
Seven Lakes is an abandoned, historically populated place in
Teller County, Colorado
Teller County is a county located in the U.S. state of Colorado. As of the 2020 census, the population was 24,710. The county seat is Cripple Creek, and the most populous city is Woodland Park.
Teller County is included in the Colorado Spri ...
, on the
Pikes Peak
Pikes Peak is the highest summit of the southern Front Range of the Rocky Mountains, in North America. The ultra-prominent fourteener is located in Pike National Forest, west of downtown Colorado Springs, Colorado. The town of Manitou Sp ...
mountain.
It was once the site of the Seven Lakes Hotel along a carriage road to the summit of
Pikes Peak
Pikes Peak is the highest summit of the southern Front Range of the Rocky Mountains, in North America. The ultra-prominent fourteener is located in Pike National Forest, west of downtown Colorado Springs, Colorado. The town of Manitou Sp ...
. Its waters flow from Beaver Creek to the Lake Moraine reservoir, a supplier of water to Colorado Springs.
History


Seven Lakes Park was a horseshoe basin nearly enclosed by Bald Mountain's (generally now called Almagre Mountain
) walls. In the late 1870s, a wagon road from Colorado City (now
Old Colorado City
Old Colorado City, formerly Colorado City, was once a town, but it is now a neighborhood within the city of Colorado Springs, Colorado. Its commercial district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. It was founded during ...
) to Jones Park was extended to Seven Lakes. From there, it was about a five-mile hike to the top of Pikes Peak. In 1889, the carriage road was completed from Seven Lakes to the Pikes Peak summit. Another route could be taken in 1904 on the
Colorado Springs and Cripple Creek District Railway
The Colorado Springs and Cripple Creek District Railway was a railroad operating in the U.S. state of Colorado around the turn of the 20th century.
History
On April 13, 1897, Lucian D. Ross, Thomas Burk, James L. Lindsay, W.T. Doubt and Kurn ...
(Short Line) to the
Clyde station. It was about via trails and the carriage road to Seven Lakes.
A one-story log cabin built about 1877 in a ravine at in elevation served as hotel. In 1880, Mayo G. Smith bought the Seven Lakes Park property and ran the hotel from 1882 to 1883. It was visited in 1887 by the Boyden Expedition of
Harvard College
Harvard College is the undergraduate college of Harvard University, an Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636, Harvard College is the original school of Harvard University, the oldest institution of higher ...
, who took atmospheric measurements of Seven Lakes and Pikes Peak.
The hotel was expanded to several stories and fitted with a billiard room and bowling alley, and burned down in the 1880s.
Visitors came to the area to camp and fish. The Pike's Peak and Seven Lakes Toll Road Company was established by 1890.
Railway lines
In 1896, the Colorado Springs & Cripple Creek Short Line Company planned to build a railway branch through Seven Lakes to Pikes Peak.
In 1909, the mode of transportation into Seven Lakes was via horses.
The Seven Lakes-Pike's Peak Railway Company was formed in the fall of 1901 to build an
electric trolley
Electric current collectors are used by trolleybuses, trams, electric locomotives or EMUs to carry electrical power from overhead lines, electrical third rails, or ground-level power supplies to the electrical equipment of the vehicles. Those fo ...
line from Clyde to
Pikes Peak
Pikes Peak is the highest summit of the southern Front Range of the Rocky Mountains, in North America. The ultra-prominent fourteener is located in Pike National Forest, west of downtown Colorado Springs, Colorado. The town of Manitou Sp ...
through Seven Lakes.
It was expected to be completed within a year at a cost of $250,000 ().
Henry C. Hall was one of the company's railroad directors. Hall made a proposal during a citizens meeting in the Colorado Springs council chambers in August 1901 regarding water at Seven Lakes. He asked for a review of the use of Seven Falls as a source of water for the city. He claimed it would be an expensive investment but might not provide as much water as anticipated.
Seven Lakes water supply
Background
The Seven Lakes water supply of one hundred or more acres consists of small bodies of water at in altitude which flow south into Beaver Creek and then Lake Moraine, a source of water for the city of Colorado Springs by 1899. The seven natural lakes formed by glaciers were: Isoetes Lake, Lake of the Rocks, Marsh Lake, Michigan Lake, Mirror Lake, Ramona Lake, and Ribbon Lake.
The city of Colorado Springs purchased Seven Lakes land for $70,000 in 1891. That year they built the Lake Moraine Dam.
An injunction to prevent the City of Colorado Springs from paying for and receiving title to the Seven Lakes property was refused in January 1902.
Reservoirs built
In 1905, the Mason and McReynolds reservoirs were built
in the Seven Lakes area.
Marsh, Ribbon, and Mirror Lakes were used to make one of the reservoirs, and another reservoir was formed in the Seven Lakes area.
Water from the two reservoirs flows through the St. John tunnel to Lake Moraine.
In 1909, the City of Colorado Springs restricted access to McReynolds and Mason Reservoirs (Seven Lakes), a source of the municipality's water, which closed off transportation opportunities through that area.
Closed since the 1900s, the two South Slope Recreation Area reservoirs were opened for fishing in 2014, subject to a reservation with the City of Colorado Springs and a Colorado fishing license.
Notes
References
External links
{{Coord, 38, 46, 54, N, 105, 00, 31, W, display=title
1877 establishments in Colorado
Former populated places in Teller County, Colorado
Pikes Peak
Former populated places in Colorado