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Trails Across the Thompson Valleys Prepared
by members of the Loveland Historical Society
Nestled between the majestic Rocky Mountains and the rolling plains was and is the perfect path to travel north and south. Sheltered by the mountains with rivers along the way to stop at, the trails were the most convenient path to follow. Known by many names including Trappers Trail, Cherokee Trail and Overland Trail, and later the Lincoln Highway and Interstate 25, they carried Native Americans, mountain men, traders, animals, immigrants, gold seekers, and general travelers between The States, Santa Fe and Fort Laramie. The paths may have been within a few miles of each other, but they had the same purpose, and that was to expedite travel between New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming. Early on, the trail carried people on foot, then by horse, mule, wagon, and stage coach. As time passed, modern forms of transportation took over the trails, and they became roads and highways. Today, remnants of the old trails, camp grounds, stage stops, and settlements along the trails can still be seen.
BERTHOUD AND LITTLE THOMPSON VALLEY
Trail
corridor looking north from present-day Yellowstone Rd. and U.S. Highway
287 View of the Cherokee and Overland Trail Corridor The view from Yellowstone Road about 200 yards west of U.S. Highway 287 provides a vista of the corridor that contained the Cherokee and Overland trails as they coursed their ways north through the Little Thompson, Big Thompson and Cache la Poudre valleys. The landmark “Horsetooth Rock,” nearly 20 miles in the distance, marks the general vicinity of present-day Ft. Collins and the point where trails diverged to various destinations in Wyoming. The earliest account of travel on the Cherokee Trail through the Little Thompson Valley presently known to exist occurred in June 1850. Documented by Fletcher, Fletcher and Whiteley in Cherokee Trail Diaries, Vol. II, p. 295, the diary of James Mitchell (Edmonson party) reads: “14
[June] Fryday a Soon Start in hopes of a good days travel and in a
few miles was detained by another bad creek
we all got over again without loss
our crse north aggain
we were Scarce ever out of Sight of antilopes and 10
[“Several” cross through] of them were killed
our gides Brother in law a young Snake Indian got hurt badly by
his faling with [while?] in presuit of a wounde antilope
in the evening we had another daingerous bad creek to cross
the gide calls it Sadly because he found a Saddle on it long ago
we camped up in the edge of the mountain on a little creek runing
east, the water cold from the Snow.” [Little Thompson River near
Berthoud, Larimer Co., Colorado]
Mitchell’s diary entry seems to indicate that the Cherokee Trail hugged the foothills on its course through the Little Thompson Valley. Government survey maps show subsequent roads including the Overland Trail were located two to three miles east in more open terrain.
According to
the oral histories of Little Thompson Valley farmers who lived in the
vicinity of the Little Thompson Crossing, the trail crossed the river in
the area where two present-day trees bend toward each other to form an
arch. Little Thompson Crossing While trails crossed the Little Thompson Valley at several points within the three to four-mile trail corridor, it is generally accepted that a crossing, campground and stage station was located on the banks of the Little Thompson one-quarter mile west of present-day U.S. Highway 287. On September 2, 1886, the stage station at the Little Thompson crossing was the setting of an incident recalled by Frank Bartholf in the Fort Collins Courier: “After drinking Slade mounted the stage and ran the horses over to the Little Thompson station, when one of them laid down, played out. I was keeping the station for my brother-in-law, who had gone up into the hills to bring down his wife. As the stage drove up I went out to unhitch the horses. The driver made some remark to me and I answered him pretty short. Biff! Something struck me across the right eye. I turned quickly and looked straight into the barrels of two revolvers. I had never seen Slade before, but I knew right away that we were introduced. After I went into the stable he went over to where a couple of young fellows were camped and threatened to shoot one of their horses, and finally did shoot a dog laying under their wagon. Then he kicked their coffee pot over, put out their fire and went off. All this time two fellows with guns stood there and watched him. He afterwards wrote me a letter of apology, saying he thought I was the agent, and he did not allow any of his agents to cuss him.”
