Isabel Mace

Isabel Mace_Side A

Interviewed by Larry Fredrick and Ruth Whyte

December 17, 1996 at Toklat Lodge

C229_1996.014.0001

 

Larry Fredrick [00:00:04] You said that Walter was interested in a dog, and then he decided the dogs should be up here.

 

Isabel Mace [00:00:09] Yeah. In Aspen.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:00:10] Excuse me. Could I make an introduction?

 

Larry Fredrick [00:00:12] Sure, yeah.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:00:13] We’re, uh, Larry Fredrick and Ruth Whyte are interviewing Isabel Mace at Toklat Lodge on, um, today is Tuesday, December 17th, 1996. And, Larry, will you go ahead with your questions? Thank you. Isabel.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:00:31] Right. We were discussing the… how the Maces found Aspen. And interestingly, Walter Paepcke had met Stuart and wanted to adopt a puppy and… a husky, of course. And Walter mentioned that the dogs would be better suited for Aspen. And then you were talking about, uh, Walter offered you a place on Red Mountain, but obviously that’s too warm in the sunshine, facing south, so the dogs would not have enough snow. And then you were discussing about Walter Howell…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:01:08] Haug. H-A-U-G.

 

Isabel Mace [00:01:12] But anyway, so we… Stuart made a trip over to Aspen in November of ’47 and decided it wouldn’t work. There wasn’t any place for the dogs to be. And in the month later, in the middle of December of ’47, we got a call from Walter, from Haug, saying that Stuart should come back to Aspen. There was a gentleman there that he should talk to and that wished to talk to him. So, we took Lynne over to stay with her grandmother, who was living in Boulder at that time. We bundled Greg up, who was five, I think… no, no, no, three. And came over Loveland Pass in a snowstorm, in a jeep with a canvas top. And there was a car trail right in front of Stuart. And he says, “I’m going to follow this. I hope it stays on the road.”

 

Ruth Whyte [00:02:20] Well, we all have had that experience.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:02:23] Yeah, I’ve been in a few of those myself.

 

Isabel Mace [00:02:26] So we got into Aspen about 3:00 in the morning. It took us about 12 hours to get here.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:02:31] Wow. From Boulder?

 

Isabel Mace [00:02:33] Well, in a snowstorm, in a jeep, you know? Over Loveland Pass those days?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:02:38] You’re right. That’s understandable.

 

Isabel Mace [00:02:42] And we got, we put up at Hotel Jerome. Laurence Elisha was there then, wasn’t he?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:02:49] Yes. Pretty sure. Now, the dogs weren’t with you, though?

 

Isabel Mace [00:02:53] No, no, we came over to see… meet… to talk with this gentleman, whoever he was. And we had a meeting out at the Four Seasons Club.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:03:04] Oh, you don’t remember the name of this gentleman?

 

Isabel Mace [00:03:07] Oh. The what?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:03:07] You don’t remember the name of this gentleman?

 

Isabel Mace [00:03:09] Yeah, it was Ted Ryan.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:03:11] Oh, okay. I’m sorry.

 

Isabel Mace [00:03:12] Ted had come into Aspen and somehow or other got talking with Walter and arranged this meeting at the Four Seasons Club with Ted. And there were some people there, and the only people I can remember who were there were the Morrises. Rudy and Wendell.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:03:31] Oh, Morse. M-O-R-S-E.

 

Isabel Mace [00:03:33] Morse. Yes.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:03:33] Right. Okay.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:03:34] Rudy and Wendy. Wonderful. Oh…

 

Isabel Mace [00:03:36] They were at this meeting. I can’t remember why or the wherefore, but they were. But Ted had, of course, started the Highland Bavarian Lodge, and that was in ’36 that he opened it.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:03:55] Mhm. December of ’36.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:03:56] Right.

 

Isabel Mace [00:03:57] Because they were still building it in ’37. They were still working on it.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:04:02] They could have, but they did open it for Christmas guests.

 

Isabel Mace [00:04:04] Because a strange coincidence is that Stuart had been climbing in this area with his mentor, Karl Melzer. The goal was to climb all the 14,000 foot peaks in the United States, but they were at that time climbing the Colorado 14,000s, and they had just completed their climb of the 14,000s in this area up here, were the last ones, and they were coming down Ashcroft, and they saw this activity at this place, and they stopped there to see what was going on. And years later, we found out that Stuart and Ted had talked to each other at this time.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:04:48] Oh, how interesting. Yeah.

 

Isabel Mace [00:04:50] Now, I thought this was ’37. It could have been ’36 that he would have been a junior in high school. Um.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:04:59] Well, at that time, winter of ’36 would have been winter of ’37, so… We get our dates mixed up sometimes on the winters.

 

Isabel Mace [00:05:06] But when we came back to Aspen to meet Ted and whatnot, that… this didn’t come to surface until about two years before Ted died. This little incident.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:05:17] Oh, I see. Well, that’s interesting that it took that long to find that out. Okay. So, alright, so you talked to Ted Ryan…

 

Isabel Mace [00:05:24] Ryan, and, uh, I guess they had only tried to have accommodations and take people in at Highland Bavarian… you say ’36? Well, ’37…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:05:39] The winter of ’36 – ’37. But they obviously still could be building, finishing.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:05:44] They were adding on. Sure. Finishing it up. We’ve got photos of them standing in snow, putting roof beams on.

