Pikeview, Colorado facts for kids
Pikeview (also known as Pike View or Pike's View) is a neighborhood in Colorado Springs, Colorado. It became part of the city on August 1, 1962. Back in 1896, Pikeview had a Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad station. Around that time, miners started digging for coal at the Pikeview Coal Mine. Later, in 1905, a quarry opened in Pikeview to dig for limestone, which is used to make concrete.
Coal mining stopped in 1957, but the Pikeview Quarry is still active today. However, the quarrying has created a large mark on the hillside. Since the late 1980s, people have been working to restore the land. In 2003, the Greg Francis Bighorn Sheep Habitat was created in what used to be Queens Canyon Quarry. This habitat honors the people and groups who helped turn the quarried land into a natural home for animals.
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Railroad Station History
The area of Pikeview started as a Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad station around 1896. It was named Pikeview because of the amazing view of Pikes Peak, which is about 10 miles (16 km) away. The train station was located near Monument Creek. It was north of the Roswell train junction and south of the Husted station, which opened in 1875.
Colorado Springs Water System
Two reservoirs, called the Pike View Reservoirs, were built in 1894. These reservoirs were part of a bigger project to extend the Colorado Springs Irrigation System to Monument Creek.
Early Town Life
By 1903, a school house was built in Pikeview, about 1 mile north of the train station. The Pikes View Coal Mine was also about the same distance from the station. The post office was located about 4 miles south of the station. By 1906, the train station area included a depot (a train building), a pond, and a road crossing. This crossing connected the north-south Monument Valley Highway (which is now Interstate 25) with a road leading west towards Rampart Range.
Pikeview Coal Mine Operations
Miners began digging a shaft in late 1896, and they found the main coal deposit at the Pikeview Mine (also called the Carlton Mine) on January 1, 1897. The Pikeview Mine was a "slope mine," which means it used a method called "room-and-pillar" to dig out the coal.
In the early 1900s, many people from Southern Europe came to the United States. A lot of these immigrants went directly to mining towns in Colorado, like Pikeview, Papeton, and Franceville, to find work. Many of the miners at Pikeview were Greek.
In 1913, the miners went on strike. A man named Louis Tikas, who worked for the United Mine Workers union, visited the mine. He secretly gathered information from workers about their working conditions. Most of the Pikeview miners returned to work after a few days, getting the same pay.
In a letter from August 28, 1913, Tikas wrote that 350 Greek men worked in the Southern Fields, which included mines in Pikeview, Las Animas County, and Huerfano County. Since January 1, 1913, 13 men had died on the job, and many more had been hurt. It was important for a Greek-speaking person to collect these stories, because information about immigrants was often missed in official reports. Miners also said they paid very high prices for goods at company stores. They also felt that the scales used to weigh the coal they mined were unfair, and they didn't get good medical care. They were also discouraged from talking to lawyers if they were in the hospital.
Tikas reported that the Greek miners of Southern Colorado were ready to fight for better conditions. He said they were "ready at any time unless conditions improve to engage in an industrial war and to fight, just as their fathers and brothers in the fatherland had fought the Turks until their freedom had been obtained, so these men are ready even at the sacrifice of their lives to fight until their industrial freedom had been obtained."
These labor disagreements helped lead to the Colorado Coalfield War. This was a major strike that started in September 1913 and lasted for over a year. The conflict became much more violent in April 1914 after the Ludlow Massacre, where Tikas and other striking workers were killed by members of the Colorado National Guard and local groups.
In 1920, the Pikes Peak Consolidated Fuel Company, which was part of the Golden Cycle Mining and Reduction Company, was located in Pikeview. Harvey McGarry was the president, and Robert O'Neil was the superintendent. By 1922, almost all of Pikeview's economy depended on coal mining.
The Golden Cycle Mining company owned the mine when it closed on July 1, 1957. At that time, 30 miners who lived in company housing on the site were affected. The managers were moved to other Golden Cycle operations.
Pikeview Quarry Operations
The Quarry Mark
The Pikeview Quarry has been operating since 1905. The Queens Canyon Quarry also mined limestone starting in 1958. When Castle Concrete dug out the stone, it created a very noticeable mark, or "gash," in the Queens Canyon Quarry. This quarry is north of Garden of the Gods and closed in 1990.
Restoring the Land
Some mining still happens at Pikeview Quarry, but those operations are being moved to another part of the hill. As this move happens, the land will be reshaped. This plan was created by Greg Francis, who worked for Castle Concrete for 30 years and spent 15 of those years working on restoring the quarried land. He started with Pikeview Quarry. After some attempts to restore the land didn't work, he came up with a plan to cut back the hill. This way, it could be "resculpted" into a shape that would better support new trees and plants.
Wanda Reaves, a project manager for the Colorado Mountain Reclamation Foundation (started in 1992), said that "Time and moisture will blend the quarry into the surrounding hillsides." By the fall of 2003, 2,000 trees had been planted. Another 800 trees were planned for Pikeview Quarry in 2004. Castle Concrete planned to mine Pikeview Quarry until 2013, so the efforts to restore the land were set to continue during that time.
Greg Francis Bighorn Sheep Habitat
On August 1, 2003, the hillside was renamed the Greg Francis Bighorn Sheep Habitat. This was done to honor Greg Francis, who passed away in October 2002. A statue of a bighorn sheep stands in the habitat. It recognizes the herd of 65 bighorn sheep (in 2003) and the hard work of Greg Francis, hundreds of volunteers, and Castle Concrete. They all worked to bring back Rocky Mountain juniper trees, native grasses, and small piñon trees to the hills.
