The land on which Fort Carson is built was never the
permanent home of any Indian tribe, although many
tribes--among them the Utes, Commanches, Kiowas, Cheyennes,
Arapahos and Sioux--did live here from time to time. Other
tribes, such as the Pawnees and the Jicarilla Apaches
frequently hunted in this region. Except for the Utes, these
tribes came from east of the Rockies. They had been
gradually pushed west by white settlers. In the early 1700s,
the Ute Indians occupied the Rocky Mountains and the South
Park region, traveling the Carson area to forage and hunt.
Other tribes moved to the Carson area, but then migrated
south to the Arkansas River. Evidence of the different
tribes can be found in the petroglyphs and pictographs,
arrowheads, pottery fragments, camp sites and Indian burial
sites found on the Fort Carson reservation. The decline in
the Indian population in the fort area came in 1861 when the
government made a treaty with the Cheyennes and Arapahos.
The tribes, according to the treaty, would give up some
80,000 square miles which included what is now Fort Carson.
The land would go into the new territory of Colorado.
In exchange, the tribes were to receive $450,000 to be paid
in 15 yearly installments. Reserved for their use was a
tract of land along both sides of the Arkansas River and a
portion of their southeast Colorado holdings. This treaty
attempted to settle land ownership, but violations by both
sides led to a war of terrorism through most of the 1860s.
The United States, engaged in a Civil War, could not spare
the troops needed to enforce the terms of the treaty.
Meanwhile, settlers in the Fort Carson area fortified their
ranches and retreated to Fountain or Colorado Springs to
escape Indian attacks. By 1869, hundreds of U.S. Cavalrymen
were in the region and most of the Indians left. Further
contact with them by white settlers was sporadic. In 1873
the first stage road to cross Fort Carson was built. It
carried passengers and light freight loads from Denver to
Canon City. Discovery of gold in Colorado and the need for
better and faster routes to Denver led to the building of
the stage route. The demand for transportation was so great
that stages began running day and night, stopping only long
enough for a change of teams and for meals. Outlaws plagued
the lightly protected stages and "traffic jams" were often
created along the route by grazing herds of buffalo. A major
stop on the old route was the stage station of Glendale,
located one-half mile outside the southwest boundary of the
Carson reservation at the junction of the Red and Beaver
Creeks. Most of the station was destroyed on a rainy night
in June 1921 when a dam on Beaver Creek broke and a wall of
water swept through the stage stop.
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The Railroad
A little-known railroad called the Kansas-Colorado,
incorporated in 1898 and without a single section of track
for its first 10 years, ran from Pueblo to an area on Fort
Carson called Stone City. The railroad carried the clay and
limestone quarried at Stone City. When limestone lost its
popularity as a building material the quarries at Stone City
and Turkey Creek closed in 1930. In 1911, the
Kansas-Colorado Railroad Company became the Colorado-Kansas.
The corporation was dissolved in 1934, but Colorado
Railroad, Inc. was formed to reopen it. The tracks were
dismantled in 1958. Another track with an even shorter life
span ran across Fort Carson. Incorporated in 1909 and called
the Beaver, Penrose and Northern Railroad, its main purpose
was to carry trains of prospective land buyers to sites near
Penrose, Colorado.
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The Settlers
The men and women who homesteaded the land that is now Fort
Carson were a tenacious breed. They had to be to survive the
rigors of life that revolved around the hardships of
"running cattle." The semi-arid meadows and rocky foothills
often posed problems. It was no small accomplishment to keep
a handful of cattle together until they could multiply into
a herd large enough to support a family. Names of many of
the original homesteaders are forgotten, recorded only in
old archives. At one time a man by the name of Booth lived
down range, but time has
erased all traces of him and his family. Only the unchanging
mountain bears his name. Other names imprinted on the
reservation are the Avery, Early, Ingle and Mary Ellen
ranches. All are now part of history, as are the Mesa View
and Cheyenne Valley Ranches.
W.D. Corley owned the Cheyenne Valley Ranch. Corley was a
Mississippi cotton farmer who brought his young wife to
Colorado Springs to recuperate from tuberculosis. Among his
many business ventures, Corley had the urge to become a
"gentleman rancher." The ranch house and the other buildings
are gone now. All that remains of the ranch, on which
Carson's cantonment area was built, is the foreman's house.
The building, called Corley House, is home by tradition to
the division Command Sergeant Major. Guy Parker, for whom
the education center was named, was a homesteader of land
purchased by Fort Carson in 1965. The second white male
child born in El Paso County, he was a man whose
self-education never ceased. Despite the demands that
running a ranch and raising a family placed on his time,
Parker embodied the positive attributes of continued
education. Further south on the reservation is Turkey Creek
Ranch. It was originally owned by Frank Cross whom later
sold the ranch to Spencer Penrose. He used it for
entertaining guests, who came to the region to hunt. Today,
the beautiful Turkey Creek Ranch is a recreation area for
Carson soldiers.
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The Birth of
Camp Carson
In 1941 the nation was climbing out of its worst depression.
Poland and Norway had been crushed by Hitler's blitzkrieg,
as had the Netherlands, Belgium and France. Great Britain,
putting up the greatest resistance in its history, faced the
prospect of starvation by blockade. Japan declared its
alliance with Germany and Italy. There were signs all over
the world that the struggle would soon spread. The United
States, leaning steadily to the side of Britain, was sending
supplies to that country
in increasing amounts. In an unprecedented act of faith, the
people of the United States had returned Franklin D.
Roosevelt to a third term as President, indicating their
willingness to go all-out in an effort to aid Britain. Only
the year before, Congress had passed the Selective Service
Act calling for Conscription of an Army with a potential
strength of four million men. Following Japan's attack on
Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the United States declared
war on the Axis powers. Officials in Washington, D.C., in
charge of selecting new military installations, lost no
time. Less than one month later, on January 6, 1942, it was
officially announced that Colorado Springs had been selected
as the site of an Army camp. Russell D. Law, Douglas C.
