Divide (Junction US 24)—Cripple Creek—Victor—Florence (Junction US 50); 50.7 miles, State 67.

Graveled road; open all year, but subject to heavy snows. Limited accommodations.

State 67 crosses one of the world's most famous gold fields—the Cripple Creek district. This region, long pronounced worthless by mining experts, has produced $380,770,422 of yellow metal since 1891. The history of the field is a saga of tenderfoot luck and the confounding of experts, for this "$300,000,000 cow pasture" was proved by butchers, bakers, and candlestick-makers who did their prospecting with pitchforks.

In 1858 a Captain Norton, heading a party of explorers, picked up rock here that revealed the presence of gold, but no attempt was made to find the vein. During the Pikes Peak Rush of 1859, when every square mile of the territory was critically examined, prospectors found some "color" in the field but did not consider their finds worth investigating. Hayden H. Wood, of the U. S. Geological Survey, and A. H. Kidney, a mining engineer, discovered gold near the eastern slope of Mount Pisgah (see below) in 1874, but their reports were not taken seriously.

Mount Pisgah gave the field a bad name 10 years later. In April 1884 rumors of rich discoveries on this dark solitary cone west of the present town of Cripple Creek brought prospectors from Leadville and other camps nearby. Thousands explored the hill but found gold only in the prospect hole of those who had reported the discovery. "Salting" —the practice of planting gold on a claim in order to sell it—was suspected, and this seemed to be confirmed when one of the owners was caught with a bottle of chloride of gold in his possession. Threats of lynching followed, but as no one had been injured, the affair terminated with a picnic and general drunk, and the experts' adverse reports on the district were even more generally credited.

Gold was again reported in this area a year later by Theodore H. Lowe, another member of the Geological Survey, and an uncle of Robert Womack, the young cowhand destined to open one of the world's fabulous treasure vaults. While riding the range for Horace Bennett and Julius Myers, of Denver, young Womack dug so many holes that his employers reprimanded him because of danger to the cattle. In 1891 two Colorado Springs prospectors, L. M. De La Vergne and F. B. Frisbee, traversing Poverty Gulch (see below), found Womack working at the bottom of a 48-foot shaft, in which he had uncovered a promising vein. Womack named this claim the El Paso and took specimens of ore to Colorado Springs.

Ore from the El Paso, the first in the district, assayed almost $250 a ton, and the cowboy went on a roaring drunk, sold his claim for $500, and galloped through the streets of Colorado City, now West Colorado Springs, celebrating his luck. Subsequently, the El Paso was developed by the Gold King Mining Company and produced $5,000,000. Womack died impoverished in Colorado Springs, a ward of loyal friends.

Reports of Womack's discovery did not precipitate an immediate rush. Experienced miners refused to believe that any large body of ore would be found, and the Mount Pisgah hoax was still fresh in mind. In May 1891, however, Frisbee and De La Vergne interested Winfield Scott Stratton, a Colorado Springs carpenter and prospector, in the district. Stratton found traces of gold on Battle Mountain (see below), and on July 4th staked out the Washington and Independence mines; nine years later he sold out to an English syndicate for $11,000,000. Stratton had not pushed development of his claims, preferring to let the gold remain in the ground until needed. "The banks," he said, "will go bust."

Late in 1891 Bennett and Myers, advised by their ranch foreman that prospectors were beginning to overrun the country, platted an 80-acre townsite. The newcomers—the butchers, the bakers, and the candlestick-makers of legend—were generally regarded as a nuisance. Almost $200,000 was taken from the district that year, but skepticism remained so strong that it was difficult to obtain capital for development. Prospectors continued to swarm in, however, and new discoveries were made. In 1892 several thousand men were mining in the field, and gold production reached $600,000. Two years later the population had increased to 18,000, and by 1896 gold production had jumped to $8,750,000. During 1901, the peak year, as long ore trains rolled out day and night toward Colorado Springs, $24,986,990 in gold was taken from the field, which was surpassed only by the Witwatersrand in the Transvaal, South Africa. At this time the district had an estimated population of 50,000.

