Ever wonder why Main Street in Mancos runs north and south while Main Street in Cortez runs east and west? It all started in the 1880s when the road coming from Durango came in on what is now Montezuma Ave.
The Lemmon Hotel was located where Main ends on the south and where the road continued on to Cortez. Thus, the main street in town ran north from the Lemmon Hotel, across the bridge and on to the north. Grand Avenue had only a few businesses. It wasn't until 1887 that the school was located on Grand Avenue. In 1888, the two-story Union Hall was erected facing Grand Avenue. In 1906, an addition was made to the Union Hall, and it became the two-story grade-school building that many of us remember. It wasn't until 1892 that Grand Avenue stopped at Spruce Street and Spruce Street connected on to the road going to Cortez.
In 1894, the first attempt was made to push Grand on to the west, where it joined up with the road going to Cortez just west of the bridge, close to what has been Weaver property. I was in college when the last changes were made, and the paved highway going to Cortez resembled what it looks like today.
Those of you who live in or visit the Mancos Valley must wonder if we have ever seen a winter, spring and early summer like this year's. I'm still just a kid, but people older than me say they have never seen a year like this one. It may be a part of the global climate change or the El Niño, but regardless of the reason, this has certainly been a different year. Now farmers are having a hard time putting up hay because of continuing storms. If someone had predicted how this spring and summer would go, they would have been considered weird, which of course, is how this year is proceeding.
The Halls families
I'll take the remaining space for this column writing a little about the Halls families.
David Halls was born on Oct. 12, 1877. He married Lillian Emma Dean in August 1902. He was the first president of the Young Stake of the LDS church. He became bishop of the Mancos LDS ward in 1928. At one time, he was also president of the Mancos Chamber of Commerce and the school board. His children were Hazel Hammond, Edith Duvic, Leon, Harry, Gene, Dean, Verd, Ralph and Clifford. The last one to pass away was Harry. David moved to the Webber Valley from Bluff, Utah, in 1886. He died of a heart attack on Jan. 24, 1952. Lillian Emma Dean was born on Nov. 30, 1882, and came to Mancos by way of the narrow gauge railroad with her mother when she was just a child. She passed away on June 10, 1968.
J. Lewis Halls, who was next-farm neighbors when I was growing up, was born on June 23, 1883, and came to Mancos as a young man from Huntsville, Utah. He married Vida Burnham in 1906. I never heard her called anything but Aunt Vid while I was growing up. Lewis was the ward clerk for the Mancos LDS ward for decades. He lived on his farm south of Mancos until 1964 when he went to live with his daughter, Grace Halls, and passed away on Sept. 30, 1947. Aunt Vid was born on Dec. 9, 1881. She died on May 10, 1954, while en route to a Salt Lake hospital after falling down a flight of stairs.
Darrel Ellis is a longtime historian of the Mancos Valley. Email him at dnrls@q.com.