Located on a
bluff a short distance from the trail crossing on the Little Thompson
River, the unmarked grave commands a spectacular view of Mt. Meeker and
Longs Peak. Unknown Grave at the Little Thompson Crossing Located on private land in the vicinity of the Little Thompson crossing lies an unmarked grave that may be linked to travel on the trail during the 1850s and ‘60s. Local oral histories hold that the occupant was a young man who died at the crossing and that the grave was disturbed by adolescents in the 1940s. The property owner and volunteers from the Berthoud Historical Society “capped” the grave in May 2009 to mark its location. Private parties are not given permission to visit this “last resting place” of an early pioneer. Major John Kerr Native Virginian John Kerr established a homestead in the Little Thompson Valley in 1876. Kerr’s intimate knowledge of the valley dated to the early 1860s when he was employed by Ben Holladay to oversee of the segment of the Overland stage line that extended from Denver to Salt Lake. Kerr set up each station on the line including a “swing station” on the banks of Little Thompson creek where teams of fresh horses were hitched to stagecoaches for runs north to Namaqua or south to Burlington. Kerr made his residence in the Little Thompson Valley from 1876 to 1893. Upon Kerr’s death the Fort Collins Courier noted, “His was a brave, adventurous spirit and in early manhood we see him wending his way to the then far west. He arrived in St. Joseph, Missouri, in 1849, just at the height of the overland rush to the California gold fields. The following year he made his first trip across the plains with a train of bull teams loaded with merchandise, billed to Livingston & Kincaid, the pioneer traders of Salt Lake City. The venture, though extremely hazardous, was successful, and continuing in the business he made a round trip from the Missouri river to Salt Lake each succeeding year for eight years for the same firm, his freight bills often running as high as from $50,000 to $56,000. In 1859 he was engaged in transporting government supplies from Independence, Missouri, to Salt Lake City for Gen. Sidney Johnson’s army, then employed in keeping the Mormons in subjection. His route lay up the North Platte via Fort Laramie and the South Pass. It was a wild country in those days, infested with savages who made frequent attempts to capture is train, but never with success. His reminiscences of those exciting times were intensely interesting and if printed would read like a romance. “While making the crossing at Green River in 1853, he fell in with Old Jim Baker, W.T. Shortridge and Harvey Jones, the acquaintance ripening into a warm and enduring friendship. Of these four and intrepid pioneers and frontiersmen but two are left to recount the thrilling scenes in which they had a part, Old Jim Baker, who is passing a quiet old age at his home on Snake river, and Mr. Shortridge of this city…When Ben Holladay moved the Overland stage line to Denver in 1863 Mr. Kerr was selected to take charge of the line from Denver to Salt Lake. He established all the stations on the road, purchased the stock and supplies and employed the men. His orders were to see that the mail never failed to go through on time and he carried them out to the letter. While in charge of the line he never missed a trip or failed in getting the mail through according to contract. Everything was run on a high pressure system in those days. Competent men commanded wages ranging from $200 to $300 per month and everything else was in proportion.”
Originally
located at the present-day intersection of Larimer County Road 4E and
U.S. Highway 287, the Pioneers of the Little Thompson Valley monument
may now be seen in Berthoud Town Park.
Pioneers of the Little Thompson Valley monument In May 1937 a teacher and a group of students who opened the rural Red Rock School in 1881 erected a granite monument along the highway southwest of Berthoud to commemorate “the labors of the men and women who blazed the trails that others might more easily follow.” Engraved with an image of pioneers and a covered wagon, the monument was placed at the intersection of present-day County Road 4E and U.S. Highway 287. At the monument’s unveiling pioneer citizen Charles L. Wilson remarked, “The Overland Stage road in the early fifties and sixties came down onto the Little Thompson and crossed the creek just a few rods west of this marker, and on the old campground on the creek many relics have been found.” Contrary to the estimation of Mr. Wilson who arrived in the area in 1880, the road was first used by the Overland Stage Company in 1862. The marker’s remote location led to a lack of maintenance that caused the marker to be moved to Berthoud Town Park in the 1940s. The marker has remained in that location since that time and continues to memorialize the “trail heritage” held dear by the pioneers of Berthoud and the Little Thompson Valley. LINCOLN HIGHWAY CONNECTION Pioneer Trails served a need for travel and commerce. Motorcars came of age in the early twenty century, and Auto Trails evolved into America’s first highways. Today’s U.S. Highway 287 follows the historic Lincoln Highway. Currently a section of South Garfield Avenue in Loveland, this road was originally a section of the 1913-1915 nationwide Lincoln Highway, America‘s first coast to coast rock highway. The Colorado Loop was a branch on the New York to San Francisco route that ran though Denver, recognized by the Association briefly before withdrawing their recognition in the spring of 1915. Although officially removed, this recognition continued for years on maps and in business references along the Colorado route. Lincoln Avenue in Loveland was named in 1908, previous to the highway running through town on it circa. 1913-1915.
The Lincoln
Highway Garage / Auto Livery was located at 311 Lincoln Avenue
Colorado Lincoln
Highway section in Campion between Berthoud and Loveland, 1913.
