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Historical Glade Guard Station receives face-lift

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Tuesday, June 14, 2011 2:06 PM
Journal/Kimberly Benedict
Doug Wamsley, Steve Vittum and Dave Ferguson reshingle the roof of the newly restored barn at the Glade Guard Station on Thursday. Wamsley and Vittum are retired smokejumpers and members of the National Smokejumper Association, which provided volunteer labor for the project. Ferguson is a volunteer with the organization. The group also built a new corral at the site.
Journal/Kimberly Benedict
The newly restored outhouse at the Glade Guard Station was originally built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s.
Journal/Kimberly Benedict
Dave Ferguson, a volunteer associate with the National Smokejumper Association, helps nail new shingles on the recently renovated barn at the Glade Guard Station.
Journal/Kimberly Benedict
A flag donated by the Veterans of Foreign Wars waves in the breeze outside the newly refurbished Glade Guard Station on Thursday. The station is being renovated as a recreation rental.
Journal/Kimberly Benedict
A sign posted on the newly renovated Glade Guard Station reminds visitors to “Help Preserve Your American Heritage.”

When you stand on the edge of the aspen grove near the Glade Guard Station, it is easy to hear the tales of history whispering through the quaking leaves.

“Come listen to our stories,” the leaves beckon. “Come immerse yourself in the past of this place.”

Now, thanks to the hard work of the U.S. Forest Service and a group of unique volunteers, members of the public will have an opportunity to share in the guard station’s history.

The Glade Guard Station, located roughly 15 miles north of McPhee Reservoir, has been the subject of a three-year restoration project aimed at repurposing the complex, which includes a guard station, garage, outhouse and barn.

“Before the project started the (U.S. Forest Service) was going to just burn it down,” said David Singer, with Silverton Restoration Consulting. “They saw it as a liability. The project has allowed us to save this piece of San Juan National Forest history.”

Rather than a liability, the work project is turning the guard station into an asset for the forest service as a rental facility to be shared with the public.

“It was really viewed as an attractive nuisance,” said Julie Coleman, heritage team leader for the forest service. “This really is a great resource and piece of our history that the public is going to be able to enjoy now that we have saved it.”

The Glade Guard Station was first commissioned by the forest service in 1906, shortly after the formation of the San Juan forest. The station is one of the oldest forest service buildings in Colorado and is listed on the Colorado State Register of Historic Properties.

The original log cabin was replaced by the current ranger house in 1916. It was remodeled in 1936 and 1937 by the Civilian Conservation Corps.

While the CCC camp was located at the site, corps members built an outhouse and woodshed and made improvements to a natural spring located near the house.

In the mid-1940s, after the completion of the Dolores Public Lands Office, the Glade Guard Station lost its usefulness to the forest service. It has stood abandoned since the 1970s.

The restoration project came together thanks to a serendipitous confluence of available funding and volunteer labor. Restoration costs have run close to $20,000 a year, according to Singer. Funds have come from the Colorado Historical Fund, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the Gates Family Foundation, the Bacon Family Foundation, and the Ballantine Family Fund. Fundraising is coordinated by the Dominquez Archaeological Research Group.

“Everything really came into alignment to be able to do this,” Coleman said. “We were able to write some grants and get some (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) money and then the workers came.”

The workers, who have volunteered time since 2008 to complete the Glade project, are another piece of the guard station’s intriguing story. The crew comprises members of the National Smokejumper Association, men who spent their youths in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s protecting the forest. Now, they spend their time preserving the forest’s history.

“We really want to aid the forest service or (U.S. Bureau of Land Management) in maintaining some of these sites,” said Rich Hildebrand, 65, the squad leader. “Our real interest is the historic preservation aspect of the project.”

Volunteers from the association spent a week in 2008, 2009 and this year providing labor for the Glade project. Nine of this year’s volunteers were former smokejumpers. Three were nonjumping associates of the group.

The volunteers are all retired and pursued a variety of career paths after their time as smokejumpers. The oldest member of the team was 78-year-old Ron Siple. All of the volunteers enjoy spending their time in the forest once again.

“It is a great time to relive the old days while protecting the forest and preserving the history,” said Warren Pierce, a jumper in 1964 in Cape Junction, Ore. “It is a good way to get out and do something beneficial.”

Over the past three years, a great deal of work has been completed on the project. In 2008 and 2009, the volunteers repaired the stone foundation, replaced the roof and restored the exterior of the guard building; repaired the interior and exterior of the outbuildings; and did maintenance work around the property. This year, the focus was the restoration of the barn and construction of a new corral.

The next step is the renovation of the guard station interior, which will be completed by a private firm this summer. Costs will range from $90,000 to $130,000. The property should be ready for rental either this fall or next spring.

Coleman is excited to see the years of work come to fruition.

“It is going to be cool for the public to have that experience of staying at the station,” Coleman said. “We’ve made a lasting impact and contribution. It is great.”



Reach Kimberly Benedict at kimberlyb@cortezjournal.com.

Stations have history in forest

When the Glade Guard Station was built in the early 1900s, the ranger assigned to the location was sent to the isolated area with his family, a horse and wagon and $400 to build a home. The log cabin that resulted from the ranger’s work stood for a decade before it was replaced by the 600-square-foot home that now stands at the site.
Across the United States and Southwest Colorado, other guard stations stand as quiet testaments to the innovative and hard work of rangers on the front lines of forest protection and preservation at the turn of the century.
“The guard stations were outposts for the forest service,” said Julie Coleman, heritage team leader for the San Juan Public Lands Office. “It was a pretty solitary existence.”
U.S. Forest Service rangers assigned to guard stations had the unenviable job of protecting the forest from overuse in the days before a well-regulated permitting system, as well as regulating disputes between multiple users.
“The two main functions of the rangers were to watch over cattle grazing and watch over logging and timber sites,” Coleman said. “They were to make sure cattleman and sheepherders weren’t over-watering or over-grazing the area and ensure the logging was carried out according to whatever permits there were.”
Coleman said the rangers often had to manage conflict between users.
“It was really a tough job,” she said. “At the time there was a lot of hostility between the sheep and cattle producers. They had to handle all of that on their own.”
While the necessity of managing forest resources has not waned in the past century, the advent of modern transportation has made outpost guard stations unnecessary. Many of the stations across the country were abandoned as full-time resident stations after World War II.
Many stations have been lost to the march of time, but the forest service and private organizations have recognized the necessity of preserving the historic stations that remain, Coleman said. A number of stations in Colorado have been repurposed as recreational rentals for tourists, a process Coleman calls “adaptive reuse.”
“The idea is slowly catching on of restoring these special places and then renting them out with the proceeds going into the upkeep and maintenance of the building,” Coleman said.
Restoration and reuse may look different depending on the forest and the station, Coleman said. Locally, four historic ranger stations are significant: the Rico, Dunton, Aspen and Glade guard stations.
While the Glade Guard Station is being renovated for a recreational rental, the Aspen Guard Station has served as a summer artist-in-residence facility for 16 years. The station was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s and was repurposed in 1994.
The Dunton Guard Station, also built by the CCC in the 1930s, is used as a work station for forest service crews. The Rico station was built during the same time period and is an information center staffed by volunteers.
Along with the physical buildings, the San Juan Public Lands Center also has the original ranger diaries from the stations and hopes to create a complete history of the guard station days of the San Juan National Forest.
“Through restoration work we are really able to save these pieces of history for the future,” Coleman said. “It is a lasting legacy that we are preserving for the future.”

Reach Kimberly Benedict at kimberlyb@cortezjournal.com.

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