The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1882-08-25
WHOLE NO. ITO

dreds of feet on either side, worn by
the river into all sorts Of fantastical
shapes, and sometimes appearing al
most to close over the river and rail,
road.
1t is not an easy task to adequately
describe this the most wonderful of
all mining towns. There is nothing
like it in Colorado, or anywhere else,
and with all that has been written
concerning it only those who have
been here to see for themselves have
very correct idea of the place.
Though the rapidity of its growth is
not such as it was three and four years
ago, when the Leadvllle excitement
swept the entire land, yet it is still
wonder, growing and constantly
changing. 1t has from the first been
like kaleidoscope in the sudden
ness of its transformations, though
its colors were of the simplest kind,
and of the sombre, too. In the ear
ly days entire street were opened up,
built upon and settled within week:
and even now stores, houses, log
cabins, and hotels spring up sudden
iy, side by side. There is an opera
house constructed out of rough pine
boards, with its dress circle and gal.
lery, and looking for all the world
like an unfinished livery stable.
There are also variety theaters where
the illegitimate drama fourishes to
the delight of sturdy miners. Two
years ago there was but one church
and one school house here and the
principal hotel was two story frame
building with neat gables and an imi-
tation mansard roof. The office of this
hosiery is about six feet wide by
sixteen long, and was evidently not
intended for loafers. That large
class of the population are given
room in the bar and billiard hall
opening from the Office. A solitary
barber plies his occupation at one
end of the apartment, charging IS
cents for shave and so for hair
cut. The Grand has in its day
turned away from SO to 100 people
day over and above all it could ac-
commodate with lodgings. Lead
vile has never been particularly
religious place, and even in the days
when there was only one church to
10000 inhabitants an audience of 80
worshipers was about the average. I
have been told about the following
notice posted in the old church, but
have not seen it: "Please do not shoot
the organist; he does his best"
In the general character of the
place there has not been much change
from what it was from the first, except
that the evidences of haste are not so
plentiful and the buildings are better
and more substantially built and
there is little more of the atmos-
phere of permanancy. But all the
details / might give would after all
afford the reader little idea of Lead
vile as it is, or its surroundings as
they appear to the actual observer.
Let one imagine himself penned up
in the widest fastness of the Rocky
Mountains at an altitude of 10000
feet above the sea. He is literally on
the mountain tops. Yet far above
Leadville on every hand rise the
bald crowns of the snowy range
desolate, bleak, and absolutely with
out vegetation of any kind. Here in
the gulches are forests of evergreen
and pine, which extend far up the
sides of the adjacent peaks. But the
timber line is as strongly marked
and as clearly cut on every side as if
human hands had been at work clear
ing away every trace of tree or shrub
along the line of a survey, and as if
the same hands had planed off the
mountain summit to the smoothness
and barrenness of a country school
yard. To the stranger, coming from
the luxuries and comforts of civiliza-
ton, Leadville presents an aspect of
unutterable desolation: Approach
ing by the old stage road. one Of the