 

Isabel Mace [00:05:49] He had brought the Nielsens out to take care of their lodge.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:05:56] Oh, the ones that ended up doing The Epicure.

 

Isabel Mace [00:05:59] And so I guess… now I don’t know that Saville knows this. Maybe she doesn’t know the answer to this, but they only were open about a couple of years. And then the Nielsens went into town and opened up the bakery.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:06:10] Epicure. Yeah.

 

Isabel Mace [00:06:11] Yeah. The Epicure.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:06:13] What were their first names? Do you remember?

 

Isabel Mace [00:06:14] Camilla and Louie.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:06:16] Louie.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:06:17] Camilla and Louie. Okay.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:06:20] Yeah, I remember Lou.

 

Isabel Mace [00:06:22] And, uh… um, so the Highland Bavarian was empty, so to speak.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:06:28] I was wondering how long they kept…

 

Isabel Mace [00:06:30] It was only a couple of years, because… well, when we… Now, wait a minute. What? Where am I?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:06:39] Because they did build the boat tow, and everybody was skiing on Aspen Mountain.

 

Isabel Mace [00:06:43] Yeah.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:06:43] And they did have a trail on the lower level, the Roch Run.

 

Isabel Mace [00:06:47] Yeah.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:06:47] And of course, this is all before ’46 and then… so I was wondering if they had any guests that were interested in coming out here? I mean, out to the Highland Bavarian?

 

Isabel Mace [00:06:58] Well, there is a picture of Ruthie and Ted and the children in front of Highland Bavarian, a black and white picture somewhere.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:07:05] Well, do you think they, as a family, probably came out and stayed there?

 

Isabel Mace [00:07:09] Um, no. Uh, well, they might have come for the winter. But Ruthie told me that she did not want to come to Aspen because that gave her one more household that she had to take care of. And they already had three: one in… somewhere in North or South Carolina, I think, one on Fire Island, and the one in Connecticut.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:07:32] One on Fire Island?

 

Isabel Mace [00:07:34] Fire Island, which was the…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:07:35] In New York?

 

Isabel Mace [00:07:36] Yeah.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:07:36] Yeah. Fancy place.

 

Isabel Mace [00:07:37] Place for the people to go.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:07:40] Yeah.

 

Isabel Mace [00:07:41] And she did not want another household to have to manage.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:07:44] I don’t blame her.

 

Isabel Mace [00:07:45] I don’t either. So, they kind of withdrew, more or less, from the Aspen scene and raised a family in Sharon, Connecticut. And so the Highland Bavarian was open for renting.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:08:02] Oh.

 

Isabel Mace [00:08:03] And Ted led us there that winter of… Well we finally, we went back. He said we could live there and no other arrangements, rent-free.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:08:16] Mm. For taking care of it, basically.

 

Isabel Mace [00:08:19] Yeah. And, uh, so…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:08:24] Then you must have… that was December of…

 

Isabel Mace [00:08:27] So that was… you see that happened… this arrangement with Ted was made in December of ’47. We went back to Boulder, packed up and moved over in January of ’48…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:08:40] Okay. So it was the winter…

 

Isabel Mace [00:08:43] …to the Highland Bavarian Lodge.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:08:44] Okay. Okay. So you stayed there that winter?

 

Isabel Mace [00:08:46] Stayed there that winter, and Stuart would snowshoe up, and he was familiar with the area because he climbed here in the ’30s, you see?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:08:55] Oh, okay.

 

Isabel Mace [00:08:57] So he would come up on snowshoes, on dog team. And also he went to Aspen with the dog teams to try to drum up a little business. But, you know, Aspen…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:09:11] There wasn’t much here.

 

Isabel Mace [00:09:12] There wasn’t anything there. Curiosity was all. And we have to laugh because he would pull up in front of The Epicure, put the dogs down and sit there for 2 or 3 hours, I guess. And Louie was just trying to learn to bake at a high altitude, and he would give Stuart all of his failures that he brought up the hill. And that was a large part of our diet for the rest of that winter.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:09:39] Oh, wonderful. That’s a great story.

 

Isabel Mace [00:09:43] Besides that, Stuart did get a… went out and killed a deer, so we had some of that kind of food to eat.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:09:51] Well, wild game. You survive on the land. Um…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:09:56] So, you were established here in ’48, then? I mean, you’d actually come into the valley.

 

Isabel Mace [00:10:01] Yeah. In ’48. And then Stuart asked Ted about buying some land up here. And of course, you know the story, that was all tied up with Billy Fiske and Finn, Flynn and Rowan, Bob Rowan and, uh, they had all lost interest… or after the war… and actually the money to develop this after the war was astronomical, and none of them wanted to foot it.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:10:38] Right. Besides, Billy Fiske was dead, as we all know.

 

Isabel Mace [00:10:40] Yeah, Billy Fiske was dead.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:10:41] He was sort of the driving force.