Jardine, J. Raymond Lowell, and Dr. George J. Dwire
especially welcomed the announcement. These four men had
poured more than a year of determined effort into ensuring
the city would be selected.
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A $28 million
town wins a $30 million contract
The backers of the camp could testify to the fact that
military installations are hard to win. An Army post has to
be wanted. The requesting community must provide incentives
to the military to have a post built at its doorstep rather
than elsewhere. In addition, that community has to guarantee
not only the soil on which future soldiers will live and
train, but also a lifetime of water, utilities and a
multitude of other necessities. The Pikes Peak Region had
the primary inducements--miles of prairie for large-scale
training maneuvers and a climate that would permit year
round training. There was never any doubt in the minds of
the four visionaries that Colorado Springs could provide for
an Army training camp, but much had to be done to convince
the townspeople and the federal government. The first step
was to persuade the citizens of Colorado Springs to buy land
which, if the city were successful in its bid, would be
offered to the government for a cantonment area. The best
choice seemed to be the 5,533-acre Cheyenne Valley Ranch,
just south of Colorado Springs. It was ultimately purchased
by the city for $36,500. At the same time, city-planning
engineers moved to gain additional water resources and
power-generating facilities for a camp. Almost immediately,
squabbles arose among the town's residents over whether the
proposed camp would bring disaster to the town's water
supply. A few irate citizens protested that their peaceful
town would never be the same. However, many saw a need for
dramatic change. A survey in 1940 indicated that 1,500 homes
in Colorado Springs were vacant. Additionally the war in
Europe threatened the town's tourist trade, its prime source
of income. Without change, the economic future of the city
looked bleak. Next, the War Department had to be persuaded.
Despite intense competition for the camp, Law, Jardine,
Lowell and Dwire counted heavily on the fact that the
climate of Colorado Springs was ideal for year-round
training. Where else, they maintained, were the summers so
invigorating and the winter snows so temporary? Even though
they offered what they believed were strong incentives, the
tightly knit committee needed help. Two men whose abilities
were uniquely suited to the needs of the committee, J. Chase
Stone, a New Yorker by birth and a banker whose diplomacy
proved invaluable, and Charles L. Tutt, then head of the
Broadmoor Hotel, contributed heavily to the team effort. The
group became a formidable organization for selling Colorado
Springs. No avenue was left unexplored, no detail overlooked
to increase the appeal of Colorado Springs.
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Appeals went out to Colorado Senators Alva B. Adams, a
member of the War Department Subcommittee on Appropriations,
and Edwin C. Johnson, later Governor of Colorado. The help
of Assistant Secretary of the Interior Oscar Chapman, also a
Coloradan, and newly elected Representative J. Edgar
Chenoweth was also solicited. That summer, crews from the
U.S. Corp of Engineers, Omaha District, were sent to
Colorado Springs to survey Cheyenne Valley Ranch. The crews
encountered trouble within the first few days when they
discovered the area had a huge rattlesnake population. The
engineers favored calling the survey off and reporting that
the land was unsuitable for soldiers. Only after someone
observed that "rattlesnakes move out when men move in" did
the engineers submit a favorable report. On several
occasions, Law and Stone went to Washington, D.C., staying
as long as was necessary to solve a variety of problems that
threatened the project. Jardine and Dwire were frequent
visitors there as well. By then, the men were bound by a
determination that Colorado Springs would be selected. The
death of Senator Adams on December l, 1941 was a severe
blow. Without his backing it was feared that past efforts
might have been in vain. Stone moved to Washington as the
selection date for the site drew near. Not until all
investigations were completed did the War Department decide
in favor of Colorado Springs, and then only after the
disaster at Pearl Harbor made a decision imperative. On
February 22, 1942, Colorado Springs newspapers reported that
the camp would be called Camp Carson in honor of Brig. Gen.
Christopher "Kit" Carson, the famous frontiersman. The
original military reservation consisted of 60,048 acres of
land. 5,533 were donated by the city of Colorado Springs,
29,676 were purchased from private owners, 262 were acquired
from the Department of the Interior and 24,577 were leased
from the state of Colorado. Thus ended months of hopes,
doubts, frustration, travel and fatigue borne by the few who
refused to swerve from their goal, to lead their beautiful
resort town from oblivion
to economic stability. Despite threats of closure after the
war, the camp was declared a permanent fort in 1954; and in
1964 it was enlarged to more than twice its original size.
With its growth, the Mountain Post has increasingly
benefited the community, and interdependence has developed
between Fort Carson and Southern Colorado. Just as important
is the steady influx of culture and intellectual enterprise
channeled into the city by former military families who fell
in love with the Front Range communities while serving at
Fort Carson.
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Construction
Committed to war, the United States was desperate for
trained soldiers. Camp Carson was to help meet that need.
Construction moved ahead with surprising speed.
Specifications had been completed for bids by mid-January.
Of the three bids received, the lowest--$31,500,000--was
submitted by Colorado Springs Construction, Incorporated.
Even though it was the lowest, the bid was considered high
and had to be reduced to $30,054,390 before it was accepted.
The contract was signed February 14, 1942, in Omaha,
Nebraska. Signing the document were the heads of five firms
which had teamed together as one corporation. The firms were
the Edward H. Honnen Construction Company of Colorado
Springs; Peter Kiewit and Sons of Omaha; Condon-Cunningham
Construction Company of Omaha; C.F. Lytle Company of Sioux
City, Iowa; and Thomas Bates and Sons of Denver. Each
company had proven its capability. Kiewit and
Condon-Cunningham were recognized nationwide for their
experience with large projects. The Bates Company brought
experience in hospital construction. Lytle was expert in job
management. Honnen specialized in grading and earthwork.
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The concept of a "package" of contractors rather than one
large company was fairly new. It had been conceived by
bonding companies prior to construction of Boulder Dam to
reduce liability risks in event of death or financial loss.
