San Miguel County has been working to update and reinstall signage on a historical site in the reaches of the San Juan Mountains. The signage is for a small camp and a machine gun nest occupied when the state declared martial law to quell labor strikes. KOTO News took the opportunity to retell a colorful piece of local history. Parks Supervisor for San Miguel County Rich Hamilton begins.

“If you go up and over Imogene Pass and you go towards the Ouray County side of the pass, there’s another little spur that goes up to a bench where people can park and view Red Mountain. From there you can look up to your right, to the ridge, at 13,365 feet, and that’s where Fort Peabody is located,” says Hamilton. 

“So Colorado Tourism promoters extol our scenery, our fall colors, our snow capped peaks — but no one mentions our historic machine gun nest at the top of Imogene Pass between Telluride and Ouray — a machine gun emplacement and a small wooden fort survive as silent testimony to worker struggles,” says Andrew Gulliford, a Professor of History at Fort Lewis College in Durango, who has written extensively on the American West. The oddly placed machine gun nest they speak of has its roots in a labor revolt during Telluride’s mining era. 

“In Telluride in 1903, the miners went out on strike and Governor James Pebaody in collusion with the wealthy miners called in the Colorado National Guard. And running the National Guard was Bulkeley Wells, a captain,” recounts Gulliford. 

“He organized mass deportations kicking people out of town on special trains, he filed false criminal charges, there were bearings. There was no due process! There's no judge, there's no jury, they're just thrown out of town,” Gulliford continues. 

“As illegally deported miners trickled back into Telluride over Imogene Pass, National Guardsmen under Wells’ command built a wooden sentry post or redoubt complete with a small stove, a flagpole, and a stone sniper or machine gun nest with a Colt rapid-fire machine-gun.” 

That Fort was named Peabody, after Colorado’s Governor. Soldiers stationed at the pass were on constant watch for union organizers who, kicked out of San Miguel County, would risk their lives and attempt to sneak back in, in order to continue their labor action. Hamilton says the remote location of the fort testifies to the way of life at that time.

“The military was up there year-round, but they had a little fire place, and I'm sure life was harsh, both for the miners and for everyone at that time,” Hamilton says. “I think it is a very important site for Labor History in the West. There was turmoil with all kinds of violence as miners were dissatisfied and mine bosses were, basically, greedy.” 

“So it's really an attempt by the mine owners to stop unionization,” Gulliford says, “but the mines were terribly dangerous — coal mines were dangerous, gold and silver mines were dangerous — so, yes, [the miners] wanted better wages, but they also wanted safety, and they wanted an eight-hour workday. And thanks to them, we have it.”

“There were big, big boarding houses close to the mines,” Gulliford continues, “and most of those have all collapsed and fallen in, although there are a few scattered around near Silverton and Ouray. So housing was a problem then; it's certainly a problem now. But the mine owners knew they had to build housing. And they also had food at the boarding houses. So the most important person in the mines wasn't the mine superintendent, and it wasn’t the miners; it was the cook! Because miners would simply quit if they didn't like the food.”

Hamilton leaves listeners with a final piece of advice. 

“I would encourage everyone to go visit that historic site up on top of the ridge there. Not only do you learn a little about labor history in the West, and visit and look around and see where that machine gun would have, and walk down the ridge towards Telluride and see the sniper's nest, but then you can go bag Telluride Peak,” Hamilton says.