 

Isabel Mace [00:10:43] Well, I wanted to ask you about this. Ted came to Aspen at the request… would it have been Flynn who was the son of a Colorado lawmaker, legislator or something?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:11:03] Well, T.J. Flynn was trying to help revive Aspen, and I think he basically was trying to get some of the mining going again.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:11:12] Right. He… Flynn, Sr. owned mining claims in Aspen. He had lived here in the earlier years, and he was in California. And apparently at a party, the discussion turned to building a ski area like the nice ones in Europe.

 

Isabel Mace [00:11:32] Well, you see, Ted had skied in the ’20s in Europe and in Canada.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:11:38] Right.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:11:40] At that time, I think that’s when he met Billy Fiske, in the ’20s in Europe. And they knew each other from skiing in Europe. And Billy Fiske wanted to create a ski area like here, and Sun Valley was in the works, but wasn’t still really developed yet. And so, we hear so many stories how T.J. and Billy Fiske got together. Once it was at a racetrack, and then it was at a party, you know, whatever. They got together. That was the main thing. And he was a little Irishman, very feisty, apparently. And he said, “You just got to come out and see this great place. It’s got mountains.” And you know, he just raved and raved. And so in order to shut him up, he said, “We’ll come, we’ll come.” It’s the story I heard.

 

Isabel Mace [00:12:36] Yeah. Well, alrighty. But they asked, they met Ted, and they all came out to Aspen to see what was going on. So, um, I guess the first effort they had was to do the Highland Bavarian.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:12:53] Right.

 

Isabel Mace [00:12:54] And then, uh…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:12:56] The other important thing is inviting Andre Roch and…

 

Isabel Mace [00:13:01] Andre Roch, they invited him…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:13:02] And Gunther…

 

Isabel Mace [00:13:03] …to come and survey and see where they should have their ski area.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:13:06] Right.

 

Isabel Mace [00:13:06] And of course, he got involved in town, too. But he told them that the best skiing at that time he had seen ever in America was Mount Hayden.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:13:16] Right.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:13:17] This is a sketch of what…

 

Isabel Mace [00:13:21] And so…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:13:22] …they proposed.

 

Isabel Mace [00:13:23] Yeah.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:13:25] And it would have… basically where we’re at would have been the base of the village for the ski area because they said this would be the one lift located right here that they could use, regardless of the weather conditions.

 

Isabel Mace [00:13:36] Well, it was to be up here where the Cookhouse is. That was the base.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:13:39] Right.

 

Isabel Mace [00:13:40] And go up to Mount Hayden.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:13:41] Right. And that would be the one they could use all the time. And the others… uh, apparently Mr. Roch was quite, uh, surprised at the altitude and the wind conditions.

 

Isabel Mace [00:13:55] Well, yeah, that would be, because the Alps aren’t that tall.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:13:58] Right. And they’re not used to timberline. And once you get above timberline, you’re a bit exposed.

 

Isabel Mace [00:14:03] But anyway, after talking with him and his recommendation, they decided to set, to move the operation from the Highland Bavarian up here.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:14:13] Oh, the operation up here, I see.

 

Isabel Mace [00:14:15] And they went back to Washington, D.C. to clear all the patents because they didn’t trust the county government.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:14:27] Pitkin County.

 

Isabel Mace [00:14:27] Pitkin County government. And they went back to Washington to make sure they had clear patents.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:14:34] Clear patents on what?

 

Isabel Mace [00:14:36] On the land they bought up here.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:14:37] Ah.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:14:38] Do you have any idea why they felt that way about the county? Did they…?

 

Isabel Mace [00:14:43] Well, even now, the county records are sometimes iffy. So what were they back then? More so. Not recorded right. Not surveyed right. I mean, as far as the county is concerned.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:14:59] Yeah. I was just curious if there was a specific reason or that they had previous experience…

 

Isabel Mace [00:15:04] Oh, I don’t, I don’t think so. Now I could be wrong.

 

Lynne Mace [00:15:08] I think it’s probably more likely that it was the outside people who came in, and perhaps the local yokels didn’t know what they were doing.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:15:14] Right. That’s… a typical position at that time was they didn’t trust the locals.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:15:19] Probably, it is true that, you know, these people did not know how…maybe didn’t know how to keep good records.

 

Isabel Mace [00:15:27] No, they didn’t.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:15:28] I mean, they weren’t trained. I mean, the knowledge wasn’t out there to to know how to really…

 

Isabel Mace [00:15:33] Back then, it was not important.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:15:36] And maybe not as important. They didn’t think.

 

Isabel Mace [00:15:38] It wasn’t important to the early miners. You know, the line was here.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:15:42] Yeah. He knows all about the miners.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:15:45] Yeah. Townsite issues.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:15:48] Can I ask one more? Um, well, since we’re in that sort of era, did you all meet… you must have met Andre Roch or did… was he gone by the time you came?

 

Isabel Mace [00:15:57] No, he was gone and we didn’t meet him until… when was he back here?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:16:01] Well, he came back, and I always forget what, exactly what year that was.

 

Isabel Mace [00:16:04] It’s been ten years ago?

