Some of the fondest memories of those who grew up in Glade Park are centered on experiences that could only happen in an extremely rural area. Today, it’s difficult to imagine coming of age in the small community adjacent to the Colorado National Monument.

Rough and tumble beginnings

F.D. Miracle’s parents, Eli and Eula Miracle, came to Glade Park in 1933, moving their large family of nine into a small cabin directly across the road from the Glade Park Store. His younger brother, J.P.—child number 10—was born in the historic log cabin on South 16 1/2 Road.

Residents who struggled making a living in the area sold their land for taxes and moved to town. This enabled the persevering Miracle family to eventually purchase more than 1,100 acres in the area. Like most residents, they were dry land farmers.

“Everyone raised a big garden, had some pigs, goats, chickens and maybe a couple of cows. We raised enough to take care of our family,” said Miracle, 83.

Miracle’s father also worked on the construction of the Monument Road at the Civilian Conservation Corps Camp.

“Dad would haul the garbage from the camp to feed our pigs,” he said. Miracle and his brother attended the Glade Park School until his brother was caught playing hooky.

“We’d walk to school, and my brother would only go so far and just stay in that spot for the day. I went, but when the teacher and our parents found out, we both got kicked out,” he recalled.

For the remainder of that year, they rode horses or walked several miles to attend Little Park School. Glade Park School closed in the late 1940s. The few students living in the area would meet at the old school to be transported to town. Miracle, then 16, was recruited by the Grand Junction school district to drive the school bus up and down what is now Serpent’s Trail. There were no tunnels yet, and it was the only road that connected Glade Park with the rest of the world.

“There were a couple of curves, so sometimes you had to back up and try to get around them with a second or third try,” said Miracle.

In the summer, kids hung around the rodeo corrals south of the Glade Park Store. Rodeos could get rough, Miracle said.

“I was a pretty tough buck back then, but on one ride, the horse made three jumps and then stuck me in the dirt,” he remembered.

Tackling country life

Evita Carpenter Schultz’s grandfather, Floyd Carpenter, also lived north of the store. Schultz’s parents, Francis and Rita, moved to Glade Park when she was 5 after her father decided to join his father in the ranching business.

“I remember my grandmother saying, ‘You have to come to Colorado to get land,’” recalled Schultz, 70.

She remembers that the Glade Park Store was the community hub.

“The post office was always part of the store,” Schultz said, “and there was always a pot of coffee on and the `store owners would have cookies.

They had an enormous wall of candy behind the cash register that was every kid’s dream. You’d take your 50 cents and they’d let you go behind the counter and choose what you wanted.”

It was a trusting place. People put their purchases on a tab and paid several weeks later. The store also had extremely flexible hours.

“The owners would often be asked to open later as cowboys who were moving cows and needed groceries at night would be stopping by,” Schultz said.

Country living was difficult, but residents made it work. Before electricity came to Glade Park in the early ’50s, residents had ice delivered weekly from Grand Junction. Schultz remembers the big truck stopping at her house. The driver would use a pick to cut off a chunk of ice and put it in the icebox on the front porch.

Access to clean water was sometimes an issue.

“Mother used to cut sheet squares and wrap them around the faucet to filter mud and twigs from the water,” said Schultz.

Growing up in Glade Park meant being in the middle of ranch activities.

Schultz could ride a horse at an early age.

“When I was very small, a movie—‘Devil’s Doorway’ with Robert Taylor—was filmed up here, and Dad and my uncle played Indians,” she said. “The movie company purchased horses from local people and one of the horses had a colt that Dad bought and brought home.”

The colt, Punkin, became her favorite horse and lived with the Carpenters for 19 years.

Although the school was closed, Schultz remembers lots of activities held in the building. She recalls Christmas parties with Santa, Saturday night dances for the entire family, cakewalks and an active quilting club.

Schultz’s family moved to Grand Junction in the winter so she and her brother could attend school, but still spent time at their Glade Park home, sledding on old car hoods across the abundant snow.

Both Schultz and Miracle grew up appreciating the beauty of their remote home. They each left for a while, but found their way home again. Miracle and his wife, Mary, still live on their 75 acres, close to the junction of DS and Little Park roads. Schultz and her husband, Jim, moved to Grand Junction three years ago after spending most of their lives on Glade Park.