The
Campion section of the Lincoln Highway sports the last of the 1948
county bridges. LOVELAND
AND BIG THOMPSON VALLEY Mariano
Medina, the first permanent settler in the Big Thompson Valley
Spelling of his name has taken several forms.
His first name was Mariano, and the correct Spanish form of the
fairly common surname is Medina.
Mariano Medina’s home on the south side of the Big Thompson River In 1858 Mariano Medina established the first permanent settlement on the right (south) bank of the Big Thompson River, where the lay of the land necessitated the Cherokee Trail and the later Overland Stage route merge. Mariano’s complex consisted of a traditional Spanish-style plaza surrounded on three sides by his neatly whitewashed log home, trading store, saloon, corrals and eventually a post office. The settlement was originally called Miraville, then Mariano’s Crossing, Big Thompson Crossing, and by today’s name Namaqua, after Sauk Chief Black Hawk’s beautiful daughter. It grew to about 100 souls, some of whom were former mountain men with their Indian wives, as was Mariano. Mariano is credited with establishing the first business, first school, first church, and first consecrated cemetery in the valley. He was an excellent horseman and traded travelers’ worn out stock for healthy animals he had fattened on abundant river bottom grass. When the Overland Mail route was put through in 1862, his crossing was designated a home station. The significance of this first community of “Indians and Mexicans” was discounted by later white settlers. No trace of the valley’s first settlement remains today.
Trading Store/Saloon and Namaqua Post Office on the north river bank.
Mariano’s
Bridge on the Big Thompson, looking SW from the north bank.
Mariano built a substantial toll bridge that withstood several floods. He charged from 25 cents to $1, and fenced his land so that travelers must use it in times of high water. The modern bridge is about 200’ down river from Mariano’s toll bridge site. Namaqua Road is slightly east of the original Trails and heads more directly north, while the trails veered northeast after crossing the river.
Wells Fargo built a barn on the left (north) bank of the river after
purchasing the Overland stage company in 1866.
Mariano situated his family cemetery on higher ground south of his
settlement and on the east side of the Cherokee Trail.
It was surrounded by a rock wall and measured about 12’ x
20’.
Looking west from Namaqua Road, only a few rocks from the wall of the
Medina cemetery are visible in 1973.
Newly opened Namaqua Elementary School is in the background.
Memorial
Marker in Namaqua Park The
only known graves are those of Mariano Medina’s family and one family
friend; but many agree, “Surley there were more graves.”
The cemetery was viewed with curiosity mixed with respect by
settlers and travelers, who expressed surprise at finding it so
well kept in such an uncivilized land.
(Gates, Mariano Medina, Colorado Mountain Man) The earliest grave was of a family friend prior to 1864, followed by two of Mariano’s children in 1864. It’s 12’ x 20’ stone walls were kept neatly whitewashed and it’s entrance was an ornately arched gate topped by a blue cross, a symbol of his Catholic faith. In all there were 8 burials. In 1878 Mariano had to be buried outside the walls because there was no room inside. A young son by his second marriage was buried next to his father. In 1942 headstones were placed at the graves in respect for our first permanent settler. In 1960 the walls were torn down by the county coroner under court order and five graves were reported moved, along with a pioneer memorial marker, to Namaqua Park, across the road from Mariano’s home. Although the county coroner’s report listed Mariano as one of the graves reinterred there, research has shown Mariano’s grave was among those not moved from the original location. In 2003 an awareness project was started to bring attention to mistakes that may have been made in 1960. Fortunately, the Medina cemetery escaped development for 151 years. Three members of the Loveland Historical Society joined forces with preservation of the last vestige of the earliest settlers in mind, and now, with the help of many, such a plan was put in motion in 2009. In its 151st year the Medina Cemetery was seriously threatened by development. DEATH ON THE CHEROKEE TRAIL
Original site of pioneer H.L.W. Peterson’s 1854 grave, near the
SE corner of US Highway 34 ( West
Eisenhower Boulevard) and Namaqua Road.
Relocated headstones of Mexican Joe, recently identified as
Jose Rosendo,
and H.L.W. Peterson at Loveland’s Lakeside Cemetery. OCTA dedication plaque: H.L.W.
Peterson A
lonely grave on the banks of the stream, three miles west of Loveland,
bears witness that one adventuresome young man had found a final resting
place. A headstone at this grave still bears the inscription:
‘To the Memory of H.L.W.
