Hanging Flume
In need of water to work its Dolores Canyon
gold claims, the Montrose Placer Mining
Company built a thirteen-mile canal and
flume to deliver water from the San Miguel
River. The last five miles of the flume clung
to the wall of the canyon itself, running
along the cliff face below you. Constructed
between 1888 and 1891, the four-foot-deep,
five-foot-four-inch-wide “hanging flume”
carried 23,640,000 gallons of water in a
twenty-four hour period. Its construction
dazzled mining pros with its sheer
ingenuity. The placer claim, unfortunately,
dazzled no one; after three yers of
indifferent yields the company folded,
abandoning the flume to the ravages of
weather and time. Now listed in the
National Register of Historic Places, thi
engineering marvel symbolizes the twists of
fate so often encountered in the pursuit of
Rocky Mountain gold.
Spanish Exploration
Seeking to consolidate the northern frontier of its New World
empire, Spain dispatched two scouting parties into this part of
Colorado during the eighteenth century; both passed within a
few miles of here. Juan Maria Antonio de Riviera came first, in
1765, getting as far north as the Gunnison River. His journals
paved the way for a more ambitious expedition in 1776 led by
missionaries Francisco Atanasio Dominguez and Silvestre Valez
de Escalante. Assigned to map a route from Santa Fe to
California, the friars marched into a fearsome wilderness no
European had ever seen, crossing two thousand miles of
present-day Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. Although
Dominguez and Escalante never did reach California, their
journey stands as one of history’s epic achievements.
[Picture Captions]
What is left of this section of the flume can be seen today from the River Road.
Courtesy Jerald Reid Collection from Main Street Photo
This work will show how easy it is, when backed up by enterprising capital, to bring water from and to points which were always thought to be inaccessible
Engineering and Mining Journal, January 1890
Hydraulic mining operation
similar to that used by the
Montrose Placer Mining
Company. This method
separated the flake and flour
gold from the dirt and gravel
running across the sluice
boxes.
Colorado Historical Society