The region is named for the little stream that meanders southward from the plateau, but the origin of the name is uncertain. One story has it that the stream was named because so many cattle were lamed in the bogs along its course.

The topography of the country delayed mining discoveries here, for the Cripple Creek district has few outcrops and heavy volcanic debris on the rounded hillsides makes digging difficult. The gold-producing area, about six miles square, lies on a plateau ranging in altitude from 9,500 to 11,000 feet, through which great masses of volcanic rock were spewed up at intervals in ancient times. Gold is found in this eruptive material, usually in the form of free gold or telluride of gold.

A gold-mining district seldom enjoys an extended prosperity, but Cripple Creek has again confounded experts. Gold was mined in great quantities for almost two decades before the veins began to be depleted. After 1914 there was a long period of stagnation, but in the early 1930's the district took on new life, and in 1938 the population trebled when gold production rose to $5,109,055.

At the height of its glory the gold field had eleven camps—Cripple Creek, Victor, Goldfield, Independence, Anaconda, Gillett, Elkton, Altman, Lawrence, Arequa, and Mound City—all connected by a network of electric tramways. Two electric lines connected Cripple Creek and Victor, the major settlements; three railroads were built into the district during 1894-95—the Florence & Cripple Creek R. R., the Short Line, and the Midland Terminal. Business was so profitable that the Florence & Cripple Creek is said to have paid for itself within a year. At a time when other Colorado mining camps, particularly Leadville, Aspen, and Creede, were suffering from the crash of the silver markets in 1893, the millions in gold taken from approximately 5,000 shafts in and around Cripple Creek went far toward stabilizing economic conditions in the State and gave birth to a new dynasty of millionaires.

Throughout the boom years "high-grading"—the stealing of high-grade ores—flourished. Ore in excess of $2,000,000 was stolen in a decade, it has been estimated, the thefts ranging from what could be carried away in lunch pails to carload lots. Stolen ore was disposed of through a "fence," usually an assayer or a miner who owned a producing shaft. One notorious gang bribed the teamsters of a rich mine, unloaded the ore at a convenient spot, and replaced it with bags of low-grade stuff. So general did high-grading become that for a time mine owners provided rooms where workers were compelled to change their clothes and have their lunch pails examined before going off shift. Even so, several men were discovered trying to smuggle out small amounts of gold concealed in their beards.

Turbulence and bitterness marked the early labor history of the Cripple Creek area. Trouble first occurred in 1893, when some mines attempted to reduce the prevailing $3 wage scale for an eight-hour day. The Western Federation of Miners, with a membership of 800, went on strike from February 1 to June 10, during which time several men were killed and one mine was dynamited. After the National Guard had been ordered into the district, differences were arbitrated and the prevailing wage rate remained in force.

More serious trouble developed when employees of the Standard Mill at Colorado City (see Colorado Springs) struck in February 1903, in protest against the discharge of union men; a sympathetic strike was called by the Western Federation of Miners at Cripple Creek against "unfair" mines, or those that continued to ship ore to the struck mill at Colorado City. This dispute was settled on March 31, but Colorado City mill employees again went on strike on July 3 for a wage increase and reinstatement of union men who had walked out in the previous strike. Union miners in Cripple Creek laid down their tools in August, and by the next day 3,552 men were idle. Two months later 1,000 union men were employed in the "fair" mines, and 1,700 non-union men and strike breakers were at work in the others.

With neither side inclined to yield, friction soon developed. In September 1,000 militiamen established stations on every commanding hill. Union leaders were arrested; when a hearing was held for their release on writs of habeas corpus, the Cripple Creek courthouse was guarded by sharpshooters and a gatling gun. Accusations of terrorism and intimidation were made by both sides, and acts of violence multiplied. On November 21, when the superintendent and the shift boss of the Vindicator Mine were killed by an explosion in a shaft, W.F.M. members were again arrested, but none was convicted. Union miners, on their part, charged that these disturbances were a part of a plot to discredit their organization.

