INDIAN HILLS

wanted to show him where she spent her summers as a girl, so they traveled to Indian Hills, fell in love with the place and bought a cabin.

“We decided this is the place we wanted to be,” Lankston said.

Early history

e Indian Hills Improvement Association’s website provides an extensive history of the area. e following are excerpts: e rst people to settle the area came in the 1860s to the area rst called the North Fork of Turkey Creek and then Parmalee Gulch after one of the earliest settlers in the valley, John D. Parmalee. He owned the Denver and Turkey Creek Wagon Road Co. and constructed a wagon road leading from Denver through Turkey Creek Canyon toward South Park, according to the website.

In 1918, George Olinger of Olinger Mortuaries in Denver began to buy land to develop summer cabins, to be called Indian Hills, the history said.

“Olinger bought the 160-acre quarter-section at the mouth of Parmalee Gulch and christened it Arrowhead Park, the rst ling of Indian Hills, in 1923,” the history said. “Large billboards were placed at the Turkey Creek and Bear Creek entrances to Parmalee Road advertising ‘Indian Hills for Your Mountain Home.’”

Ho’ Cha’ Nee’ Stea’, or Chief’s Inn, a tea room and soda fountain, was built near the entrance to Indian Hills, and it was the rst stopping place for buses or cars bringing sightseers and prospective buyers to Indian Hills. e building was across from the present post o ce, and it later became a grocery store called e Trading Post. en it was a private residence, Mirada Fine Art Gallery and now e Meeting Sanctuary.

Dates in Indian Hills history

Among the highlights in Indian Hills’ development:

• e Indian Hills Improvement Association was established in 1926.

• e one-room building that became the Indian Hills Community

Center in 1952 was a school from 1923-1949.

• e Indian Hills Fire Department was started in 1947.

• Parmalee Elementary School opened in 1962, and its PTA hosted the Mountain Mingle, a huge carnival that everyone in Indian Hills attended.

• In 1973, during the gasoline shortage crisis, Fred Harrison, who owned a gas station in Indian Hills, only sold gas to locals. He told outsiders they hadn’t bought gas from him before the shortage, so they couldn’t buy gas from him now.

• Gov. Richard Lamm wanted Colorado to host the 1976 Winter Olympics, but voters turned it down. e plan had been to hold the bobsled competition in Pence Park. Lankston noted there was no snow that year.

• Since Indian Hills was lled with summer cabins, water came to homes through above-ground pipes. Water was on in May and o in October. Year-round residents hauled water from pumping stations until 1976 when pipes were put underground, and digging and blasting trenches for water pipes wasn’t always easy. “It brought a di erent group of people to Indian Hills,” said Ron Matson, whose family moved to Indian Hills in 1927.