 

Larry Fredrick [00:16:06] He was here in ’70…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:16:07] Oh, yeah. He was here ten years ago, but he also came back…

 

Isabel Mace [00:16:10] Well, now, I don’t remember meeting him before that.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:16:13] Oh, okay. You never met him before…

 

Isabel Mace [00:16:15] Maybe Stuart did.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:16:17] He was here in ’76, I know.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:16:20] He came back in ’76, yes, and then he came back for the 40th reunion of the Ski Company and the 50th reunion of the Ski Club. And this was the last time he was able to come back. Of course, he’s been… he’s unable to come for the 50th this year. But he did come back. Well, he was… the first year he was here, he stayed for quite a long time. And then he…. but he came back again just as… 1946, or probably ’45 – ’46.

 

Isabel Mace [00:16:58] See, we weren’t here in ’46.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:17:00] Yeah. I see.

 

Isabel Mace [00:17:01] So he was there…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:17:02] So that’s why you probably didn’t get a chance. All right. Let’s continue on up to where you moved. Then when did you start building this lodge?

 

Isabel Mace [00:17:09] Um, well, Stuart started coming up, seeing, through that winter of ’47 – ’48, to see the snow conditions and whether it was suitable to have the dogs up here, you know? How things worked. So then he asked if he could buy some property, and they were so messed up with everything, they couldn’t all get together and have a sale. But they said they’d lease it. So that’s what we’re on now.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:17:47] So then when did you, um…? So you stayed at the Highland Bavarian Lodge only one winter?

 

Isabel Mace [00:17:54] Yeah.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:17:54] …which is the winter of ’47 by the time you got up here.

 

Isabel Mace [00:17:58] Well, ’47 – ’48. It’s ’48 when we came in.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:18:02] Right. January ’48.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:18:03] ’48. Okay.

 

Isabel Mace [00:18:03] When we finally got here.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:18:04] ’48. So that summer…?

 

Isabel Mace [00:18:07] The following summer, we started building.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:18:10] ’48. Summer of ’48. And obviously, you finished it. It wasn’t as big as it is now.

 

Isabel Mace [00:18:17] No, no, the whole back end has been added on. Before the county was doing things. So…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:18:25] Right. Okay. So…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:18:31] So you were here because of the dogs. This was a good location.

 

Isabel Mace [00:18:36] It was a good location for them.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:18:38] But how were you going to survive economically?

 

Isabel Mace [00:18:42] Well, um, for a year after Stuart got out of the army, discharged, we got $100 a month…what?

 

Larry Fredrick [00:18:54] Discharge? War pension? Something?

 

Isabel Mace [00:18:55] Discharge, yeah. $100 a month for a year. And we were living on that, and Louie Nielsen’s bread. And, oh yeah, alrighty, um, Ted loaned us $10,000 to build with.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:19:13] Wow.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:19:15] That was a lot of money.

 

Isabel Mace [00:19:16] That was a lot of money.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:19:18] And you probably did most of it yourself. I mean, your children…

 

Isabel Mace [00:19:22] Yeah, well, Stuart did all…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:19:23] So then, when did the next child come along? Wasn’t that pretty soon?

 

Isabel Mace [00:19:27] Pardon?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:19:27] Well, after Lynne?

 

Isabel Mace [00:19:28] Well, year ’48, Alan was born, while we were building.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:19:32] So Alan was born here then?

 

Isabel Mace [00:19:34] Yeah. Alan was born in the old…old folk’s home?  {laughter}

 

Ruth Whyte [00:19:38] Hospital. Yeah. Okay. So now you had three. But, so… all right, so did you… when did you decide…?

 

Lynne Mace [00:19:47] Actually, Mother hasn’t answered Larry’s question.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:19:48] Sorry. Go ahead.

 

Lynne Mace [00:19:50] About how did you plan on making…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:19:51] Yeah. How did you plan on making a living when the money ran out?

 

Lynne Mace [00:19:54] This was built as a lodge.

 

Isabel Mace [00:19:55] Well, Ted gave us the 10,000, and so we figured we could do it. And Stuart was planning to take people on dog sled rides.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:20:03] Mhm.

 

Lynne Mace [00:20:04] And this was built as a lodge where people came to stay and to eat and to go on the dogsled rides.

 

Isabel Mace [00:20:09] Oh yeah. We had the lodging.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:20:11] Well, that’s what I was, that’s what I was going to ask.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:20:14] Yeah, that where I was trying to get to was…

 

Lynne Mace [00:20:15] This was a six-room lodge.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:20:16] Six-room lodge. Maybe the recorder can’t hear you.

 

Isabel Mace [00:20:19] Had room for 16 people, all crammed up, double deckers.  {laughter} And served meals.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:20:28] So did you get people up here that very first year?

 

Isabel Mace [00:20:32] That very first year, uh, no, not to stay, but there was a couple from Canada that came by, and I can remember in that little room in there, serving them some food. That’s all I can remember about them. Uh, well now, no. No, that was in ’48 when… that’s after we moved up here. After, so, you know, but we didn’t start building until the spring of ’48 and all summer. And Stuart rounded up most… it didn’t… well, the logs were all mining timbers that had been felled and stored in Glenwood Springs and were still there, and he was able to buy them for practically nothing. The redstone came from the Washington School that Waterman had taken down and were piled in his backyard.