December found the entire district under martial law; while efforts were being made in Denver to arbitrate the strike, word came of a tragedy at the Independence Mine, where a cable hoist to the shaft-house parted and plunged 15 men to death.

Quiet reigned early in 1904, and troops were withdrawn. But the lull was deceptive. In June a mysterious explosion wrecked the railroad station at Independence (see below), killing many non-union miners. Mines were closed and business temporarily suspended; a committee of mine owners forced the Teller County sheriff to resign; furious rioting broke out in Victor, where two men were killed and many wounded; W.F.M. stores and offices of newspapers favorable to the union were ransacked and pillaged; troops were again brought in. A blacklist against union members was established by mine owners, and scores of union men were escorted out of the district, some as far as the Kansas and New Mexico Lines. Hundreds of others left of their own accord. The strike collapsed, and with it the W.F.M. as an effective organization in the Cripple Creek field.

With the exception of Cripple Creek and Victor, the towns that once dotted the district are deserted, identifiable only by a few scattered decaying buildings. Of the railroads, only the Midland Terminal remains.

In DIVIDE, 0 miles (9,183 alt., 153 pop.) (see Tour 5b), State 67 branches south from US 24 (see Tour 5b) and winds through hilly country with frequent views (L) of Pikes Peak and other summits of the Rampart Range, and (R) of the rough and jagged outline of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. South of MIDLAND, 5.5 miles (8,270 alt., 10 pop.),which has a privately-owned fish hatchery and fishing pool (50¢ a Ib. for fish caught), the route follows the crest of a small ridge, skirting the western edge of Pike National Forest and the Pikes Peak Game Refuge (see Tour 5). RHYOLITE MOUNTAIN (10,771 alt.), rising sharply (R) from a comparatively level terrain to an almost perfectly rounded summit, contains the northernmost gold deposits of the Cripple Creek district; a strike yielding $100,000 was made here in 1891.

At 13 miles is the junction with a dirt road.

Left on this road to GILLETT, 1.1 miles (9,938 alt., 10 pop.), now a handful of abandoned houses, once a busy town of several hundred with a large reduction mill and a race track. One of the few bull fights in the Spanish manner ever held in the United States was staged here by "Arizona" Charlie Wolf on August 24, 1895. Toreadors and bulls were imported from Mexico, a wooden arena was built, and excursion trains were run from Colorado Springs and Denver. One bull was killed before authorities interfered.

CRIPPLE CREEK, 16.2 miles (9,375 alt., 1,428 pop.), surrounded by barren hills dotted with gray mine dumps and overshadowed by the sharp regular cone of MOUNT PISGAH (10,400 alt.), looks old and worn beyond its years. Although a few new structures grace the business district, not a building was erected from 1914 to 1934, at which time a five-room house was built. The news flashed along press wires, for almost everything that has happened in Cripple Creek since its founding has been news. Many miners have modernized old shacks; and it is not uncommon for a house, unpainted for 25 years, to be equipped with an electric range, refrigerator, radio, and the newest furnishings.

Still a part of the modern scene are the former prospectors who failed in their quest for gold, and who no longer dream of achieving fortunes made by early millionaires. Today, too old to work in the mines or to roam the hills with "torture tools" as they term picks and shovels, they while away their time in the pool halls and cigar stores they frequented as youths. In outlying districts a few "dump rats" salvage ore from old dumps. Younger men, for the most part born here, usually possess special skills. Many earn a livelihood by leasing a section of a mine from a large corporation, which they work on a 50-50 basis, the company furnishing compressed air, blasting powder, and tools. Others work for wages. To the younger generation the work is merely a job; to their fathers it was an adventure holding a promise of wealth and independence.

The seat of Teller County since its creation in 1899 and its largest town, Cripple Creek once had a population of 20,000. The two decades following its incorporation in 1892 constituted a heady mixture of modern progress and the wildest of the Wild West. It was born when gold ore began to pour down from the hills and gold coins filled every pocket. Here were the ubiquitous saloons, dance halls, and bawdy houses, side by side with outfitters' tents selling everything from diamonds and silks to picks, shovels, bacon, flour, and tobacco.

