The Lacys Come to Palisade

They spent the first night down by the river. Muddy water from the Colorado flowed past the willows and tamarisk, and mosquitoes swarmed hungrily around their meager campsite. They had pulled a camp trailer from Kansas, and that's what the small family slept in. This was a new place with new surroundings, a long ways from their old home in Kansas. The evening must have been peaceful, with the subtle sound of a creeping river and dark shadows of forlorn cliffs. Claude, who was just a young boy, remembered that first night for the rest of his life.

Earl and Garnette had brought their little family to Palisade, Colorado in search of work, most likely at one of the coal mines or in the peach orchards. Earl's brother and father already lived there, but they didn't know where. The next day they found his brother, Howard, and learned that he lived in some cabins near the Garfield Coal Mine. They quickly moved the camp trailer next to Howard's cabin, and there they began a new life on the western slope of the Rocky Mountains. The year was 1937.

The Lacy Family at the Garfield Mine in 1937. (L-R) Earl Jr., Earl Sr., Garnette (holding Myrt), Claude.

Earl Lacy is my great-grandfather. I would like to have met the guy, but he died before I was born. However, colorful stories of him abound. He was a tough man who wrestled in the carnivals, as well as a gentleman with the touch of a teddy bear. He loved to drink, which led to a lot of fights, which, in turn, produced so many colorful stories.

A couple years ago I came to Palisade with the idea of learning a little more about my great-grandfather and the rest of the Lacys who called this place home for nearly ten years. I was able to visit a few of the locations that I had read about in our family history, putting an image with the story.

Coal mining was a big part of our family history, especially around Palisade. I remember my grandpa, Claude, pointing at the Book Cliffs on the north side of I-70 and telling stories about his father working in the mine. All the stories and references that I've heard him tell refer to the Garfield Mine. But when I went to Palisade and talked to the people at the city office building, they had never heard of a Garfield Mine. Instead, they knew well of the Gearhart Mine, which is in the same area of the Book Cliffs. Whether the Gearhart and Garfield are the same mine, or two different entities, I may never know. But on this day, the Gearhart Mine served my purpose just fine.

Gearhart Mine in Palisade, Colorado.

A lightly used lane, with the distinct name of “35 8/10 Road”, ducks beneath the freeway and comes to a car park at the foot of Mt. Garfield Trailhead. The hiking trail steeply climbs the Book Cliffs, past old mining debris from the Gearhart Mine, and eventually leads to Mt. Garfield, a prominent summit along the top of the cliffs. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to make the arduous climb, but I did take a moment to get a feel of this place that was nearby where my great-grandfather worked.

Between 1930 and 1968, the Gearhart mine produced 172,000 tons of coal. Once the coal was mined from underground workings high on the palisade, the ore would be transported down the mountain via an areal tramway to a tipple at the foot of the hill. My grandpa told me stories of their high-tech system, and how his dad used to grab the tail of a mule to climb the steep hill:

“Dad did that when he first started working in the coal mines with his two brothers. They were working in the Garfield Mine. One of them had to get up every morning and get the tail of that mule, and they went up to the top, and they had a loaded car up there and they'd turn it loose and it would pull everybody else up in an empty car, up to the top, and then they got off and started to work. But somebody had to walk up there in the morning, and it was steep. Then they took the mule in the mine and that's how they moved their cars around in there, their empty cars. So, they would load it on up and the mule would would pull it. It was pretty level. It would pull it out to the outside and they would hook it onto the hoist and take it down and it would pull the other car back up. Then they would take it down there and empty it. Then, the next time, another loaded car would pull the empty car back up to them. They didn't have much mechanized stuff in there. That was a steep trail going up there. When my dad first started out, he did that, and then when his younger brother, Bob, came along, they let him do that and Dad got to ride up. The mine is closed down now. There's nothing left there; just traces of it.”

Earl and Garnette Lacy family in 1943.

At the end of the day, miners would speed down the slope on the tramway, which was dangerous, but fast. They would leave the mule on top and it would always find its way down to the bottom to greener pastures. The mule would always be near the same spot where the first miner would find him in the morning, grab his tail, and work his way back to the top.

When Earl came home, he would often carry a bag of coal over his shoulder, which they would use to heat their home. When he left for work in the morning, he usually took the car, but if didn't start, then he would walk.

Earl worked in the Garfield Mine for several years, making about two dollars a day. This was on the tail of the Great Depression, and times were tough. Sometimes during the summer, the mine didn't work that well, so Earl went to work in the orchards where he would make from 50 cents to a dollar a day.

Peach Orchard in Palisade.

Palisade is known as “The Peach Capital.” Even in the early days of settlement, the locals learned that it was an excellent place for the cultivation of fruit, and especially peaches. The area has a milder climate and fewer freezes than anywhere else in the valley. The growing season averages 182 days, and 78% of those days are sunny. Irrigation allows for exact watering.