 

Lynne Mace [00:21:38] And we have the cornerstone out on the terrace.

 

Isabel Mace [00:21:40] The cornerstone is on the terrace. The aspen, we logged off of the hillside across from the Highland Bavarian Lodge. And all of this had to go to a sawmill at the base of this side of Loveland to be processed.

 

Ruth Whyte Oh my.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:22:02] Now, if you were going to run this as a lodge, do you remember what you were going to charge people? Was it going to be by the night or by the week?

 

Isabel Mace [00:22:11] I can’t remember. I have a feeling that if we charged a nightly fee of $10, it was a lot.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:22:19] But that included meals because you were already, they were already up here.

 

Isabel Mace [00:22:22] Yeah.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:22:23] Now, did people start to come here? Did they stay for just a night or two, or did they stay for several days?

 

Isabel Mace [00:22:30] Yeah. Well, when we finally got opened in, I would say, well, it could have been the early winter of ’48 and ’49, um, because when we finally opened…. I know we, in the fall, when it started to snow, we still hadn’t moved in. And Stuart asked the county if they could open the road, and they said, “No, you don’t live there.” And that was a policy. Of course, they plowed wherever anyone lived. So we had a young man, Jack Zollinger, taking care of the dogs and uh..

 

Ruth Whyte [00:23:22] Jack Zollinger?

 

Isabel Mace [00:23:23] Zollinger.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:23:24] Okay.

 

Isabel Mace [00:23:25] He came up here with about 5 or 6 dogs. We had the heat in the building, and he came up with about 5 or 6 dogs and stayed. And Stuart called the county and said, “There’s someone living there now. Will you plow the road?” And they did.

 

Lynne Mace [00:23:44] Great.

 

Isabel Mace [00:23:47] So, uh…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:23:51] So when the people came up here, did they come to ski as well? Did they snowshoe or…?

 

Isabel Mace [00:23:58] Yeah, cross-country. Uh, there was an old timer, and I can’t remember his name. He was around for a long time that he used to come up. He was, of course, European. Um, and we really didn’t have the rooms fixed up. There were no doors, and there was still sawdust all over the place. But we had people come by and throw their bedrolls down, and uh… I suppose I was thinking what year it was. Barnard, Prissy’s husband… what? Who?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:24:34] Bob Barnard.

 

Isabel Mace [00:24:35] Bob?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:24:36] No. Oh, Prissy…

 

Isabel Mace [00:24:38] Prissy…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:24:40] Barnard.

 

Isabel Mace [00:24:42] Yeah, Barnard. Barnard Hut.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:24:43] The Barnard Hut, yeah. I can’t think of his first name. All I can think of is…

 

Isabel Mace [00:24:47] I can’t either, but anyway, he was a great cross-country enthusiast, and he would organize… and this may have been that winter of ’48… organized people to go cross-country skiing, and climbing Mount Hayden was all the rage. And they would come up here, and we would feed them breakfast at 3:00 in the morning. They would climb Mount Hayden, and as soon as… they had it all timed so as soon as the sun hit Mount Hayden, they would ski down and be back down here by 9:00 in the morning.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:25:24] Oh my gosh.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:25:27] My gosh.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:25:29] I have a question because, um, I didn’t come till later, but I used to hike up to Tagert Hut. What was the condition of Tagert Hut at that time? Was… obviously Stuart was familiar with that?

 

Isabel Mace [00:25:42] Well, yes, but Tagert Hut wasn’t anything until, uh, John Holden got hold of it and renovated it.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:25:51] Okay, so that was later in the ’50s.

 

Isabel Mace [00:25:53] Yeah, that was later.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:25:54] Okay, we’ll go back to the ’40s.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:25:56] Yeah. Now, okay, so now you’ve got some winter activity and you’re doing dog sleds and cross-country…

 

Isabel Mace [00:26:03] And we would take dog sleds. We had what we called the “Sergeant Preston.” No, no. Well, that wasn’t that soon. No, it was a little short trail around for $5.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:26:13] $5.

 

Isabel Mace [00:26:15] Now, the “End of the Valley” trip, I don’t remember what we charged, but if that was $5, I would imagine it wasn’t more than $10 or $15 for the “End of the Valley” trip, which took two hours. This took half an hour.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:26:27] Now the puppies, the so to speak puppies that he brought back to Boulder in the ’40s are now a little more grown, so they were able to pull sleds. And then, didn’t Stuart make his own sleds?

 

Isabel Mace [00:26:41] In the army, at Fort Robinson.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:26:44] Did he buy…? Was he able to…?

 

Isabel Mace [00:26:46] He was able to purchase those for…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:26:50] Peanuts, as we say.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:26:52] Now away from the winter activities, the summertime… when you came up here, the ghost town looked different. It’s been restored quite a bit. What was your impression of the ghost town? Did you hear stories or…?

 

Isabel Mace [00:27:08] No, not particularly. Well, Joe Sawyer was over there.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:27:12] I was going to say, there was one guy still there.