Gambling increased as wealth piled up; high-graders operated singly and in gangs; beautiful or lucky "professional" women married millionaires. Everybody speculated heavily in mining shares; brokerage offices vied with saloons for choice sites along the principal streets, and their scouts combed the hills daily for news of fresh strikes. Early accommodations were limited; lines formed outside hotels and restaurants at meal hours; finding a house to buy or a room to rent was as difficult as finding an unstaked claim. Miners returning from work at night sometimes found their cabins appropriated or removed to another site. Yet it was Cripple Creek's romantic boast during this fevered period that houses were seldom locked and a woman could walk any street day and night unmolested—provided she kept her eyes straight ahead and kept moving.

As befell the majority of flimsy early mining camps, Cripple Creek had its fire. In 1906 an overturned stove in a Myers Avenue hotel lighted a conflagration that destroyed much of the town. A second fire two days later leveled what remained. The town was soon rebuilt with stone and brick structures. At the beginning of the century the camp had 41 assay offices, 91 lawyers, 46 brokerage houses, 88 doctors and dentists, 14 newspapers, 70 saloons, and one coroner—usually very busy.

Two brothers, A. E. and Leslie Carlton, who began a freighting; and transfer business, bought the First National Bank; with Spencer Penrose of Colorado Springs, whose fortune also came from these fields, they invested heavily in mining enterprises. Today, the Carlton interests control most of the production of the gold field.

Many names now celebrated in one way or another have been associated with Cripple Creek. Here Texas Guinan launched her career as an entertainer, and Lowell Thomas carved his initials on a schoolroom desk. Governor Ralph L. Carr of Colorado (1940) also attended school here and worked for a time on a newspaper. Jack Johnson, first Negro world heavyweight champion, was once a bouncer in a local saloon; William Harrison (Jack) Dempsey worked as a mucker in the mines and fought a long and bloody battle here for a $50 purse.

Few landmarks of the old camp remain. During its dormant period hundreds of buildings were torn down for their lumber, and scores of houses were removed to Manitou Springs and Colorado Springs. Some ramshackle buildings still stand along Myers Avenue, the early red-light district. When Julian Street, magazine writer, visited the town in 1914, he interviewed Madam Leo, known as "Leo the Lion," an inmate of the district, who told him she would give him a story "hot enough to burn the paper on which it is written." Street's article, which concerned itself much more with Myers Avenue than with the mines and the more respectable parts of the community, incensed the town fathers, who declared that the writer had been too frightened to venture more than a block from the depot and retaliated by wittily calling the notorious thoroughfare Julian Street.

JOHNNY NOLAN'S SALOON, 3rd and Bennett Sts., a two-story false front building, now a grocery store, was once the busiest gambling saloon in town.

The old WESTERN FEDERATION OF MINERS BUILDING, Bennett St. between Third and Fourth Sts., now boarded up, was miners' headquarters until the union was shattered in the strike of 1904.

Left from Bennett Avenue in Cripple Creek on a dirt road winding up Poverty Gulch to the GOLD KING MINE (visiting in surface structures by permission), 0.4 miles, where in 1891 Bob Womack made his gold strike.

South of Cripple Creek State 67 winds tortuously between rounded hills marked by mine dumps and decaying shaft houses.

At 18.7 miles is the junction with a dirt road.

Left on this road to ELKTON, 0.3 miles, a few houses grouped about the corrugated gray iron superstructure of the ELKTON MINE (visiting in surface structures by permission), discovered in 1895 by John W. Bernard, who, walking from Colorado Springs, spent his first night sleeping on the ground. Ignorant of prospecting, he staked out a claim around the first likely looking rock pile, naming the mine, which has yielded $13,000,000, for a pair of elk horns lying nearby.

