About Manitou Springs' Downtown Manitou

Emma Crawford Coffin Race ~ Manitou Springs

It must have been frightening to be 17, engaged, and suffering from the dreaded disease of tuberculosis. Emma Crawford was courageous of spirit, and in 1889 she and her family, as did many hundreds of others, moved in the hopes that the dry mountain air and the healing waters of Manitou Springs would cure her consumption.

Emma and her mother were Spiritualists, and both believed that Native American spirits were guiding them. Emma lived with her family on Ruxton Avenue, and walked constantly thru the surrounding hills of Manitou Springs. On one such journey up Red Mountain, Emma Crawford had a vision. With a frightful aversion to cemeteries, Emma tied a scarf to a tree near the summit where her spirit guide had appeared, and made it known that if she died, that was the location in which she wanted to be buried.

Soon after the Crawfords moved to Manitou Springs, Emma was joined by her fiancé, William Hildebrand, a railway engineer on the Pikes Peak Cog Railway. Feeling better, Emma and William threw themselves into their wedding plans. But it was not to be. On December 4, 1891, at the age of 19, Emma Crawford succumbed to her disease before she and William were married.

Being true to his promise, William and eleven other hearty men took two days carrying Emma’s coffin to the 7,200 foot peak of Red Mountain. The location became a popular spot for spiritualists to hike to see if they could communicate with Emma’s spirit. But in 1912, a railway company decided that they wanted to put tracks through that area of the mountain, and relocated Emma’s body. The relocation and the railway were both failures.

Due to inept burial and erosion, Emma’s coffin washed down the side of Red Mountain in August, 1929 in a severe rain storm. In the force of the slide, the coffin broke apart, and Emma’s skull and other bones were discovered in the canyon by young hikers who took her remains to City Hall.

While there are several versions of the story, one says that Emma’s bones stayed at City Hall while officials tried to find surviving family members. After two restless years, her skeletal remains were claimed by one of her pall bearers, who had her buried in an unmarked grave in Manitou’s Crystal Valley Cemetery. Some say that Emma Crawford gently haunts the hills of Red Mountain and won’t rest until she is again buried in her chosen resting place at the summit.

In 1994 the City of Manitou Springs started honoring her with the Emma Crawford Festival. On Friday night of the weekend prior to Halloween, the Emma Crawford Wake is held for her every year at Miramont Castle, a sanatorium in the late 1890s for tubercular patients.

The following day, Saturday at noon, there is the Emma Crawford Parade and Coffin Race down the main street of Manitou, led by hearses. The races immediately follow the parade and are judged on not only speed, but on the creativity and originality of design of the coffin and costumes. Each entry in the race has five participants ~ one who portrays Emma in her coffin, and four mourners who race the coffin, the wheels of which cannot be more than six inches in diameter.

Ten years after the Emma Crawford Festival began, the City of Manitou Springs honored her in 2004 with a memorial headstone. This is an irreverent, celebratory, pre-Halloween Festival that is one of the biggest events of the year in Manitou Springs, just 15 minutes from Downtown Colorado Springs.

Emma Crawford Coffin Race was written by Mimi Foster

Colorado Springs Coffee Shops – Marika’s

Recently I had a less-than-pleasant experience at Panera Bread, which set me on a quest to find wonderfully inviting Colorado Springs Coffee Shops in which to read, write, work, or meet friends. I found near-perfection in nearby Manitou Springs, and when my quest is done, it may just be my ‘place of choice.’

Manitou Springs is a unique and eclectic town less than fifteen minutes from Downtown Colorado Springs. My wonderfully patient husband walked thru the entrance to Marika’s and turned and smiled at me and said, “Just your kind of place.” Indeed, it was a little slice of Nirvana, and exactly what I have been looking for. Located at 739 Manitou Avenue in the heart of town, Marika’s is located in an historic building and is inviting and cozy.