 

Isabel Mace [00:27:14] Joe Sawyer and the Whispering Swede…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:27:16] Yep.

 

Isabel Mace [00:27:17] …would not stay… he was not staying… he’d come up now and then. He didn’t stay here. Joe was here all summer. And Joe… who was Joe’s buddy that used to come up from Aspen and stay with him? But they stayed up here until, uh… What was the county? I can’t remember why, but…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:27:47] That’s all right.

 

Isabel Mace [00:27:48] They had to run things…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:27:48] Joe and the Swede didn’t stay up here in the winters, then?

 

Isabel Mace [00:27:52] No, he didn’t stay up in winter.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:27:54] Yeah.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:27:55] Now, was Billy Tagert, one of the buddies? Did he come up here?

 

Isabel Mace [00:27:58] No, no, Billy was living in town.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:28:00] Okay.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:28:02] Well, that’s who Ted Ryan bought the land from, was Billy Tagert, or some of the land.

 

Isabel Mace [00:28:06] Some of the land. I don’t think… he may have bought… maybe the Highland land was Billy’s.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:28:12] Yeah, I think so, too.

 

Isabel Mace [00:28:13] And so Billy became his right hand man, so to speak, in the area. The years they were down there, the couple of years they were down there. And then, you see, Billy… the Tagert Hut was an old mining cabin that he had gotten hold of, and he gave us, Billy gave us the piece of land that the hut is now on.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:28:39] Your personal hut, the Mace Hut.

 

Isabel Mace [00:28:43] Yeah, uh-huh.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:28:44] Besides the couple of miners that came up here in the summertime, did visitors come up here in the summertime and…?

 

Isabel Mace [00:28:50] People started coming right away. Drifting by, drifting by. Uh, there wasn’t any money much in it, but we served meals right away. I mean, when we had people sleeping here, we couldn’t tell them to go back to town and get a get a sandwich because, you know, a dirt road 12 miles to town.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:29:09] So did people stay with you in the summertime as well?

 

Isabel Mace [00:29:12] Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, it wasn’t much, but a few came by and would stay here and there and, um…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:29:20] Did you have any people that were repeat and you still are friends with? Do you remember?

 

Isabel Mace [00:29:27] Oh, I don’t think so, because I think most of those older people are gone.

 

Lynne Mace [00:29:32] Mother? The Nudges, the Nebenzahls?

 

Isabel Mace [00:29:34] Oh, that’s later.

 

Lynne Mace [00:29:36] Oh, okay.

 

Isabel Mace [00:29:40] I was trying to think of those very, very early…

 

Lynne Mace [00:29:43] Aren’t Jossy and Ken pretty early?

 

Isabel Mace Pardon?

 

Lynne Mace [00:29:46] Aren’t Jossy and Ken pretty early? The Nebenzahls?

 

Isabel Mace [00:29:49] Yeah, but they came by in the early ’50s on their honeymoon. The Nebenzahls. And I’m trying to stay back in the… ’48 and ’49 at this point.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:30:04] Mhm. Well we can…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:30:05] Now are the children old enough to go to school at this point? Or is that a little bit later?

 

Isabel Mace [00:30:10] I, I taught Greg at home for two years. Calvert System.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:30:17] What system?

 

Isabel Mace [00:30:18] Calvert. Calvert Schooling System. One of the very early ones. And the county, of course, had no bus, and there was no way to get them to town unless we took them. And so… I think what the county did, they hired Natalie…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:30:40] Gignoux.

 

Isabel Mace [00:30:40] ..to…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:30:41] Of Little Percent.

 

Isabel Mace [00:30:43] Little Percent, to come and get the kids.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:30:46] Oh… who did hire her?

 

Isabel Mace [00:30:47] The county.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:30:48] They did?

 

Isabel Mace [00:30:49] The school… well, the school board.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:30:50] School board did.

 

Isabel Mace [00:30:51] But that goes back… when we tried to get the county to put, or the school board, to put a bus on the road. They brought in the superintendent of schools from Denver to argue this case because…. They brought him up the road, showed him the road, in a snowstorm. So they went back to the meeting that night and he said to them, “Well, gentlemen, I…” Now Stuart told me this, I wasn’t there. Um, “I wouldn’t drive up that road. I wouldn’t drive up the road any time.” But he said, “You have to educate those children.” And so that meant either they came to Aspen or putting a school up here. So that’s when they hired Natalie to take the kids to town.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:31:55] But at that time, Greg… Lynne was… So when did you…? Do you remember riding in the taxi? Okay. Then when did they get a bus? Finally get a bus up here?

 

Isabel Mace [00:32:07] I can’t remember.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:32:09] That’s alright.

 

Isabel Mace [00:32:09] But you remember back in the…

 

Lynne Mace [00:32:12] There was another family on the road.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:32:14] Kay and Rob Roy?

 

Lynne Mace [00:32:15] Yeah.

 

Isabel Mace [00:32:15] The Roys. And there was a lot of… there were several kids down in Conundrum.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:32:18] Yeah. When they’d finally gotten where, I was going to say, it’s probably when other families started…

 

Isabel Mace [00:32:24] Yeah, there were other families.