Mesa County drew many settlers from the mid-west, such as the Lacys who hailed from Kansas. Many others moved from Iowa to Palisade and today there is an Iowa Avenue. On the south side of Palisade, across the river, is Orchard Mesa, where groves of peach trees continue to thrive.

Claude's first job as a boy was in the peach harvest. He didn't pick the peaches, but hauled them in from the fields. It only last a couple of weeks. I wonder how many of the local boys work in the peach harvest now-days. When we drove on Orchard Mesa, we saw a tractor hauling a flat-bed trailer with ladders—and a bunch of Mexicans. 

Modern-day peach workers.

Trying to keep track of where the Lacys lived while in Palisade can be a difficult task for anyone who didn't experience it. Exact locations and dates can be vague, impossible to pinpoint, or sometimes appear to contradict themselves. The best I can come up with is that they moved into the area in 1937, lived there for a couple years until Earl and his family moved to Hasty, Colorado where he worked for a year on the Caddao Dam. They returned to Palisade around 1940. By 1944 they were living near Cameo, or at the mouth of Plateau Creek. A year or so later they moved back into Palisade where they lived in a house for their final two years before leaving for Utah in 1947.

As far as I know, Eri Lacy and his wife, Millie, lived at the mouth of Plateau Creek up until he died, and she continued to live there for a few years before moving into Palisade.  She lived in two locations in Palisade, including an apartment building. As for Earl's brothers, Bob and Howard, I don't know their exact time-line.

Earl Lacy home as it appeared in the year 2000.

The only structure that I've seen that I know they lived in was the last house in which they lived in Palisade. My Grandpa, Claude, is the one who showed it to me in 2000, and although I didn't write down an address, one can judge from the picture that it is close to the Book Cliffs, on the south side of I-70. When we returned in 2015, after my grandpa had passed away, we searched everywhere and couldn't find the house.

We do know, however, that Grandpa Claude attended Mount Lincoln School until the eighth grade. The white, flat-topped structure still stands, although it is now a residence. Back in the day, it was a two-storied building, with an auditorium on the west side, and a ball field on the east. 

Claude Lacy's class at Mount Lincoln School (1939).  Claude is on the front row, third from the left.

Mount Lincoln School in 2015 is now a residence.

The year 1941 began as a traumatic year for the Lacys, as their patriarch, Eri, died from a heart attack while packing a deer down a steep hill near his cabin at the mouth of Plateau Creek. Although only nine years old at the time, Claude remembered the incident vividly sixty-four years later:

“Eri Lacy stayed in a little place at the mouth of Plateau Creek. He liked to hunt and was always up on the mountain poaching deer. We used to go with him quite a bit. In fact, he died on the mountain poaching a deer. He was carrying it down the hill and died of a heart attack and my brother, Earl, was with him at that time, and I can remember that real plain where Earl was coming off the mountain top. He was coming off the side of the hill there yelling that Grandpa was dead. And my dad had been drinking and he was in there sleeping in the house. But he got up and he and Mom and Earl went back. They went up the mountain trail and he carried Grandpa most of the way down. Now, by the time he got him almost down, his two brothers, my uncles, Howard and Robert, they got up there then and helped him carry Grandpa. But Grandpa was only sixty-three years old, and that happened January 12, 1941.”

Decoration Day, 1941, at the grave of Eri Lacy.

Another day during that year that proved memorable was December 7, 1941, the day the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. In those days, it wasn't the television that leisurely entertained families in their living rooms, but the radio. The Lacys had a small radio that they listened to. Claude enjoyed programs such as The Green Hornet and The Shadow, and he remembers them coming on around eleven o'clock. On the Sunday morning of the attacks, he recalls getting ready to listen to his programs and being on the fight because they were all replaced with news coming from Pearl Harbor!

Abandoned structure in Cameo.

During our visit to Palisade, I knew that I wanted to visit the abandoned ghost town called Cameo. Nothing is here now, except a power plant and a few abandoned structures. Just a few miles north of Palisade, up De Beque Canyon, Cameo was once a small town associated with the Cameo Coal Mine. Earl and his family used to live in Cameo and Earl worked in the mine. Exactly where they lived, I don't know.

When we drove there, we took the exit from I-70 and crossed the Colorado River, then the railroad tracks, and then traversed a canal after passing a power plant on our left. We didn't go too much further, but far enough to get a feel of the place. On this day, it was hot and dusty. A couple of four-wheel drive vehicles passed us coming from up the canyon.

There is one story associated with Cameo that has always fascinated me. While Claude was living there, he and his friends got the idea that they wanted to go to a cabin back in the hills. One of his friends borrowed a horse and they packed all their gear on the unfortunate animal. It was wintertime and they got up to a place that was slick and the horse couldn't keep its balance. It slid back down and over the cliff with the pack and everything on it. The gear was scattered everywhere! Laughing about it years later, Claude said, “That poor horse. We should have known better than what we did. We didn't. I can see it right now. We started up that long hill there and it just couldn't keep its balance and started sliding down. Boy, it sure shot off there, off that hill! We never did get up to the cabin.”

