The Palette & Chisel, Vol. V, No. 5, May 1928. Tom Moses’ Trips, Breckenridge, Col. Continued
“[Ed] Morange and [Hardy] Maratta were getting tired of the hard bed and indifferent food, so after a week of it they packed up and started east. The same day, Young and I started for Dillon by rail. We shipped the camp outfit back to Chicago. This day there was a heavy rain down the valley. We were several hundred feet above it, and we found it interesting to watch the lightning and hear the thunder so far below us. The mountain peaks were jutting up through the storm clouds, not unlike so many small islands. The top of the clouds seemed to be perfectly level, like a great sea. We could see nothing of Breckenridge below us. The storm did not last long and it was soon clear, so we proceeded to get out outfit down to town.
We were sorry to see Ed and Hardesty go, as we had planned at least two weeks in the tent. One night we had a terrific rainstorm that was not below us – it was on top, and very much so. We felt as though we would be washed down the mountainside into the town, but the tent ropes stood the strain. We got the full force of the lightning, and the shock was fierce. When the natives inquired next morning how it felt to be perched so high, and whether the storm had worried us, we had to get even with them saying: “We slept through it all; we were used to heavy storms in Chicago.”
When Young and I arrived in Dillon we went to the only good hotel, kept by a Mr. Hamilton. We discovered some trout streams not far from the hotel, and there was plenty of fine trout in the streams. We had a lot of fishing and tackle, and tried to get Mr. Hamilton to allow us to fish. As the regular fishing season did not start for over a month we thought that, as the streams belonged to the hotel, we certainly could have a lot of fun fishing and turn them in at the hotel. This pig, Hamilton, went out for himself and caught a big mess for the hotel.
When the waitress brought in a large platter of the same trout Young and I didn’t do a thing to that platter. The girl went back to the kitchen for more. We saw several female heads at the kitchen door, after the waitress told them of the to gluttons. Even Hamilton gave us a rap after dinner about it, but we had an answer for him. We also heard from some of the boarders. They made some harsh comments on the “conduct of parties from the far East.” We, at the same time, congratulated ourselves that we had plenty of fish for the first time in our gay young lives. A good night’s sleep, in a real bed, put us in good shape for the next day’s work.
Our first day of sketching at this place was a very busy one. The mountain streams all do the serpentine cut to the sea, compelling us to cross and re-cross many times. One crossing had to be done over a large log. This was no trouble for Young, while I had to creep across with the aid of my tripod sketching stool. I was doing a balancing act, but did not succeed. I slipped and went in and the water was ice cold. I managed to swim across. Young grabbed my hickory stool and pulled me out of the water. My sketching bag and contents got some water-color effects that I couldn’t do with brush or pencil. As the sun was awfully hot I removed my outer garments and laid them on the hot sand; my underclothing was soon dry, dried my sketchbook, and within an hour I was ready to travel.
We soon came to a little cemetery. One rough head-board had the following epitaph, printed with black letters: “Here lies the body of John Sands. A Frisco miner, an honest man and an old timer.” No dates nor age. Near by was the small town of Frisco, which at one time was a prosperous mining town of about three thousand inhabitants. The mines gave out, no one stayed, and homes and stores were left to the elements. As we struck the main street we looked about, but we couldn’t see a living thing, excepting a few chickens which convinced us, however, that someone must have stayed. The feeling we had among the deserted homes and stores was rater uncanny. The buildings had been hastily built; all very rough, and very few of them had been painted. The sign boards were a hot, badly spelled and very typical of a frontier mining town; a regular mushroom town – it grew over night.
Young was not satisfied with the indifference of the citizen as to our coming, and insisted upon some kind of welcome, so he gave a regular “war whoop.” As the echo died away in the mountains a door opened in the hotel at our right. The citizen came out and welcomed us to “his” city. We inquired if the town had gone on a picnic, but he replied that out of the three thousand of two years ago he and his wife and a saloon-keeper, were the only ones left. We were invited into the comfortable hotel parlor and met the wife. A glass of cold milk satisfied our thirst. We were also invited to luncheon, and it was fine. The saloon-keeper boarded there and opened his saloon only when the stage passed through town, once each day. The rest of the time he spent working the mine, by himself. The hotel-keeper was from Brooklyn; had kept a meat market before he got the gold fever. He had enough money to build and open his hotel, and during boom times, which lasted several years, he had made money, but had sunk all his profits into many holes in the ground. He and Young went for a walk after dinner. I wanted to make a sketch of the hotel porch. The wife came out and sat down for a visit. I said to her, “Your husband tells us that your health will not permit of your going back east,” which he did, when we asked him why he did not follow the crowd. She replied: “He tells that to everyone. Those holes up the side of Buffalo Mountain is what keeps us here. He hates to back without a fortune; we will never get it here.” All was so barren and desolate that I wondered how they kept from going insane.”
To be continued
Historical note about Frisco, Colorado:
Frisco is situated on the shores of Lake Dillon, seventy miles west of Denver. The town was founded by Henry Recen as a result of the mining boom in the 1870s. By 1882, the town boasted two railroads, many businesses, hotels, and saloons. Frisco was the center of mining activity because of the railroads and a stagecoach stop. Frisco served as the gateway to the towns and mines in the Ten Mile Canyon. The two narrow-gauge railroads, the Denver & Rio Grande and the Denver, South Park & Pacific, stopped at Frisco. Eventually, the railroads pulled up their tracks and Frisco became the sleepy little town that Moses encountered on his sketching trip in 1883.