Within the framework of the contract, each company was
responsible for only the percentage it agreed to perform.
Honnen, a native Coloradan, was named contractor/sponsor of
the project. His experience included work on an Army
installation at Cheyenne, Wyoming and completion of
construction at Rock Island Arsenal, Illinois. At the time
he undertook the Camp Carson project, he was engaged in the
construction of Peterson Field, east of Colorado Springs. By
January 31, 1942, the first building on the new camp site
was completed: a headquarters built by the U.S. Army
Engineer Office of Omaha.
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With a July 13 deadline, Honnen ordered his heavy grading
equipment moved onto the site the day before the contract
was signed. Huge floodlights were set up and work went on
around the clock despite the winter weather. Some grading
and other tasks that did not require daylight were done at
night. Carpenter shops were open 24 hours a day to allow as
much prefabrication as possible. To avoid unnecessary
grading, the camp was designed to conform to the contour of
the land, accounting for the "banana" shape of the post. As
fast as one area was leveled, workers hauled pre-cut lumber
to the building sites. It was the extensive use of
prefabrication units that allowed the buildings to rise so
rapidly despite a severe winter and heavy rains in April and
May. In one two-week period, crews finished a large segment
so quickly that a Kiewit representative was sent from the
firm's home office to verify the achievement. At the
construction's peak, nearly 11,500 workers were employed,
many of them having moved here from neighboring states. The
Colorado Springs Bus Company bought a fleet of new buses to
provide transportation for workers. Even so, a solid line of
privately owned automobiles poured in and out of the
construction area daily. As the tempo increased, Mountain
States Telephone and Telegraph Company joined in the
activity, hurrying to keep pace with the demand for
communication. The Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad
laid a spur connecting the warehouse district with Kelker,
Colorado. Lines for electricity rose with precision while
gas, water and a city-sized sewer system went underground.
One critical problem was keeping enough building material on
hand to keep production at full speed. Carson was only one
of many installations being built, and lumber and pipe were
in short supply. By April 1, the list of materials ordered
but not received reached the $20 million mark. Signs urging
the workers to "Work, boys! We'll drown `em in our sweat!"
and "Nail down the planks--Here come the Yanks!" boosted
morale and stepped up production even more. The payroll for
the entire period amounted to $7,468,175.33. The first
segment of two-story frame buildings was turned over to the
Army on June 2, about six weeks before the July 15
activation of the 89th Infantry Division. The division
itself was ready ahead of schedule as advance parties of
soldiers had been arriving since May. Facilities were
provided for 35,173 enlisted men, 1,818 officers and 592
nurses. Nearly all of the buildings were of the mobilization
type construction with wooden siding exteriors. The hospital
was of the semi-permanent type concrete block and had space
for 1,726 beds with the capability of expansion to 2,000
beds. Shortly before the contract deadline, the Army
requested
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Over 11,500 people were employed at the peak of construction
of Camp Carson. (PHOTO in center of page) additional
construction to house a prisoner of war internment camp,
plus barns to shelter 3,310 horses and mules. Needed along
with the barns were more barracks for the additional men.
The supplemental contract raised the original cost to
approximately $41 million and extended the completion date
to November 4. All work was completed within the required
time.
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A "re negotiation" clause was included in the contract as an
emergency measure that gave the government the privilege of
a complete audit of all expenditures after work had been
finished. It was accepted as a way of arriving at an overall
cost which was fair to both the government and the
contractors. If the audit showed that the contractor had
been unable to operate at the agreed minimum profit, he
would be reimbursed by the government. On the other hand, if
construction costs amounted to less than the contract price,
the contractors were obliged to refund all monies above the
stipulated profit. The skill and experience the five
companies brought together under Colorado Springs
Construction, Incorporated enabled them to not only meet the
imposed deadlines but also to refund nearly $2.5 million to
the government.
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The War Years
With the acceptance of the first buildings by the camp
commander, Col. Wilfrid M. Blunt, the war-time post was in
business. Two days later, on June 4, 1942, Maj. Gen. William
H. Gill arrived to assume command of the 89th Infantry
Division. The first troops of the 89th arrived from
Jefferson Barracks, Missouri on June 15 and one month later
the division was activated. During World War II, a total of
104,165 soldiers trained at Camp Carson. Along with three
other infantry divisions--the 71st, 104th and 10th
Mountain--more than 125 units were activated at Camp Carson
and over 100 other units were transferred to the mountain
post from other installations. The camp trained nurses,
cooks, mule packers, tank battalions, a Greek infantry
battalion and an Italian ordnance company--soldiers of any
and every variety. Toward the end of the war, after the
departure of the divisions and established units, Camp
Carson trained replacement troops and provisional companies.
The peak troop strength of the installation was in late 1943
when approximately 43,000 military personnel were stationed
at the camp.
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The Army Mules
The first shipment of Army mules arrived here by train from
Nebraska on July 30, 1942. The men of the 604th and 605th
Field Artillery (Pack) had to take the wild mules, break
them, and train them to carry a field pack over almost
inaccessible terrain. It took six to eight weeks to break
and train a mule and the battle could be spectacular.
The mule was first introduced to the feel of the rigging.
Later, heavier and heavier packs were placed on him until he
got used to the load. Almost every Army unit has a
goldbricker and so did the mules. His name was Useless, and
he was assigned to the 602nd Field Artillery. They tried to
turn him into a good "soldier", but it was useless. He was
first a pack mule. Then he became a messenger mule. Then he
was hitched to a wagon and used to draw hay, but even hay
hauling was too much for Useless. The mules even contributed
to the construction of the NORAD Combat Operations Center.
Two were hired to haul cargo in areas beyond the reach of
machines. The mules were paid $40 each while their keepers
were paid $2.