The Lacys ran this service station at the mouth of Plateau Creek (1944).

During the fall of 1944, a new arrival was delivered to the Lacy family. Although she can't remember it, Aunt Alice does a good job describing the day she was born:

“My parents had a little service station and kind of a convenience store right at the junction of Plateau Creek and the Colorado River and I was born there on September 9, 1944 at about one o'clock in the morning. At the time, our cousin, Ronnie Coleman, was staying with us and when my mother went into labor, my brothers, Earl and Claude, and Ronnie, were sent to go get the doctor. Well, they couldn't get the car started. So they all three piled onto a mule that we had and rode into town to get a doctor. My mother had me really fast, so my dad delivered me. My sister Myrt always said that he dropped me on my head when I was born, but that's not the truth I'm sure. I don't know how long we lived there. We didn't live there very long after I was born. My Grandparents Lacy lived right up the canyon from us. It was probably two blocks (in length), and they had a little house up there. My grandpa Lacy had died by that time. He had died three years before I was born.”

Shortly after Alice was born, Earl and Garnette moved into town at Palisade with their four kids⸺Earl Jr., Claude, Myrt, and Alice. Alice recalls the front of the house being on street level, but the back had long stairs leading down to an alley. The house also had a chicken coop and outhouse. 

Palisade High School in 2015.

Palisade football team (1945). Earl is on back row, third from left; Claude on middle row, second from right.

At this time Claude made the transition from Mount Lincoln to Palisade High School. It was there, while as a freshman, that Claude began his wrestling career. It is true that their father, Earl, had been a professional wrestler, but of amateur wrestling, he knew very little. For me, this is a very pivotal time in our history because it is what continued the Lacy tradition of wrestling that continues to this day. In my family line alone, there have been five generations of Lacy wrestlers, with 100% of the males participating, and several State Championships. Even the females participate in stats-keeping. Without that one decision that my grandpa, and his brother, Earl, made to wrestle for Palisade High School, wrestling in the Lacy family may have fizzled out over fifty years ago.

The man responsible for coaching Claude and Earl Jr. was a former college wrestler by the name of Carl Cox. Claude recalls his first match that year, as a freshman. He wrestled 138 lbs. in Olathe, Colorado, and got beat. He would quickly rebound from his loss, and went on a roll until the end of the year, when he took third place at the State Championships in Denver. Back in those days, they didn't have classifications such as 1A, 2A, 3A etc. They were all grouped together. The little schools like Palisade wrestled with the big teams from Denver.

The following year, Claude wrestled 145 lbs. and didn't lose a match until the Western Slope Championships where he lost to a kid by the name of Alvis Fetters. The following week at the State Championships in Denver, Alvis Fetters got beat, and Claude defeated the kid who beat him. This would be the first of three State Championships for Claude.

Speaking of his older brother, Earl, Claude said, “He was just a one-time state champion in Utah. He didn't get started until he was a sophomore. If he would have been around and started wrestling as a freshmen, when I did, he would have been a two-time state champion. He came in fourth when he was a junior, and then came to Utah and became a state champion. He was a year older than me.”

Little Grandma Lacy (Millie) with Wolfie in 1946.

In 1947, Earl and Garnette Lacy, with their four kids, left Palisade for good and moved to Carbon County in Utah where Earl got a job at the Columbia Coal Mine near Draggerton. His brothers, Robert and Howard, eventually moved away also, but their mother⸺Little Grandma Lacy⸺stayed in Palisade for the rest of her days.

Even after leaving Palisade, the Lacys continued to call it home and would visit there often while Little Grandma Lacy was still alive. Aunt Alice tells a humorous story of these memorable trips back to Palisade:

“My mom would always drive so my dad could drink beer while we were going. It seemed like every time Mom and Dad and I would go to Colorado, they'd get in a fight, and they'd be just on the east side of Green River, and Mom would pull over and kick Dad out. And she and I would go on to Palisade—and we were going to visit his mother's house—and I can remember, clear as a bell, we would show up at her house and Grandma would say, 'Earl didn't make it again, huh?' And Mom said, 'No. He'll be here tonight or in the morning.” He'd hitchhike the rest of the way and stop wherever he wanted to. It happened just about every time we went.” ♠

Descendants of Eri Lacy at a park in Palisade, Colorado.

Sources

Barker, Alice Lacy. Interview by John Lacy, March 30, 2009.

Lacy, Claude. Conversation with John Lacy, June 17, 2000.

Lacy, Claude. Conversation with John Lacy, June 27, 2000.

Lacy, Claude. Interview by John Lacy, August 16, 2005.

Lacy, Claude. Interview by John Lacy, July 23, 2006.

Lacy, Claude. Interview by John Lacy, August 2, 2009.