 

Lynne Mace [00:32:26] When other families moved into Castle Creek, they had to put a bus on.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:32:27] Wow.

 

Isabel Mace [00:32:28] But now, you see, those families all moved out, the kids have grown up, so they took the bus off the road. I mean, it was logical, there wasn’t anybody to ride it. I’ve got to go to the bathroom. Sorry about that.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:32:39] Let me turn that off.

 

Lynne Mace [00:32:41] See, we could stop for lunch. It’s noon. {break in recording}

 

Isabel Mace [00:32:44] …to help us through those lean years, we had this lady who came to the town named Evlyn Levison. Did you run across her?

 

Larry Fredrick [00:32:53] No, I don’t believe so.

 

Isabel Mace [00:32:55] Well, her father opened the Rangely oil fields.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:32:58] Oh, sure. Mhm.

 

Isabel Mace [00:32:59] And she and her brother came into town. Stuart McLaughlin, he had a ranch out east of town where all those houses are now. And Evlyn, of course, had lots of money. She came into town, and she came up here and went dog sledding and enjoyed it. But she would… well, she put in our phone line. We used to go to town, and we were hooked up with Mike Magnifico. He’d take our messages the first year or two.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:33:30] Oh. Good old Mike took your phone messages, huh?

 

Isabel Mace [00:33:33] Yes. {laughter} And Evlyn got tired of not being able to talk to us. So she put in the phone line.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:33:42] So when was it you…? When was that? When you got the phone line? Do you know about the time?

 

Isabel Mace [00:33:49] Um. No. I think that would be in some of our scrapbook references, but I really don’t know. Well, it was before the mid ’50s.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:34:01] Mhm.

 

Isabel Mace [00:34:02] Early ’50s.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:34:04] Now did that help quite a bit? I mean, then you could make reservations, and you knew if people were coming.

 

Isabel Mace [00:34:09] Well, yeah. Yeah.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:34:10] So that helped quite a bit. Now in the ’50s… now you’ve talked earlier about in the ’40s and how you got established. But I assume business began to pick up in the early ’50s?

 

Isabel Mace [00:34:24] Well, right away…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:34:25] Right away.

 

Isabel Mace [00:34:26] I would say,  I was thinking back over things, uh, we got our restaurant license in June of ’49, and Christmas of ’49, we had a full house.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:34:45] Wow.

 

Isabel Mace [00:34:46] So you see, it picked up quickly.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:34:48] Mhm.

 

Isabel Mace [00:34:49] And we, uh, the funny part about that was, we had a snow, and of course the road between here and Elk Mountain is not an avalanche road, but the county only had its maintainer with a plow. And by the time they got around to clearing this road, in maybe 24 hours, 48, I don’t know, the wind had blown so bad that the bulldozer, the plow, wouldn’t go through that hard packed snow. And so they had to send it off… I guess it broke it… had to send it off, get it repaired. So we were a week before there was any traffic in the town. Now people could snowshoe, or Stuart took the dogs in once, but we had a lodge full of people, and two funny things. One of them is that, um, people would… I remember people from Texas making a snowman right out here. They were just thrilled.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:36:02] So a lodge full. That was, again, 16 people, about?

 

Isabel Mace [00:36:05] ’49, that was Christmas of ’49.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:36:08] No, how many people were here then?

 

Isabel Mace [00:36:12] 16.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:36:13] 16. Okay. That’s right.

 

Isabel Mace [00:36:15] Now, that may be… put a date on when we… I don’t think so, but, uh, we had the phone by then or we had… I know what happened. Stuart… there was an old phone line tacked to the trees, town to Elk Mountain, and Stuart had tied onto that, to Elk Mountain. It was this old thing that was from tree to tree to tree. And some of our lodging guests… see, they couldn’t get out with their cars, so they would call back to business and say, “Sorry, we’re snowed in. We can’t get there. See you.” And they had more fun with that little rigamarole. But, uh…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:37:04] So it was easier to make an excuse to stay on those days.

 

Isabel Mace [00:37:06] Yeah, it was a good a good excuse to stay.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:37:10] Um, the winter of ’49 you’re talking about. Do you think that, uh, because of the Goethe Bicentennial in the summer of ’49, that that had anything to do with it picking up so fast?

 

Isabel Mace [00:37:23] I suppose. We were full. They filled us up because there wasn’t that many places to stay in town.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:37:28] Even in the summer of ’49?

 

Isabel Mace [00:37:29] Yeah. This was summertime. And they filled us up.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:37:33] You mean, the chamber?

 

Isabel Mace [00:37:36] Pardon?

 

Larry Fredrick [00:37:36] Well, there wasn’t any chamber then.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:37:37] Oh, yes, there was.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:37:38] Well, in ’49?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:37:40] Yes. I think so.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:37:43] But yeah, you’re right. There wasn’t any place to stay.

 

Isabel Mace [00:37:46] So they said… was that ’48?

 

Larry Fredrick [00:37:49] ’49. Summer of ’49.

