Lake and Monument is very tortuous and winding with frequent cuts and great caution has always been observed, especially work engines and trains running as those were yesterday. Engineer Hart, and his fireman, it is presumed, believed that they could reach Monument in time to meet Engine 581, or that they would meet it on the clear track just north of that point. In this supposition they were mistaken and as a result the collision occurred.”

According to reports, the engineer and fireman from the northbound train were able to leap to safety but Hart and Fogle, headed south, were caught in the cab and crushed to death, as well as being badly scalded.

“Poor Fogle was standing between the cab and the tender, just ready to jump for his life, but was caught and horribly crushed, his leg and arm being broken.” He died before his wife could be summoned from Husted by telegraph.

The report noted “Hart, the dead engineer, has been on the road for some time and was a very efficient man. His first and last mistake occurred yesterday.”

But unfortunately, that was not the last mistake made in that area.

Just five years later, in July of 1895, a Santa Fe freight train went through the bridge at Monument and killed four.

“An appalling wreck occurred on the Santa Fe road near Monument at 11 o’clock this morning,” according to the New York Times. “A freight train consisting twenty cars plunged through a bridge near that place, burying beneath the debris the train crew, a number of tramps and several bridge carpenters who were repairing the bridge. Wrecking crews were quickly dispatched from Denver and Pueblo a special train from Colorado Springs with physicians. These with the citizens of Monument, worked heroically rescuing the dead and injured. One hundred and fifty feet of trestle went down with the train. The scene under the bridge was described as most shocking, freight cars, bridge timbers, and railroad iron being a horrible wreck. The plunge was 50 feet to the rocks below.”

But amazingly sometimes, you could experience a big wreck with no fatal injuries, as happened in Mancos, Colo. in May of 1920.

“Twelve persons were injured, some seriously late yesterday when Train No. 5 on the Rio Grande Southern derailed at Mancos, Colo. … The train was en route from Vance Junction to Durango. All coaches turned over. The train was carrying the private car of Superintendent C.B. Carpenter. The wreck was due to a water-soaked roadbed, according to railroad officials,” reported the Albuquerque Journal then.

In December of 1897, near Castle Rock, Colo., 33 men were injured when a southbound freight engine slammed into a runaway chair car.

“The car was not part a passenger train, but contained about 50 of the men who have been employed in the vicinity laying rails on the Rio Grande. In its two-mile dash it had acquired great headway and when it collided with the engine of the southbound train, the engine forced itself halfway through the car and the seats. Only a few are seriously injured,” according to the Colorado Springs Weekly Gazette.

“The fireman and the engineer of the colliding engine escaped injury by jumping. The men on the runaway car did not try to set the brakes on their car, because they did not know it was running away. They thought their train was being drawn by their engine. Most of the injuries were flesh wounds and bruises.”

It was a train wreck, of course, but not as bad as some. On occasion, there is a glimmer of optimism, despite the worst thing that could possibly happen.

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• Waved to his wife and headed for a train wreck.

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What's your name, little town?

When you are a kid, you don't always think about where a names come from. As you grow older, you begin to wonder.

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

Art Modell was the longtime owner of the Cleveland Browns who later moved them to Baltimore where they became the Ravens. The Browns name resurfaced later in Cleveland. Modell, I think, had a healthy attitude about history, and names, and understatement.
"I have a great legacy, tarnished somewhat by the move."
Folks in Cleveland hated him for the moving the team, especially considering that he said on several occasions he would never do such a thing. As a result, he will forever be considered "persona non grata" in that town. So far, it has probably kept him out of the NFL Hall of Fame.
In news this week (February 2015), an Ohio man who urinated on the grave of Art Modell won’t be going to jail, after all.
According to Alison Knezevich of the Baltimore Sun, charges have been dropped against 62-year-old Paul Serbu, who videotaped himself appearing to empty a catheter from the bottom of his pants leg with a tube onto Modell’s grave. When you are a kid, you don't always think about where a names come from. As you grow older, you begin to wonder.
When I was growing up in southwestern Colorado, I might have heard once or twice that Egnar was really RANGE spelled backwards. I do remember they weren't that strong in basketball. The story is that they were named that way to avoid conflict with a post office somewhere that was already designated "Range." But of course, I didn't remember.
According to George R. Eicher's 1977 book, "Colorado Place Names," Montezuma County, which served as my old stomping grounds, was named when it was established in 1889 for the famous chief of the Aztecs whom Cortez conquered.
"The prehistoric dwellings in Montezuma County were thought to have been built by the Aztecs," then according to Eicher. And the county was carved out of a portion of La Plata County. Cortez, with its similar naming theme, is the county seat established about 1886, and was named by homesteader James W. Hanna, who sold the the site to the Montezuma Land & Development Company.
La Plata County, by contrast is Spanish for "silver." and it was carved out of portions of Conejos and Lake Counties. The Spaniards who arrived there in the 1700's and pulled a fair amount of said material out the mountains, labeled those mountains and the river La Plata and the county later reflected that legacy.
Other Spanish names pop up here and there in that country, but they are not always linked to the early Spanish visitors. Cahone, for example, is derivative of the Spanish word cajon and means 'little box.' Bert Ballenger, the first postmaster, allegedly came up with that one in reference to a nearby box canyon. And Arriola is said to have been named for an early Spanish military man, but the details of that have been difficult to trace.
Mancos, in Spanish means roughly "one-handed," "faulty" or "crippled" and we used to have a lot of fun with that back in high school when we played football against those yahoos. To add insult to injury, their mascot was the "bluejays."
Dove Creek, another local rival, apparently got its label from an early freighter in the area that noticed an uncommon amount of the wild birds in the area. They had enough awareness to choose a more robust mascot in the form of 'bulldogs,' but we often argued that was descriptive of their cheerleaders. They said the same, or worse, about us, I am sure.
Bayfield, of the other hand, was little larger town, and picked up its name from founder W.A. Bay. It was established in 1886, and it was originally called Los Pinos. Too bad that didn't survive. We could have had some fun with a name such as that. Instead, we were stuck wondering about the wolverines, that, as far as I know, have never been documented as being in Colorado.
Pagosa Springs, is Ute derived, and means "healing waters." How they came up with "pirates" for a mascot, beats the heck out of me.
Rico, of course, means "rich." In 1879, when Col. J.C. Haggerty discovered extremely rich silver ore there, they called the place Carbon City, Carbonville, Lead City, Dolores City and a few other cuss words. A meeting called to settle the issue resulted in William Weston's suggestion of the Spanish word for rich and the name stuck.
Other names, not of Spanish origin, cropped up here in there in that area. Lewis, for example, was named for the original owner, W.R. Lewis, who bought the property in 1909. And Lebanon, which was built in dense grove of cedar trees, as was the Biblical Lebanon, got its moniker from the Railway Building and Loan Co. of Pueblo when it was established in 1908. Stoner, named for the creek that dumps into Dolores River there, had much to do with the rocks up stream, but has been called that at least since 1888.
Which brings me to the town of Dolores, home of the bears. Originally down river about a mile and half, and called "Big Bend" for the river's turn to the north -- the town was relocated, and renamed, when the Rio Grande Southern Railroad arrived in 1890s.
Dolores seemed to be a natural choice for a river town. The town, the county upriver, and several other local landmarks owe their names to group of Franciscan Padres. In 1776, the same year of the founding of the United States, Father Silvestre Velez de Escalante, on his way from Santa Fe to Monterey, came upon the river close to where the town is now. He named the stream Rio de Nuestra Senora de las Dolores or "River of Our Lady of Sorrows." Poetic, I think.
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