PETERSON Aged
24 Years Was
Killed by Lightning June
13, 1854” Nothing
is known of his history or of the companions who accompanied him on his
fatal trip. Until
just recently, that was the story of Mr. Peterson, whose remains were
relocated to Loveland’s Lakeside Cemetery in 1947. Today, thanks to
new research, we are dedicating a plaque to honor and recognize Mr.
Peterson as a trail pioneer and adventurer, a brave young man killed in
the pursuit of his dream. This is the rest of the story: H. L. Wilson Peterson
Bound for California via the Cherokee Trail, Calvin Hall Holmes,
with seven wagons, nineteen drovers and about a thousand head of mostly
Texas cattle, left Rogers, Benton County, Arkansas on April 25, 1854.
Travel was heavy that year, but in his diary Calvin soon wrote,
“pass[ed] the foremost train.”
On June 11 they arrived at Denver and crossed the South Platte
River. Striking due north on a route developed in 1850 by Capt. Edmonson’s
Arkansas train, on June 13 they arrived at the Big Thompson
River in present Loveland, Colorado. On that date Calvin Holmes
recorded: “This day we experienced a most awful scare when the
Lightning struck five of our own men. Killed Mr. Peterson and one ox.”
On June 14 he wrote: “Buried Mr. Wilson Peterson on a mound on the
Prairie.” The headstone inscription read: “To the Memory of H. L. W.
Peterson Age 24 Killed by Lightning
June 13, 1854.”
Many years later Holmes’s wife Ella wrote of the event: “ . .
. our teams and cattle were knocked down and many of our men, one whom
we left sleeping by the stream where he was killed.”
(OCTA plaque,
dedicated August 2009) The
marker, just north and east of old Fort Namaqua on the north bank of the
Big Thompson River, was replaced at least once, in 1940 by historian
Harold Dunning. In 1947
Larimer County coroner Carl W. Kibbey removed Peterson’s remains to
Lakeside Cemetery, Loveland, Colorado. The current headstone is a
replica of the original. TRAIL PIONEERS BURIED AT LAKESIDE CEMETERY
Frank
Bartholf Born in Utica, New York, he moved to Colorado’s Big Thompson Valley in 1861 as a teenager. Soon afterwards, Frank was “introduced” to Jack Slade, the notorious agent on The Overland Stage Company. Mr. Slade had a reputation as a mean drunk and a killer. Legend has it he carried a dead man’s ear in his vest pocket as a watch fob…..at least that’s Mark Twain’s story. Mr. Bartholf tells his story. “I was keeping the station for my brother-in-law, who had gone up into the hills to bring down his wife. As the stage drove up I went out to unhitch the horses. The driver made some insulting remark to me and I answered him pretty short. Biff. Something struck me across the right eye. I turned quickly and looked straight into the muzzles of two revolvers. I had never seen Slade before but I realized at once that we were introduced.” “Slade afterwards wrote me a letter of apology, saying he thought I was the agent and that he didn’t allow any of his agents to ‘sass him.” (History of Larimer County, Colorado, 1911, Watrous) Ambitious, business and civic minded and generous, he was instrumental in the growth of Colorado’s Big Thompson Valley. He organized, sponsored, and financed Bartholf Hose Team #1, Loveland’s first fire department. It’s been said he eventually owned practically half of Loveland, including the A&B Opera House, Atkins Place, The Bartholf Block, and the Bishop Building, plus extensive land holdings in Northern Colorado, Montana, Wyoming, and Canada. At the time of his death, Frank Bartholf had built himself up as one of the wealthiest men in the Loveland.
Louis Papa was born in Utah Territory and died in Loveland at about age 91 shortly after mistaking lye for lard. He rode for Frank Bartholf, who gave a plot in his family’s burial ground for Louis’ grave. Louis was Loveland’s last link to the valley’s first settlement and its last tie to the true old West.
Louis Papa
Louis Papa and Lucas Brandt were lifelong friends
Lucas Brandt Born in Ohio, Lucas came to the Big Thompson Valley, Colorado in 1867. He hauled the lumber for building the Wells Fargo stage coach barn at Namaqua, and became a lifelong friend of Mariano Medina and his stepson, Louis Papa. Later he served on the school board, as state representative, and as Loveland's Mayor. An invaluable resource for recalling the early history of the Big Thompson Valley, Lucas Brandt worked with historian Harold Dunning to record and mark the history of Loveland and the Big Thompson Valley. Proud of his service in the Civil War, he was a member of a local fife and drum trio known as the Spirit of Seventy-Six, leading many parades. He died at the age of 94, the last Grand Army of the Republic (G.A.R.) veteran to die in Loveland. He outlived his friend Louis Papa by only one year.
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