EPP REGIONAL DIVISIONS: SOUTHWEST

Cortez: Gold Medal Orchard

Cortez: McElmo Creek Flume

Delta: Homesteading Resources Escalante Canyon

Durango: Durango Power House

Fruita: Fruita Bridge

Grand Junction: Grand Junction Railroad Depot

Grand Junction: Handy Chapel

Grand Junction: Stranges Grocery

Hotchkiss: Hotchkiss Barn

Ignacio: Southern Ute Boarding School Campus

Lake City: Outbuildings

Lake City: Ute Ulay Mill & Townsite

Mancos: Kennedy Grain Elevator

Mesa Verde National Park: Far View Visitor Center

Montrose: Colona School & Grange

Pagosa Springs: Chimney Rock

San Miguel County: Lizzy Knight Cabin

Silverton: Red Mountain Mining District

Telluride: Alta Lakes Town Site

Telluride: Lewis Mill

Tiffany: Iglesia de San Antonio Church

Uravan: Hanging Flume

Listed: 2015

Constructed: 1890

Threat: Development

Closest Town to Resource: Cortez

Significance: The Gold Medal Orchard highlights the significance of historic agricultural landscapes in Colorado. The orchard won a gold medal at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, and its history is closely tied to early Colorado orchardists who dared to make a living in rugged, remote locations. Plans for the 6.7-acre orchard are to bring back heirloom fruit varieties to Montezuma County with the help of the Montezuma Orchard Restoration Project. Restoration of the orchard’s historic landscape will provide a living representation of the early agricultural founding of the county, which the property owners strongly support.

Site Needs: Funding, land conservancy, secured water rights for irrigation, and promotion of heirloom fruits

Update: The Gold Medal Orchard has moved forward a great deal since listing. Initial plantings have already occurred at the site, oral histories are being recorded, Montezuma County grafting is continuing, and a protective deer fence has been added to the property. Meetings with the next generation of property owners for the site have occurred to ensure the orchard’s long, successful future. Water rights issues have been resolved, and an updated irrigation system installed in 2020 has moved the project to a Save status.

Listed: 2011

Constructed: 1890

Threat: Natural elements

Closest Town to Resource: Cortez

Significance: The Montezuma Valley is naturally arid, but by the early-1880s, it had become a place of great promise for settlers in Southwestern Colorado who saw an opportunity for 200,000 acres of irrigated cropland. In 1878 a ditch company was formed to bring water down from the Dolores River, and by the following year, more than a hundred men began digging a mile-long tunnel under the Dolores Divide. Canals were dug, flumes were built, and by 1889 the tunnel was complete. In April 1888, the Montezuma Journal called the system “ …one of the greatest irrigation enterprises, not only in the state, but in the West. ” Today, only a single flume remains of the 104 originally constructed. It serves as a reminder of the spectacular engineering feat instrumental in developing Southwestern Colorado. The State Historical Fund has awarded the county multiple grants to complete structural analysis and rebuild the flume, and partners raised over $1.2 million for rehabilitation, completed in 2019.

Update: The flume has been rehabilitated and restored with the support of a large and diverse partnership of multiple funding sources, along with an interpretive stop along Highway 60 overlooking the flume and creek bed. CPI participated in the dedication ceremony in late 2018.