While the front room is engaging, what was even more alluring for me was the fact that Marika’s has separate rooms. Depending on your mood, depending on your desire for quiet, or whether or not you are there just for the coffee, the ambiance, to meet old friends or new friends, or a place to which to escape, Marika’s offers several alternatives.

My personal favorite was the back room that is home to couches and over-sized chairs with tables, and fulfills my personal quest for what I affectionately call The Menstral Hut ~ that place to which I can escape when everyone and everything has gotten on my last nerve. There are also chess sets that are available to while away some time with your more intellectual counterparts.

Open at 7:00 am daily, until 10:00 pm Monday thru Thursday, 11:00 pm on Friday, and 9:00 pm on Sunday, Marika’s offers a large selection of beverages and many enticing treats. Often seasonal but always delicious, some of the indulgences include Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Cookies, Pumpkin Cupcakes, Lemon Bars, Red Velvet Cupcakes, delicious Shortbreads, and many other delights. Their gourmet coffee is South American and Indonesian. Teas are also available, and everything is available hot or iced.

WiFi is free and unlimited, but please be polite and purchase something if you are going to come and use their facilities. I definitely recommend Marika’s for either a quick or prolonged encounter. You won’t be disappointed. (The accompanying song very closely defined my sentiments as we enjoyed a respite at Marika's.)

Colorado Springs Coffee Shops - Marika's was written by Mimi Foster

Take time to stop and smell the roses. It's a saying that we've all heard. But do we?

Sometimes in life there are so many things to occupy our attention. What do we choose to focus on?

While walking to the Incline in Manitou Springs one morning, I noticed this beautiful bed of poppies. It was located outside of one of the shops on the edge of the downtown shopping district. I thought it contributed to the charming appeal of Manitou's historical area.

Having spent a year in Afghanistan, where poppies were used to produce opium, which in turn funded the Taliban, I found the poppies to be very beautiful, but also interesting to see in Colorado. So, I did a little research. I found out that most varieties of poppies do no contain opium. Most poppies grown in Colorado seem to be California poppies which ARE legal to grow. These appear to be Oriental Poppies.

I also noticed that if you do not stop and really look at the flowers, you can't get the full impact of their beauty.

For my readers from California, here is a bed of flowers in Downtown Colorado Springs that has some orange poppies that appear to be the California poppies. Poppies are the state flower of California.

For more information about The Incline or Manitou Springs see:

Snapshots of the Manitou Springs: The Incline

Challenges Make Us Stronger: The Incline in the Winter

Who Says the Economy is Bad: Good News In Manitou Springs

If you are interested in buying a home in Manitou Springs, Colorado, feel free to call or email me.

Photographed,

written and posted by

Sondra Meyer CPA/Real Estate Broker

Century 21-Curbow Realty

719-390-1100 or 979-575-2700

We all hear negative news about how bad the economy is. Well, Manitou Springs downtown business district is making their own news -- good news.

Today, the Colorado Springs Independent newspaper reported that Manitou Springs has NO retail or restaurant vacancies it's downtown area. See the following link for more details.

http://www.csindy.com/IndyBlog/archives/2011/06/09/manitou-downtown-at-full-retail-capacity

The New York Times described Manitou Springs, CO as "Hippie Mayberry." Founded in 1872, as a scenic health resort, Manitou Springs is town with approximately 5,300 residents. It is located immediately to the west of Colorado Springs. (Colorado Springs boasts a population of about 500,000.) The main stay of Manitou Spring's economy is tourism.

For more information about The Incline which is in Manitou Springs see:

http://activerain.com/blogsview/2341044/snapshots-of-manitou-springs-the-incline

http://activerain.com/blogsview/2148533/challenges-make-us-stronger

(And, for those of you that have either ran or climbed The Incline, Yes.....the No Trespassing Sign is still up.)

If you are interested in buying a home in Manitou Springs, Colorado, feel free to call or email me.

Photographed,

written and posted by

Sondra Meyer CPA/Real Estate Broker

Century 21-Curbow Realty

719- 390-1100

Or

979-575-2700