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Hambone
No story of Army mules is complete without a brief note on
Hambone. Hamilton T. Bone was the pride of the 4th Field
Artillery Battalion (Pack). Year after year, he carried the
First Sergeants of the 4th up Ute Pass to Camp Hale or along
the foothills of the Rockies to Cheyenne, Wyoming for the
Frontier Days Rodeo. His silvery-white coat and entertaining
antics as a jumper won him fame in July 1949 when Life
Magazine printed a feature story on the four-footed soldier.
After serving 13 years at Carson, Hambone was retired
involuntarily along with the other mules. He spent his
retirement years as a star attraction with the Pikes Peak or
Bust Rodeo and the Pikes Peak Range Ride. In the summer of
1970 Hambone showed signs of advanced age, and he was
returned to Fort Carson for the "last mile" a few months
prior to his death on March 29, 1971. Feelings for Hambone
ran deep, and his death made newspaper headlines locally. He
was buried with appropriate military honors in front of
Division Artillery Headquarters. The legendary Hambone is
still acknowledged as king of a great era. A memorial, made
of stone quarried on the reservation, was erected over his
grave. The saga of the Army mule and an Army tradition came
to an end at Fort Carson on December 15, 1956, when Battery
A of the 4th Field Artillery Battalion (Pack) was re
designated, and the 35th Ouartermaster Company (Pack) was
inactivated. More than 322 mules marched into retirement to
be replaced by helicopters. Until the mule barns were razed
in 1970 to make way for a unique central maintenance
facility, pack mules returning to the post for ceremonial
events would head directly toward the familiar surroundings
of their former stalls.
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The POW Camp
The internment camp, opened on the first day of 1943, was
later re designated a POW camp. Located just inside Gate 3
between the service and supply area and Highway 115, it
originally housed 3,000 prisoners. In 1945, an additional
5,000 prisoners were housed in barracks located east of
Pershing Field in the area now occupied by Division
Artillery. A total of nearly 9,000 German, Italian, and some
Japanese prisoners of war were interned at Camp Carson
during World War II. During 1944, POWs alleviated the
manpower shortage in Colorado by doing general farm work,
canning tomatoes, cutting corn, and aiding in logging
operations on Colorado's Western slope. They earned 80 cents
a day. In the winter months at Carson, they worked in the
Ouartermaster Laundry and other places on and off post.
About 3,650 POWs worked at 17 branch camps located
throughout the state. At Camp Hale, near Leadville, about
400 of the most incorrigible members of Field Marshal Erwin
Rommel's Afrika Corps were confined under tight security.
Each of the compounds of the camp had a canteen where
prisoners could purchase personal necessities and a few
luxuries. The prisoners built the canteens and made their
own furniture in a prison woodworking shop. The prisoners
also published their own newspaper, a 20-page mimeograph
magazine-size publication called "Die PW Woche." The paper,
printed in German, was staffed by seven of the internees.
The staff had many American newspapers and magazines for
reference purposes. Restrictions imposed on the paper were
few. There was no board of censors as such, but Camp Carson
personnel discussed the paper with the prisoners before it
was composed. A cemetery was set aside for POWs who died
here. After the war, their bodies were shipped to their
homelands. Only one POW strike is recorded. The day after
the war in Europe ended, Americans took all the food and
cigarettes out of the canteen. The only items left were
books and papers, and the POWs were decidedly miffed. The
strike ended a couple of days later when the prisoners were
told that if they returned to work, food and cigarettes
would be returned to the canteen. In January, 1946, there
were still a large number of German prisoners at Carson. By
July 21, 1946, all had been returned to Europe or released.
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Camp Hale and
Mountain and Cold Weather Training
Construction of Camp Hale, named for Brig. Gen. Irving Hale,
began in April 1942 and was completed that November. The
camp, located about 20 miles west of Leadville, Colorado,
was the first U.S. training post for mountain troops. The
Mountain Training Command was activated at Camp Carson on
September 2, 1942, but was moved to Camp Hale in November,
just in time for the arrival of the 10th Mountain Division.
An increased need for troops trained in the art of mountain
warfare led to the formation of the 10th Mountain Division,
a unit devoted to moving appropriate weapons over
mountainous terrain in any kind of weather. The 10th was
initially trained by Norwegian General (then Colonel) Dagfin
Dahl at Camp Hale. In 1946, with the return home and
deactivation of the 10th, the doctrine learned in combat and
during previous years of experimentation and training was
kept alive by the creation of the Mountain and Cold Weather
Training Detachment at Camp Carson. The Army assembled at
Carson the best of its civilian mountaineering technical
advisors. From 1947-51, training was extended by the school
and the Detachment to such units as the 14th and 38th
Regimental Combat Teams. In addition, a special
battalion-level combat team for Operation Sweetbriar in the
Sub-Arctic, nine Ranger companies and many civilian
components were trained. Painful experience in Korea and
realization of the scope of American commitments in Europe
established the need for broader mountain training. This
need was met by the Mountain Training
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Mountain and Cold Weather Training Command was the only
unit of its kind in the Army. The mission of the MCWTC was
two-fold: to provide technical assistance in mountain and
cold weather training for selected infantry regiments and
their supporting units, and to develop mountain warfare
doctrine, tactics and techniques by conducting extensive
research and special projects in both summer and winter
phases. The foundation of all training for the command was
the requirement that troops be able to maneuver over the
most rugged terrain in the worst weather. This demand was
satisfied by intensified instruction in mountain walking,
balanced climbing, party (roped) climbing, cliff evacuation
of wounded soldiers, rappeling, and construction of hauling
lines and the use of ropes. Methods of supply by animals,
man packs and the M-29 Cargo Carrier (Weasel) were also
taught.
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Cold weather training focused on the problems of mobility
over snow and survival under extreme winter conditions.
Winter tactics and combat in extreme cold were also taught.
In 1953 and through part of 1954, the MCWTC trained a cycle
of 330 trainees every six weeks. These hand-picked soldiers
then passed on their knowledge to others. In July 1957,
MCWTC was transferred to Fort Greeley, Alaska, and Camp Hale
became a training site for Carson ski teams. Camp Hale was
declared excess to Army needs and closed in June 1965. In
trade for Camp Hale, the Army acquired land on Carson's
southern border.
