Virtual cache in the
Arapahoe National Recreation Area on the shore of Monarch
Lake.
Monarch Lake, at an elevation of 8337 feet, is a scenic gem with
12,000+ foot peaks for a backdrop and a "picture
postcard" island in the middle.
Take a three-quarter mile hike over an easy to moderate trail to
the cache. The trail meanders around Monarch Lake for a total
distance of 4.5 miles. Parking waypoint below. A pass is required.
One-day, three-day, or weekly passes may be purchased at an obvious
kiosk. Federal land annual passes will also work.
A special thank you to
The Lost Grasshoppers for originally placing this
cache!
History:
Monarch was once a bustling town and the rail head of the Rocky
Mountain Railroad. Boulder businessmen T.S. Waltemeyer, Frank
Wolcott, and Charles A. Wolcott heard about traces of gold, silver,
and mostly copper at the junction of the Arapahoe Creek and the
South Fork of the Colorado River. In 1905 they established the
Monarch Consolidated Gold and Copper Mining and Smelting Company
and built their company on the assumption that a major belt of
minerals extended east through the Continental Divide. The Monarch
Company consisted of several subsidiary companies including lumber
companies. With 1740 acres of placer and lode claims, the main
objective of the company was to mine metal ores, but supplement it
with timber and build a railway to benefit the whole company.
The Monarch Company shipped heavy machinery by flatbed cars to
Granby on the new Moffat Road. They then put an ad in the paper
asking for bids to haul heavy machinery 16 miles from Granby to
Monarch. The machinery included "5 boilers (eight and a
quarter tons each), one engine (over eleven tons), one flywheel (6
tons), other machinery (from 1 to 5 tons), a carload of nails, and
several hundred pounds of miscellaneous supplies." The task
of hauling the heavy equipment was made especially difficult by
mud-holes and bridges not made for heavy loads. Denver hauling
companies refused to take on the job and one logging company from
Wyoming abandoned the challenge after the first wagonload stuck in
a mud-hole. Finally Dick McQueary agreed to move the machinery. To
accomplish the job, McQueary purchased several hundred feet of
hardwood planks in Denver, 3 inch thick, sixteen inches wide and
twelve feet long. Accompanying the heavy pieces up the mountain was
a "4 horse team hauling hardwood plank, a 4 horse team
pulling six inch pine poles, 10 feet long, and a four horse team
pulling two ton large nails". The crew built temporary
bridges across mud-holes by laying pine poles 3 feet apart with
hardwood planks laid across the poles. Two light loads were driven
across to test bridge followed by the heavy load pulled by 12 head
horses. Finally the planks and poles were pulled up to be used at
the next mud-hole. The heavy machinery was hauled in 2 weeks.
The town of Monarch included employee housing, business offices, a
post office, and an assembly hall. Grand County's first
hydro-electric generator was in Monarch. The waterworks system was
created by piping water from the falls at Mad Creek and had
pressure up to 300 lbs per inch. In 1907, the Monarch Box Factory
and the Rocky Mountain Railway, a standard-gauge 16 mile line from
Granby to Monarch, were constructed. The Monarch Company created
Monarch Lake by damming the valley, at the junction of Arapahoe
Creek and South fork of the Colorado River, for use with the saw
mill and the box factory. A 2800 foot long chute carried tree
trunks down the hillside to the lake where they hit the water and
could bounce up to 50 ft high. Then a stern-wheel steamer pushed
logs into a system of canals and flumes that led down to the saw
mill and box factory. The box factory only operated for 2 or 3
months before it was totally destroyed by fire. In the fall of
1907, the Monarch Company declared bankruptcy.
The railway continued to be used for a number of years. Ed
McDonald, a dude rancher, put a Cadillac touring car on flanged
iron wheels to carry mail, supplies, and guests to his ranch. The
center of town was preserved and developed by the Dierks as a
summer resort called Ka Rose, after Katherine Rose Dierks, the
owner's daughter. In 1912, the rail line was used for transporting
fisherman along the river by Ernest F. Behr, a former Colorado and
Southern engineman. Finally, in 1918, the rails were sold to a junk
dealer in Denver to satisfy the World War I need for scrap
metal.
Since 1947, the Monarch town site, mill site, and box factory have
been under the waters of Lake Granby. In 2002, a year of low water,
there were still a few signs of this town on the dried lake bed
(see waypoint below). Today, at Monarch Lake, you can still see
some of the original machinery as well the flume.
Information primarily taken from the
Grand County History website.
| Monarch about 1907 |
|
McDonald's Ranch dated 1909-1912 |
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|
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| KaRose dated 1920-1930 |
|
Monarch Lake |
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|
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Please take some time to reflect back
on the lives of these pioneers and the effort it took to make
Colorado such a great state!!
Email us either the (1) seven-character name and three-digit
number cast(upside down) on the lake-side base of the machinery or
(2) twelve-character name stamped into the side of a globe valve
casing about 10 feet off the ground on the northwest corner of the
machinery.
We'll verify and you can log the find.
Please do NOT put the answer (even encrypted) in the
log.
Back In Time
Series:
Back In Time is a series of caches placed near historic sites to
remind us to remember our
past. We can learn so much from studying the past.
This series will provide a history tour of Colorado.
Their days are gone but not
forgotten!!Additional Waypoints
PK6DE9 - GC6DE9 Parking
N 40° 06.677 W 105° 44.836
RF6DE9 - Monarch Town Site View Point
N 40° 07.900 W 105° 46.400
Approximate viewing point for Monarch Town Site when Lake Granby water is low.
Back In Time - Monarch
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