Poudre Canyon Memories
Sportsman’s Lodge in Poudre Canyon. Photo courtesy of Sharon Conley.
By Jim Skeen
Several of the small resorts and places you see driving up Poudre Canyon northwest of Fort Collins and Greeley were established by early settlers.
Ted’s Place, where you start up the canyon from Highway 287, was opened in 1922 by Ted Herring. His parents had homesteaded nearby in 1887, and Ted was born in 1893.
Ted later served several terms in the Colorado legislature. The old Ted’s Place building was torn down in 1989 and replaced. For many years in the early 1900s, Ted’s Place was a favorite gathering spot where fishermen got information about what flies and lures were best on the Poudre River.
Mishawaka, a few miles up the canyon, had a long history as a dance hall. Walt Thompson and his wife, Alma, came to Fort Collins in 1907 and opened a music store.
They liked the Poudre Canyon so much that in 1916 Walt built several cabins and a store with a dance hall. He called the place Mishawaka, from an ancient Indian word.
Walt, his wife, and two daughters all played musical instruments; so they held square dances at Mishawaka nearly every night in the summers for many years. Early canyon residents enjoyed that.
Glen Echo at Rustic opened about 1924 in a little store building that was pulled there by two teams of horses and set down directly across the road from where the present store is located.
In 1921, John and Carrie Cook bought the property from a mining company and built a few cabins. They lost the business during the Great Depression.
Herman Welter bought it in 1931, added more cabins and offered an enticement to guests: He guaranteed they would take home their limit of fish. Early residents said Herman was an excellent fisherman himself and often caught more than his limit—just to make good on his guarantee, of course.
Mountain Greenery Resort, just west of Glen Echo, was opened in 1957 by Robert and Margaret Lewis. They had owned a doughnut shop in Greeley in the 1950s and delivered their pastries to canyon businesses on weekends.
Poudre Canyon Chapel, west of Mountain Greenery, was built in 1957 with native stone gathered by local volunteers. The community effort in this small, mountain place inspired an anonymous traveler from Florida to donate $500 toward the building. The man was simply driving by, saw the church going up, and decided he wanted to be part of something in the canyon, according to some residents.
Arrowhead Lodge, which became a Forest Service visitor center west of Poudre Canyon Chapel, was built by the Carl Brafford family in 1936. Stan and Lola Case bought it in 1946
and operated it for 39 years, making it one of the premiere resorts in the canyon. The main building, a fine log structure, still stands and is included in the National Register of Historic Places. Stan Case wrote “The Poudre: A Photo History,” the definitive book on Poudre Canyon, published in 1995.
Sportsman’s Lodge west of the fish unit was originally part of an 1887 homestead. In 1956, H.J. Mac and Bernedene (Bernie) McIsaac bought the resort, added to it, and operated it for many years. When Mac died in 1972, Bernie continued to run it alone until 1992. She also wrote a book about the resort titled “Sportsman’s Lodge.”
The Cases, McIsaacs and others were longtime residents of the canyon and saw it change from a quiet, backcountry area to today’s busy scenic byway.
They remembered when visitors stayed for weeks in the little log cabins, fished in the quiet eddies of the river, and returned with their families year after year to enjoy the quiet grandeur of the mountains.
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