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Medical
Services
To provide immediate medical care for Camp Carson's
soldiers, a Station Hospital was opened in August 1942. With
a 2,000 bed capacity and 11 square miles of floor space, the
Carson Hospital Center was the largest in the country during
WW II. During their existence, the combined general and
convalescent hospitals cared for more than 30,000 patients.
The staff consisted of three Women's Army Corps (WAC)
hospital companies, about 2,000 civilians, and hundreds of
doctors, nurses and medical corpsmen. In the fall of 1945, a
temporary separation center was established at the hospital.
About 9,000 soldiers from installations in a four-state area
were processed for discharge from the Army through this
separation center. In addition to being a general and
convalescent hospital, Carson Hospital Center was a major
training center. The Army Nurse Training Center, activated
on October 23, 1943, trained more than 3,000 civilian nurses
in Army nursing techniques in less than two years. A large
number of field, evacuation and general hospitals, and
medical ship platoons were activated, trained and shipped to
ports of embarkation by Camp Carson. When the war ended, the
Camp Carson Hospital Center was inactivated. In its place,
the 400 bed Station Hospital continued treatment of patients
scheduled to be released before May 31, 1946. With the
outbreak of the Korean War, the hospital was expanded to
1,500 beds. In addition to a greatly increased patient load,
in July 1951 it was asked to assist the Camp Carson
Separation Center. In a little more than two years, hospital
personnel were responsible for complete physical
examinations of more than 100,000 soldiers.
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Post War
Activities at Camp Carson were greatly reduced following
World War II. Thousands of soldiers were separated from the
service or sent overseas for occupation duty, units were
inactivated, and the prisoners of war were repatriated. By
April 4, 1946, the military strength at the Mountain Post
had dropped to around 600, not including 320 patients in the
hospital. It appeared that Camp Carson would be closed.
However, in mid-April 1946 the War Department announced that
the camp would remain open and the troop strength increased.
The 38th Regimental Combat Team was transferred to Camp
Carson at the end of April 1946, and the 611th Field
Artillery Battalion (Pack) arrived the following month.
During the next few years, the 14th and 39th Regimental
Combat Teams, the 4th Field Artillery Battalion (Pack), the
11th Armored Cavalry Regiment and the 313th Engineer
Construction Group were stationed at Camp Carson. The 40th
Field Artillery Group was formed here early in 1951.
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Families come
to Carson
During World War II, Carson was filled with soldiers who
came here to be trained quickly before going overseas. There
were no facilities for dependents. Families had to fend for
themselves. By the late 1940s--with the war over--
assignments stabilized. A large block of two-story barracks
was converted into apartments for families of enlisted men.
They were concentrated in an area near where the junior high
school now stands. By the mid-50s Carson was taking a hard
look at existing structures that could double as housing for
officers. The entire east wing of the hospital had been
closed following the Korean War. It was decided that there
were enough empty wards to create 36 sets of officers
quarters. The quarters in the hospital were fairly large.
The "apartment" occupied by the deputy post commander
contained 3,450 square feet and had nine bedrooms, nine
baths and two kitchens.
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Using every possible building on the post that could be put
into service as quarters, housing officials permitted an
enlisted man's family to live in one of the old Mary Ellen
ranch houses. The family accepted the quarters despite the
fact that the building had no utilities. As familiar as we
are with the modern Army post and facilities for families,
many of these conveniences are relatively new. Army
Community Services, as we know it, was not created until the
mid-60s. The first school, housed in a World War II
building, opened in September 1954, and a permanent
elementary school was started in August 1956.
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Fire And Flood
Due to the dry climate, every year there are several fires
on post, but only two have caused extensive damage. In
January 1943 the post was hit by a fire which was driven by
nearly hurricane force winds. In the POW camp area 23
buildings were completely destroyed. In all, the fire caused
over $1 million in damages. Seven years later, on January
17, 1950, the worst fire to strike the post started in the
Broadmoor area and was driven eastward by 50 mile-per-hour
winds to Camp Carson. By 5 a.m. Carson troops were moved to
the northern part of the post to fight the fire. Gusts of 80
to 90 mph vaulted the fire across Highway 115. Soldiers
armed with nothing but burlap bags and pack shovels brought
the flames under control in that area. Post engineer
bulldozers cut a fire break across the northern part of the
post in front of the abandoned prisoner-of-war area. The
flames leaped the cut and burned down the POW barracks.
Including the POW buildings and some warehouses more than 33
buildings were leveled.
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The winds then blew the fire all over the post. Fires
appeared where there were no men or equipment to fight them.
By mid morning, civilian volunteers and fire fighting
equipment from surrounding towns came to Carson's aid. The
NCO housing area was evacuated, the families sent to Pueblo,
Colorado. At one point it looked as if the Carson Hospital
would have to be emptied. At noon the entire camp appeared
to be in danger of being destroyed. At dusk the wind died
down, and the fires were finally extinguished by midnight.
However, by that time 92 buildings were totally destroyed
and two others were heavily damaged. Total damage was
estimated at $3 million. Approximately 150 soldiers and
civilians were treated for minor burns and an additional 21
were hospitalized. One soldier died that day, and seven
soldiers and one civilian died later of burns received
fighting the blaze.
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Nine streets at Fort Carson were named in honor of the
victims of the fire. They were: Harley McCullough, a 14 year
old junior high school student who answered a radio appeal
for volunteers; WO William J. Tripp; Cpl. Kenneth Watson;
Pvt. Marvin Tevis; Pvt. Lawrence Elwell; Cpl. Bobby Coleman;
Pvt. William Rau; Pvt. Robert Moore; and Pvt. Joseph A.
Weston.
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Probably the worst disaster in the history of Colorado
occurred in June 1965 when a flood caused property damage in
excess of $100 million and the loss of several lives.
