LuLu City
The Site of LuLu City with LuLu Mountain in the background. You can visit this site by walking up the Kawuneeche Valley from a trailhead along US Highway 36 north of Grand Lake Colorado. A nice enjoyable gentle walk following a well groomed trail. This is in the Rocky Mountain National Park, so it is illegal to take anything except for pictures and memories. Another route is to go up the Poudre Canyon to the Long Draw road following it southerly to the trailhead at La Poudre Pass. You can walk along the Colorado RIver through the Yellowstone Canyon to this site. |
"There can be no healthier place or climate than in this Grand River Gulch. The weather is warm and pleasant altho' we have heavy snowstorms. Yet the air is not cold. We are protected from the hard wind storms by the heavy timer and the mountains which surrounds us. This is truly the most beautifully situated mining camp I have ever hear of."
B.F. Burnett February 10, 1881 Some men came west to mine, others came west to mine the miners. Benjamin F. Burnett was one of those who mined the miners. One of his efforts to accomplish this goal was the establishment of the city known as LuLu City, located in the gulch near the headwaters of the Grand (Colorado) river. Benjamin F. Burnett was born the son of William and Margaret Burnett on April 9th 1838, in Tazewell county Illinois. He married Clara C. McGrew on January 31, 1865. Ben served in the Union Army in the war of Northern Aggression 1864-1865. He moved to Fort Collins in the fall of 1879 and started building a business in mercantile. Evidentually Ben was not one to let grass grow under his feet for he located LuLu City before December of 1879. Benjamin Burnett staked out the city lots and named this city after his oldest daughter LuLu. A correspondent of the Georgetown Miner, writing from Grand Lake, under the date of Dec. 10, wrote about four men: Burton, Pollard, Mayo and Burnett discovering a new Eldorado which carries plenty of ruby silver, silver glance and lead on the headwaters of the Grand River. The LuLu, Diamond, Crystal and SIlver Star lodes were claimed, assays of these lodes were as high as 104 ounces of silver to the ton. From Mr. Burnett, Mr. Gillette and Mr. Burgess, who made the Courier office a welcome call on Tuesday last, we gather many interesting points relative to the prospects of a lively season in the Lead Mountain, Middle Park mining district. Mr. Gillette is an old California and Nevada miner, whose experience in mines, minerals and mining matters gives his opinions in such matters great weight, is firm in the belief that the rush to this region. as soon as spring opens, will be as great as at Leadville last year. He says a town will be laid off on the headwaters of the Grand river just as soon as spring opens, and that he knows of three saw mills that are ready to move in as soon as they can get there. The site selected for the town is a beautiful one on the opposite side of the river from several of their best lodes, in the middle of an abundance of water and timber for all purposes. While on his recent rup east Mr. Burnett disposed of an undivided one-fourth interest in the Diamond, Crystal, LuLu and Silver Star lodes to each of two companies to devote to their development. One of these companies is composed of prominent businessmen and county officials of Peoria Illinois, including Isaac Taylor, county treasurer, Frank Hitchcock, sheriff, John West, S.L. Gill, and John Minor. These companies will be represented here as soon as work can be commenced in the spring by Mr. Minor who will then begin the work of opening up and developing their property. These gentlemen are to be congratulated on securing so valuable of property as these mine promise to become. These sales will also materially enhance the interests of our fellow citizens who still retain an undivided half interest in the lodes. We also learn from Mr. Burnett that the Chicago Mining and Exchange offers to stock the Carbonate, Mountain Gorge and Galena lodes in the same district for $500,000.00 and take one half of the stock giving the present owners the other half. Mr. Gillette will go the Chicago in a few days to perfect the arrangements. (copied from Fort Collins Courier February 19, 1880 ) An article in "The Fort Collins Courier" July 15, 1880 describes the celebration of the Fourth of July in the fast assuming metropoulos of LuLu City. They enjoyed a roasted hindquarter of Missouri chicken with a soup of Elk tract with a bean in it. This same writer talks about the volcanic region reminding him of the old castles of Petrea and the Holy Land. How the sights along the Stewart's toll road from Pingree Hill to LuLu are grand and would well repay anyone for the trouble and trifling expense they would be at in making the trip, even if they had no other object in view. ( Stewart's toll road followed near present day highway 14 up the Poudre Canyon to the Big South, following the Big South south-westerly to La Poudre Pass south along the Yellowstone Canyon of the Grand River to LuLu City. ) By the end of August of 1880 this was a booming mining district with over twenty lode claims filed on. LuLu City established a voting precinct with local judges of election, petitioned the county commissioners of Grand County to build a road from Grand Lake to their fair city, and were very busy promoting the area. More people means more business. "Weather is pleasant, miners pleasant, all is pleasant now in LuLu City. We do not, neither do we intend to write any matters concerning our town " It is simply impossible to overrate or exaggerate the worth and extent of the mineral resources of this district. The Wenburg lode a tunnel was dug that followed a four foot wide crevice containing a foot wide vein of silver ore containing over 140 ounces of silver per ton. |
The River is not Grand any longer.
The morning of February 18, 1921, found the Honorable Edward T. Taylor speaking to the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce of the United States House of Representatives. Congressman Taylor had first been elected to represent the State of Colorado thirteen years earlier. His goal that morning was to convince the Committee to pass a resolution on to the full Congress that would officially change the name of a 350-mile stream that flows from its source in Grand County, Colorado, to the border between Colorado and Utah just north of the 39th parallel.
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None of these lode claims were mined out, LuLu City failed due to its remote location.
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One item of Interest about this story is that I found the majority of rocks in this area and those 8 miles southwest over the ridge in Jacks gulch - Silver Creek to be the same. The composition of the most of the veins I found in the area of LuLu City, and those east of Teller City are identical. Is there a stockworks of high grade silver ores running under this high ridge.
One specimen collected near the "End-o-Mile" lode, weighted twenty eight pounds, yielded 34 ounces of 99.9% silver after being processed. Spot price for silver is about $19.00 per ounce, 34 ounces = $646.00. You don't get spot price when you sell - normally ~70% of spot, ($454.00) you have to deduct the cost of processing from this which runs about $2.00 per ounce - ($64.00), so if I was to sell this silver at these prices I would net ~ $388.00 not too bad for picking up a heavy rock.... |