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Colorado Vignette - Hotel Colorado & Hot Springs Pool

The world's largest natural hot springs swimming pool is fed by springs coming from deep in the earth, heated by ancient beds of magma. The water comes out at an average temperature of 126 degrees, at a rate of 3,500,000 gallons per day. What is now Glenwood Springs was considered "Big Medicine" by the Ute Indians who used the springs and adjacent vapor caves for centuries before the white man arrived. The area was almost inaccessible, except from the south where miners from Aspen traveled up the Roaring Fork Valley. Isaac Cooper filed a plat for the town and springs and called it Glenwood Springs as early as 1882 after the town of Glenwood, Iowa where he had formerly lived. Not having the funds to develop the area, Cooper sold the land surrounding the largest spring to the Devereux brothers. Walter Bourchier Devereux had made his fortune with silver mines of Aspen and coal mines north and west of there.

The vision of a world class spa and hotel began to take shape in the late 1880's with the completion of a large pool lined with firebrick and surrounded by low walls of red sandstone. A cold fresh water fountain at one end cooled the waters enough to comfortably bathe in. A red sandstone bathhouse was built to compliment the new pool. The railroads were arriving to the area about this same time, making it accessible to more people.

After completion of the big pool and bath houses, Walter Devereux began work on his next project, the Hotel Colorado. The hotel was designed after the Villa de Medici in Italy. It was built to cater to the wealthy visitors to the Pool and bathhouse. It opened on June 9, 1893. The hotel boasted 200 bedrooms and 40 private bathrooms, with ornate fireplaces in every room. The Hotel Colorado was one of the first hotels to be lit electrically. Because of the Civil War, many hotels in the east had been unable to modernize. The Hotel Colorado has had many famous guests over the century.

One of the most endearing and popular stories involves President Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt and his bear-hunting party. It is said when the president failed to "bag a bear" on the expedition the maids at the hotel made a small stuffed bear to present to him. The presidents daughter Alice liked the bear and named him "Teddy", this being the first and original "Teddy Bear". Another Hotel Colorado story involves President William Howard Taft. Taft was a portly fellow and when the hotel offered him the exclusive use of the Hot Springs Pool, he declined saying, "I've found it's much better for a man of my size not to bathe in public."

During World War II the Hotel Colorado and Hot Springs Pool were taken over by the Navy and transformed into a hospital and rehabilitation center. The first of 6,525 patients arrived in Glenwood Springs on July 11, 1943. Quonset huts were built around the pool to use for hydrotherapy for orthopedic and nerve injuries. The Navy used the facilities until February, 1946.

Over the years renovations and ownerships have changed. In the 1950's the vapor caves, pool and hotel were sold separately. A group of Glenwood Springs business men were concerned that the pool would be made into a private club. Consequently the group bought the pool to see that it remained open to the public. The last major renovation of the pool brought it to it's current size of 2 pools, one pool 100 ft. long with 91,000 gallons of 102 degree water. The second and largest pool is 405 ft. by 100 ft, with 1,701,000 gallons of 90 degree water. The filtered water in the big pool is changed completely every 8 hours, the small one every 2 hours. In the 1990's a sophisticated ozone water treatment was installed. The first such system to be installed in a hot mineral pool in the US.

In 1977 the Hotel Colorado was placed on the National Register of Historic Places, preserving it as an American Landmark.

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