Although the damage to Fort Carson was not great, troops and
equipment were used to aid suffering civilians and to assist
in flood control. Hundreds of troops worked night and day
until the flood water subsided. Helicopters evacuated
thousands of stranded civilians, many of whom were given
medical care in the Fort Carson hospital. Food, blankets,
and cots were provided by the Army. On the weekend of July
24-25, 1965, Carson was struck by a major flood, plus
damaging and deadly flash floods. More than $160,000 in
damage was done. A 20-foot crest washed out a bridge on B
Street just outside Gate 4. The greatest damage was done to
the railroad spur to Kelker. Two walls of water washed out
450 feet of track. The NCO housing area was also damaged,
and the northern part of the fort was covered with mud and
silt.
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Butts Army
Airfield
In early 1949, landing an aircraft at Camp Carson was
extremely hazardous. A bumpy dirt strip on the edge of the
post was the only facility available. Dust often decreased
the visibility to zero. Appropriations in the fall of that
year allowed for the bulldozing of a new dirt strip and
construction of a small wooden operations shack. However,
aircraft maintenance had to be done in the open and the wind
still made landing and taking off hazardous. As a result of
the uncertain conditions at the Carson strip, the first Army
aircraft operated by post personnel were based in a single
hangar at Peterson Field. In 1954, air operations were moved
to an area now in NCO housing. Winds of 60 knots or better
were common, making the approach over the hospital complex
extremely tricky. There were no hangars either. When high
winds came up, trucks had to be parked beside the aircraft
to protect them. Two years later, air operations were again
relocated, this time to a mesa strip adjacent to today's
Butts Army Airfield. There was one building on Mesa Air
Strip, but it was dilapidated. Eventually a T-shaped pre-fab
hangar was constructed; but by the time it was completed, it
was already obsolete. Appropriations for modern improvements
were made in the fall of 1963. Three years and nearly $3
million later, Butts Field was a modern airfield.
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Carson and the
Movies
The filming of the RKO picture, "The Korean Story," later
named "One Minute to Zero," gave the post a few lighter
moments in 1951. Starring Robert Mitchum, the movie told the
story of an American Army officer in the early stages of the
Korean War. Fort Carson was chosen because much of its
terrain is similar to that in Korea. The engineers built
bridges, roads, and constructed a 4000-foot runway.
Transformation of the site, three miles south of the main
gate near Highway 115, was complete from straw thatched huts
to muddy, water-soaked rice paddies. Hundreds of Mountain
Post infantrymen were cast as UN troops.
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Parts of two other movies were shot at Fort Carson. The BBC
production of "The Oppenheimer Story" in 1980, and a movie
about Marilyn Monroe shot in the early 1980s.
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Following the movie, the area was used as a realistic
training setting for troops bound for Korea. The Korean
Valley was one of three realistic training sites constructed
at Carson for soldiers preparing for an overseas war. The
Swastika flew over Carson ground, and American troops were
fired upon by live ammunition during World War II at the
village of Beauclaire. Constructed by the 89th Division in
13 days, it was a replica of the French village of
Beauclaire, captured by the division in World War I. Built
to provide realistic training in house-to-house and street
fighting, it was attacked from different points so that no
two attacks were identical. The attackers were after the
Swastika on the courthouse; when it fell, the battle was
won. With the Vietnam War requiring realistic preparation,
Bung Cong Village, the third training area, was constructed.
Booby traps and mines were stressed at all eight stations in
the village. Troops experienced combat tactics with a
combined armored personnel carrier and helicopter assault.
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The Army Dog
Training Center
The Army Dog Training Center at Fort Carson was the only
training installation for military canines in the United
States. The center was located on the Mary Ellen Ranch,
within the confines of the Carson reservation. The dogs, in
training for eight to twelve weeks, graduated in one of
three specialties: scout, messenger or sentry. Messenger
dogs had two handlers and were trained to run from one man
to another upon command. They were capable of carrying
messages, food, ammunition and medical supplies under all
conditions. Scout dogs were trained to work with line units
where their sense of smell would detect the enemy. Sentry
dogs were the only type taught to attack men. They were
trained at Carson to patrol a given area such as a warehouse
or ammo dump and attack any intruder who entered their post.
Fort Carson lost the Army Dog Training Center in 1957 when
the job of training sentry dogs was transferred to the Air
Force.
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The Korean War
With the onset of the Korean War, activities at Carson were
increased. A large number of Reserve and National Guard
units were called to active duty and stationed at the
Mountain Post. The largest of these was the 196th Regimental
Combat Team from the South Dakota National Guard, which
arrived at Carson in September 1950. Also stationed at
Carson were more than 20 engineer and artillery battalions
and several miscellaneous companies and detachments.
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The Camp Carson Separation Center was activated on July 5,
1951. It had the responsibility for separating Korean War
veterans from the service or transferring them to other
installations in the United States. By the end of 1953, the
center had processed more than 100,000 soldiers.
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Camp Carson
Becomes Fort Carson
Colorado Springs was just beginning to recover from the
recession of the early 1950s when word came that Carson was
to become a fort. In the wake of President Truman's abrupt
termination of the Korean War and subsequent budgetary cuts,
it was thought that Carson could not survive, even as a
fort. It was true that the 31st (Dixie) Division had been
transferred to Carson in February 1954 from Camp Atterbury,
but that was only because Atterbury was closed. The 31st was
re designated as the 8th Infantry Division on June 15, 1954.
During 1955 the 8th (Golden Arrow) Division trained more
than 25,000 soldiers for other units in the United States
and abroad. In spite of the nation's emergence from war to
peace, there were approximately 25,000 troops at Carson,
plus about 2,000 civilian employees. On the other hand, no
new construction had been approved which might indicate what
lay in the post's future. As far as the government's
investment in buildings was concerned, in 1954 the Army
could have scrapped every structure on post without
incurring the censure of a single taxpayer. All buildings on
post had long since passed their life expectancy of five
years.