East of Elkton the narrow rough dirt road ascends Eclipse Gulch to the CRESSON MINE (visiting in surface structures by permission), 1.1 miles, now one of the most profitable in the district. Originally it produced low-grade ore, but in 1915 a new 1,700-foot shaft opened a "vug," a pear-shaped hollow in a lode, known to geologists as a geode. The walls and ceilings were lined with tellurium with an extraordinarily high gold content, and the floor was carpeted with gold ore that was scooped up with a shovel. So rich was the discovery that a vault door was placed at the opening of the chamber. Shipped to Colorado Springs with armed guards riding the box cars, the ore yielded from $5,000 to $10,000 a ton; the richest of it assayed at more than $100,000 a ton, or $50 a pound.

South of the junction the road twists through desolate rock-marked country.

VICTOR, 19.7 miles (9,900 alt., 1,291 pop.), is a twin of Cripple Creek, but rivalry has always marked their relationship. Some thoroughfares in Victor are literally paved with gold, for in early days only high-grade ore was shipped; low-grade was used to surface the streets. In 1936 the town realized $5,000 from ore mined in the street in front of the post office. The Gold Coin, one of the richest surface mines in the district, was discovered while excavating for a hotel basement. The town was almost leveled by fire in 1899; $1,000,000 of property was destroyed, and 3,000 persons were rendered homeless.

1. Left from Victor 0.7 miles on a steep dirt road to the PORTLAND MINE (visiting in surface structures by permission), largest and richest of the mines operating in the district. Buildings and great dumps cover 180 acres on BATTLE MOUNTAIN. More than $65,000,000 in gold has been taken from the 3,000-foot shaft, deepest in the Cripple Creek district. In 1892, two young Irishmen, James Doyle, a carpenter, and James Burns, a plumber, found about one sixth of an acre of unclaimed land on Battle Mountain, staked out a claim, and began digging. Funds exhausted, they took in a third partner, John Harnan. Soon they struck ore so rich it "made their eyes bug out." Fearing that their claim might be jumped or claimed by neighboring mines, they worked in secret, taking out ore only at night, until they had accumulated $90,000; with this they successfully defended their holdings.

Below the Portland properties on Battle Mountain is the INDEPENDENCE MINE, staked by Winfield Scott Stratton on July 4, 1891, which has produced $30,000,000. The $1,000,000, commission paid Verner Z. Reed of Denver for negotiating the sale of the Independence and Washington mines to the Venture Corporation of London, England, founded another of Colorado's great fortunes.

2. Left from Victor 0.8 miles on another dirt road that skirts the south foot of Battle Mountain to an old brick schoolhouse and a dozen ramshackle frame dwellings, all that remain of GOLDFIELD, established in 1895 by the owners of the Portland Mine. Lying between Battle Mountain (L) and Big Bull Mountain, the community once had a population of 3,000, and with four schools was known as a "family town." Three fourths of the ore mined in the Cripple Creek district was shipped from the stations formerly maintained by three railroads here.

On the southeastern slope of BULL HILL (L), 2.5 miles, is the SITE OF INDEPENDENCE, another mining settlement and scene of a terrific explosion during labor troubles in 1904. Authorities believed that someone at a distance pulled a wire that fired a shot into more than 200 pounds of dynamite placed under a railroad station, killing thirteen miners waiting for a train.

All that remains of ALTMAN (10,610 alt.), 2.8 miles, are a few crumbling shacks. Prior to 1900 it had a population of 2,000, mostly miners. As the majority of elected officials were members of the W.F.M., the town became one of the headquarters of the strike of 1893 and 1903-04. So numerous were the shooting scrapes that an undertaker offered party rates if all killings were scheduled on Saturdays. Altman lies on the eastern flank of Bull Hill (10,814 alt), a commanding eminence fortified by striking miners in 1893; an attack by a large force of deputy sheriffs was thwarted by the intervention of the National Guard.

South of Victor the route winds through Phantom Canyon to FLORENCE, 50,7 miles (5,187 alt., 2,475 pop.) (see Tour 9b), at the junction with US 50 (see Tour 9b).