The County Poor Farm

The El Paso County Poor Farm was built in 1900.  It was located where Bear Creek Park is today, north of the community garden.  I found additional information on this early social service on..
http://www.poorhousestory.com/poorhouses_in_colorado.htm

LG Niles served as the Poor Farm Superintendent for a time, and his wife Catherine was the matron.  She died at the county farm while they were working there, and her daughter completed the remainer of the term as the matron.  LG's granddaughter Donna Koop furnished these photographs of the county farm.  The family believes that he served two terms at the farm, during the 1930s and 1940s.

Grandma Niles

Churches of Fountain, Colorado

The 1871 plat of the town of Fountain shows two churches, or at least the lots reserved for them.  One may have been a Society of Friends or Quaker meeting house.  More detail and the interesting 1871 diagram can be found on the About Town page.

These Daily Rocky Mountain News articles, found in an online historic newspaper index (ask your librarian how), show that a Friends meeting house had been built in Fountain by 1875.


Dec 5 1875



Jun 1 1875

The Last Run of the D&RG 638

Coal powered steam engines were phased out in the early 1960s.  This photo was taken in Fountain in December, 1962 and shows the last run of the D&RG 638, as it passed through town.  The engine was donated to the town of Trinidad.  Read more about this in the Dec 17, 1962 article in the Gazette, found on the Pikes Peak Newsfinder index at PPLD.org.