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The first inkling that Carson might become a fort was
contained in a newspaper article which stated that Congress
had authorized $13,427,000 for construction of 1,000 sets of
family quarters, the first on post. At the same time,
construction of a new NCO mess was announced. Congress also
approved $3,582,000 for new barracks and bachelor officer
quarters. On August 27, 1954, when Carson became a fort, the
town of Colorado Springs cheered. Many remembered the bleak
economy of the pre-war days, when jobs were few, houses
stood vacant, and summer income from tourists had to stretch
across a long winter. With permanent military payroll the
prospects looked good. The joy did not last, however. The
8th Division went to Germany, under "Operation Gyroscope,"
and traded posts with the 9th Division in 1956. The 9th
Division reorganized and went Pentomic, acquiring a nuclear
capability. Regiments were retired, and battle groups formed
into brigades. An active training center continued to turn
out new soldiers. By February 1960, the 9th Division had
trained approximately 85,000 recruits and 17,000 advanced
individual trainees since its arrival at Carson.
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Then came the cutbacks. The Korean War was history, the
Department of Defense had to cope with budget cuts, and the
nation once again stacked arms. Just as tales of
rattlesnakes and knee-deep year-round snow had almost
stopped Camp Carson in 1941, so reports of high respiratory
ailment rates in Colorado Springs came close to wiping out
Fort Carson in 1958-59. Carson had a flu epidemic and 1,000
people were in the hospital during that time. Efficiency
experts argued that Carson was off the beaten path, too
remote from main transportation arteries and population
centers. Shipment of supplies and training of troops could
be done much more economically at more central posts. Proud
units of the 9th Division were inactivated one by one. When
Brig. Gen. Ashton Manhart came to assume command of the 9th
Division and Fort Carson in May 1960, he found the "old
reliables" consisted of three men: himself, his aide and his
driver. During 1960 and most of 1961, the 2nd United States
Army Missile Command (Medium) was the only major unit at
Fort Carson. Houses were hard to sell. Men transferred out
of Carson were eager to unload their homes for closing
costs. Security, which had been created only a few years
before, seemed doomed to become a ghost town. The community
braced for the worst as Forts Chaffee and Polk began closing
operations. The McNamara list of base closings did, although
not known at the time, include Fort Carson. Then the Cuban
Missile Crisis and the Berlin Blockade brought justification
to reactivate two more divisions. With the evaluation board
when it came to Colorado Springs was Maj. Gen. John A.
Heintges. He looked over the reservation and was impressed.
The next morning, unable to sleep, he rose early at the
Broadmoor Hotel and took a walk. In the beauty of the
Colorado morning he decided that Carson should remain open.
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Aboard the plane returning to Washington, over a game of
poker, the members of the board talked. Maj. Gen. Heintges
argued for keeping Fort Carson open and making it the home
of one of the new divisions. Little did he know that he
would return within two years to command both the post and
the division. The manpower came from the 2d Missile Command,
which had been transferred from Fort Hood after the 9th
Division was inactivated. The missile command was
inactivated to man the Training Center in August 1961. When
the Training Center had turned out enough basic and advanced
trainees, a total of 29,597, the 5th Infantry Division was
formally reactivated on February 19, 1962. Brig. Gen. Ashton
H. Manhart was its first commander. The Training Center was
then transferred to Fort Polk, Louisiana. The 5th was the
Army's first mechanized infantry division to be organized
under the "ROAD" (Reorganization Objectives Army Division)
concept. The problems of training a mechanized division
triggered the need for more land. In 1965, Fort Carson
acquired 24,577 acres of state land (leased since 1942) by
trading it for federal land located at the Lowry Bombing
Range east of Denver. In 1965 and 1966, a total of 78,741
acres of land were acquired south of the original
reservation at a cost of approximately $3.5 million. This
consisted of 45,236 acres purchased from private
individuals, 22,694 acres of state land traded for more land
at the Lowry Bombing Range, and 7,668 acres purchased from
the Colorado School of Mines. An additional 2,871 acres were
acquired without cost from the Department of the Interior in
trade for Camp Hale. These additions brought Fort Carson to
its current size of 138,523 acres. On March 7, 1966, Camp
Red Devil was opened. The camp was the first year-round
training area at Fort Carson for soldiers in a field
environment. The base camp, which could accommodate as many
as 950 soldiers, is located south of the main post off
Highway 115.
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Vietnam War
Period
Beginning in 1965, the war in Vietnam had an ever-increasing
impact on the Mountain Post. Training for Southeast Asia
became the priority at Fort Carson. In 1966, 14,000
Carson-trained soldiers were sent to Vietnam. In 1967, 9,000
soldiers were transferred; and about 6,000 went in 1968.
During the years 1965-1967, 61 units were activated at Fort
Carson. By far the largest unit transferred was the 1st
Brigade of the 5th Infantry Division (Mechanized). The
brigade, called "Task Force Diamond," was airlifted directly
to Da Nang in July 1968 in the second largest airlift in
history. By the end of 1967, activities at Fort Carson had
risen to a higher level than at any time since World War II.
In October 1965 the military strength was 9,658; in March
1967 it was 24,735. The Army civilian strength went from
1,337 in March 1965 to 2,445 in July 1967. The economic
impact of Fort Carson on the State of Colorado rose from
approximately $55 million in 1964 to $100 million in 1967.
Fort Carson has never been isolated from the rest of the
nation. Events at the Mountain Post reflect the mood of the
country and the Front Range. In the late 1960s, relations
between the post and the city of Colorado Springs hit an
all-time low. This corresponded to the growth in nationwide
anti-war protests. To add to the problem, racial incidents
were not uncommon at Fort Carson during this period. The
situation was weathered with the combined efforts of the
post commanders and the Colorado Springs community and
business leaders. As the U.S. involvement in Vietnam
decreased, inevitable cutbacks again began taking place. In
November 1970, the 4th Infantry Division, eight days senior
to the 5th, was ordered to relocate to Fort Carson. The real
significance of the announcement to the people of Colorado
Springs was not so much which division would be based at
Fort Carson, but that the Pentagon had decided to keep the
post open. The impact of the Mountain Post at that time was
$200 million annually in the Pikes Peak Region.
