Thoughts of Aspen, Colorado usually bring images of billionaires,
movie stars, and snowboards. A place where carefully scrubbed
denim, neatly frayed sweatshirts and T shirts carefully adorn
the chests of hidden wealth; a place denoted by personal jets
standing guard at the arrival to the city. But there is a
secret there, one almost buried under an emerging forest,
a place where the roots of the past intermingle with the
roots of the land; a story of men with a history lost; a time and
a place secluded on a forgotten slope. This is the story
of Ute Cemetery, a pioneer’s burial ground.
As Aspen’s oldest graveyard, there
are over 200 crusty early American souls thought to be
buried here, more than
thirty of which were veterans of the Civil War. Ute Cemetery
is a simple hillside, buried in plants and mountain bike
trails.
In the late 1990s the City came under pressure from a group
of local veterans who felt the City should honor its veterans
and recover the grace of this historic setting. Ute Cemetery
was an almost forgotten place until the City of Aspen retained
a historic preservation consultant, a specialist in tomb
restoration,
and the landscape architect to recapture the genius loci
or spirit of the place. With this designation came grants
that
enabled the City to retain the investigative team that restored
the cemetery and brought it to its rightful place among
the
historic landmarks of Aspen.
All was not rosy at the beginning. To quote a letter to the
editor from The Aspen Times on July 10, 2002, “The
City has just started a major tourist-like project at the
Ute Cemetery- gravel trails, and parking, stone gates, memorials,
every inappropriate thing you can imagine. No popcorn stands,
but I am sure they will follow.” The design team’s
challenge was apparent from the beginning; respect the past,
preserve the heritage, provide better public access and opportunity
for interpretation, and maintain the natural environment.
Understand first what a pioneer’s cemetery meant. This
was a location first used for burial in 1880 when a prospector
died of “Mountain Fever.” With no established
burial ground the prospector’s fellow miners buried
him at the base of Aspen Mountain just outside of town. Ute
Cemetery was a burial ground for the indigent and working
class. Being such, it evolved over time in a haphazard manner.
There were no rows, no symmetry, only random placement based
on available ground. In fact the cemetery did not even have
a name for years after its beginning. It was only later in
its life that some of the graves were planned and aligned
to resemble a cemetery. The total life of the cemetery spanned
60 years from 1880-1940. After 1940 only two burials occurred
and the site began a cycle of decay with no one left to tend
to the sites and maintain the landscape. It wasn’t
until 2002 that the decaying state became an issue to the
City.
The design team’s first step was to try and locate
all of the graves possible; no easy task since there was
no plan
and no order to the burials. With the historic preservation
consultant as the lead consultant, the landscape architect
assisted with the initial inventory of the site and was responsible
for vegetative analysis and selective removal, layout of
a
new interpretive path, fencing, and establishment of a new
entry area with gateway and memorials. The landscape architect
also helped prepare a maintenance manual and collaborated
with the historic preservation consultant on the design of
an interpretive manual.
The site, located about 8,000 feet above sea level, was home
to an Aspen forest that was aggressively retaking the land
and recovering the earth. On rocky slopes as steep as 26 degrees
the work was a challenging investigation. Debris, shrubs,
and forest covered the ground and effectively hid many of
the sites. Adjoining neighbors also competed for the land,
with many gradually expanding their property outward, encroaching
upon the cemetery. After over a month of field work, many
of the sites had been located. Searching for clues such as
aligned stones, exotic plant materials, changing growth patterns,
subtle markers, and in some cases old and worn fences and
broken tombstones, the site gradually began to unveil itself
to the team. In all, over 210 gravesites were discovered,
although only 78 were marked with headstones.
To assist in the recovery, a major volunteer effort was undertaken.
The consultant team together with the Aspen Community Development
Department and Parks Department worked with volunteers from
Aspen to help in the beginning of the recovery effort. With
the assistance of the historic preservation consultant and
the landscape architect gravesites were cleared of overgrown
vegetation, litter and debris.
The City of Aspen wanted to identify the cemetery and yet
keep a low profile. To accomplish this, the landscape architect
designed a low brick monument sign reflective of the historic
nature of the cemetery and yet small and circumspect in scale
and image. Additionally the landscape architect created a
series of small gravel pathways and established a manual for
maintenance and operations in order to allow interpretation
and to ensure the cemetery was properly maintained after the
initial restoration work was completed. A small fence reflecting
the character of the historic fence was also designed and
installed to mark the site boundaries.
Lastly, a walking brochure was created by the landscape architect
to provide an interpretive experience describing the history
of the site as well as the rules for use of the property.
Mountain cemeteries are unique. Unlike cemeteries found on
the plains, they have extreme terrain and a rustic mountain
character. Long rows of gleaming white tombstones lined up
like dominoes are seldom found. More typical are randomly
placed plots with locations determined based on available
topsoil and absence of bedrock. The result is a picturesque
setting with a mystical quality. The Ute Cemetery project
shows the value that landscape architects play in historic
preservation. As a result, the Ute Cemetery project has set
a unique precedent for preservation of cemeteries in the West.
Ultimately the project was highly received
by the City of Aspen whose Historic Preservation Commission
presented the
design team a Preservation Honor Award in 2003. Through the
efforts of the consulting team, city staff, and volunteers,
the City’s oldest cemetery has been preserved from
the ultimate fate of disappearance into the forest.
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