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Carson 1970s
to the Present
By January 1973 the economic impact of Fort Carson on the
Pikes Peak area was over $340 million annually. The average
military population was 20,400 and the post employed about
2,900 civilian workers. The average soldier was changing,
and by June of that year more than 50 per cent of the troops
at Carson were volunteers. Army women were part of the
Mountain Post since its beginning, but it wasn't until a WAC
Company was organized in 1972 that they had any real impact
on Fort Carson. Organized with one officer and seven
enlisted soldiers, the company grew to 300 by the end of
1973 and to more than 1,500 just two years later. Fort
Carson, always an active and visible part of the Front
Range, began to become even more involved with community
relations programs. Project MAST or Military Assistance to
Safety and Traffic, started in the summer of 1970, was a
life saver on the front range. Other Army projects included
a new hospital wing for the Navajo Indians at Crownpoint,
New Mexico; a dam and reservoir for the San Isabel Scout
Ranch; and many graded baseball diamonds--all constructed by
Carson engineers.
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Fort Carson undertook its most ambitious community relations
program at Center, Colorado, 170 miles from the post in the
San Luis Valley. Abandoned buildings were torn down. Roads
were surveyed and resurfaced. An unsanitary dump was closed,
while a new one was built; and the city hall was also
restored. Hundreds of soldiers participated, volunteering to
work after duty hours in a variety of off-post projects.
They cleaned up communities and worked with the Boy Scouts.
When the El Paso County Legal Services Office was forced to
cut its staff, Fort Carson volunteers rushed to fill the
void.
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Soldiers extended the linguistic resources of Fort Carson to
the community by organizing and teaching a "law enforcement
in Spanish" course to local Anglo policemen. The
effectiveness of the program attracted the attention of
agencies as far away as Los Angeles. Soldiers worked with
the Colorado School for the Deaf and Blind, the Virgil
Robbins Home for Boys, the Iglesia Head Start Program, the
Rocky Mountain Rehabilitation Center, and many other such
agencies. All of this was done in spite of record-breaking
personnel turnover. Far from sapping the combat readiness of
the Iron horsemen, the vigorous community relations program
significantly enhanced individual morale and unit esprit de
corps. In addition, the individual and unit involvement in
community relations paid visible dividends in training
realism.
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VOLAR
In the fall of 1970, Fort Carson was officially notified
that it would be an initial test site for the Modern
Volunteer Army concept. The 18-month field test, aimed at
creating an environment conducive to an all-volunteer Army,
started at the Mountain Post in January 1971. The best of
the test programs would be incorporated into Regular Army
budgeted programs. Initially Carson was awarded $5 million
to support the test program. The money was used to increase
recruitments and retain active soldiers by improving the
quality of Army life. The list of VOLAR projects included:
coffee houses, barracks cubicles and furniture, mobile
classrooms, alcohol and drug programs, outdoor recreational
areas, an enlisted men's council, a racial harmony council,
a fine arts program, package ski trips, cash awards for
achievement and an off-post guest house. The overall VOLAR
program, aimed at eliminating the need for the draft by July
1, 1973, had a major impact at Carson. Living conditions
were improved. Pay was increased. Training was upgraded and
made more relevant. Communications were also improved.
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Communications played a vital role in VOLAR. The post
newspaper, The Mountaineer, was augmented by other
publications. A Spanish newspaper, Adelante, was published
to reach individuals who spoke English as a second language.
Soldier's Bag was for the troops, and Over The Back Fence
was for spouses. A large number of organizations produced
publications that were unique to their area of interest. The
enlisted men's council made quality-of-life recommendations
to the command.
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VOLAR ended officially at Fort Carson on June 30, 1972. A
large number of VOLAR projects have been discarded, however
many of them continue to have an important role in today's
Army.
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Pinon Canyon
During 1974 the need for additional land for training began
to receive considerable emphasis. The plan was to acquire
the needed land in yearly increments. The total,
approximately 74,000 acres, was located on the east and
southwest border of Fort Carson. The citizens of the Pueblo
area voiced considerable opposition to the expansion,
particularly the proposed use of the Pueblo Reservoir for
amphibious training. Carson's efforts to obtain more
training land involved considerable interaction with the
local civilian communities. Following public hearings,
Colorado Governor Richard Lamm appointed a 12-member
committee to submit a report in the spring of 1976. Due to
additional Department of the Army requirements that all land
expansion proposals be supported by analytical study, a
comprehensive study to analyze the division's needs was
completed in 1978. The study determined that a 129,000 acre
shortfall existed. Additional offers were considered by the
Army. Pinon Canyon, consisting of 245,000 acres and located
some 100 air miles southeast of the fort, was selected. The
land purchase was completed on September 17, 1983. The cost
was approximately $26 million. An additional $2 million was
used for relocation of 11 landowners and for school bond
relief. Approximately one half of the Pinon Canyon Maneuver
Site was acquired through the legal process of condemnation.
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PCMS was opened for training in the summer of 1985. Units at
Fort Carson are rotated to the site for maneuver training
and preparation for the National Training Center at Fort
Irwin, California. Expansion of the training site includes
the construction of a dirt air strip, additions to the
cantonment area, and a vehicle maintenance facility. The
Environmental and Natural Resource Program for the Pinon
Canyon Maneuver Site is unique within the Department of
Defense. The operation of this important maneuver training
site was planned to provide for the continuing balance
between the military and national resource protection. The
resource protection program is divided into six primary
areas: the study and protection of wildlife; plant and soil
conservation; water quality; the impact of training on
archaeology and cultural resources; and the effect of sound
on the environment in the Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site. |