 

Isabel Mace [00:37:51] Or ’49.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:37:54] The Goethe, I always forget which one it was. It was the year before the FIS, though.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:37:59] Right. The FIS was ’50.

 

Isabel Mace [00:38:00] ’50. So it would have been ’49.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:38:02] Which brings us to an interesting point. Now, we had the FIS in Aspen, so skiing was getting popular there. Did any of those skiers come up here or…?

 

Isabel Mace [00:38:12] Um. No.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:38:15] So you had a different type of visitor up here.

 

Isabel Mace [00:38:18] A different type of thing. And, you know, this is not to criticize anybody, but back in those early days, Fred and Friedl, of course, were scratching bottom, trying to make things go, and…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:38:37] So were you.

 

Isabel Mace [00:38:38] …were very antagonistic to anyone who drew people out of Aspen.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:38:43] Mhm. I could, I can understand their thinking.

 

Isabel Mace [00:38:47] Yeah. But they just… and that was one reason for the call to cancel the sled trip. They didn’t want any business to go out of Aspen. I can see, you know, they were really struggling to make a go of it and… but so, we never associated that much with the skiing.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:39:05] So you had a totally different type of clientele then. More of a outdoors-type people maybe?

 

Isabel Mace [00:39:12] Well, of course, yeah, but a lot of people came downhill, came up here and went dog sledding.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:39:18] Now, the dog sleds became quite popular when they started the TV series.

 

Isabel Mace [00:39:23] Oh, before that even.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:39:24] Oh, yeah.

 

Isabel Mace [00:39:25] From the very beginning.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:39:27] Now, I know you had… back in the mid 1950s, I ran across a newspaper advertisement, and it said, “Mail your letter and it will be delivered from the mailbox by dog sled.”

 

Isabel Mace [00:39:41] So that was a gimmick search.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:39:42] That was the gimmick. Yeah. That was Stuart’s gimmick to…

 

Isabel Mace [00:39:45] That was a gimmick.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:39:46] Did it…? Was it successful? Did it work a bit?

 

Isabel Mace [00:39:48] Oh, you know, any little thing, you try. I can’t remember how many letters we got or how much it was, but it was it was a gimmick to…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:39:57] So it did catch on, though. So I alluded to “Sergeant Preston.” When was it that the TV series… how did that come about?

 

Isabel Mace [00:40:06] Uh ’55, ’54, ’56. Right in there.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:40:10] ’54, ’55, ’56.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:40:12] Well, the mid-50s.

 

Isabel Mace [00:40:13] We were just talking with Dick and whatnot, and he had a little bit that he wrote in ’54. Now, whether he was here the year before that or the year after… Dick Simmons. And so it was right in there. And, you see, that was what paid off our debt to Ted.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:40:36] Oh, sure.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:40:37] Because you got the rights or they gave you a…

 

Isabel Mace [00:40:41] The “Sergeant Preston” series. The money…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:40:43] The money from that.

 

Isabel Mace [00:40:44] …paid off our debt to Ted.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:40:45] Because they obviously gave you some money for the use of the land here.

 

Isabel Mace [00:40:50] Yeah.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:40:51] That’s wonderful.

 

Lynne Mace [00:40:51] You know, not that you…

 

Isabel Mace [00:40:52] Well, not to use the land. Our personal debt.

 

Lynne Mace [00:40:54] …was a double for Sergeant Preston. They ate here. My mother fed them.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:41:00] And then didn’t they fly to California from time to time to do some of the scenes?

 

Isabel Mace [00:41:03] Yeah, they were only here that one winter. They were here… “Sergeant Preston” was started as a summer show, and people didn’t go for it because they associated Sergeant Preston and the huskies with the north and cold. And the summer show did not go over. So then Trendle started the winter series, and they were here that first winter and did all the shooting here.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:41:28] Did they hear about the dogs somehow or…? I mean, how did they know to come here and find the dogs? Somebody must have…

 

Isabel Mace [00:41:38] Well…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:41:39] You know, well, even though you weren’t connected with the ski school, people like Fred Iselin had a lot of connections with Hollywood, and so…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:41:48] That’s true.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:41:49] So maybe the Paepckes…

 

Isabel Mace [00:41:50] Well, I think it was more articles in magazines and papers. We have a whole raft… in the 1950s, we’ve got a whole raft of articles that came out all over the country. And I think it was probably through that more than…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:42:06] Since they didn’t have email then, it was probably…

 

Larry Fredrick [00:42:09] That’s right. That’s right.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:42:10] Well, you know, that’s what they had. I mean, in those days they had researchers that went out to find, and they probably looked… I mean, you were probably the only sled dog operation in the country besides something in Canada, maybe.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:42:25] Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. Why didn’t they just say, “Well, if we need a dog sled, we go to Canada”? Instead, they came to Colorado, and a rather isolated place to begin with, so I was wondering if there was some connection, if somebody knew somebody.

 

Isabel Mace [00:42:39] Well, at this point, I don’t know. I can’t call it to wonder why there was a, why they came here. Unless…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:42:46] Keep your hands down so we can understand.

 

Isabel Mace [00:42:49] I do that without thinking.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:42:50] That’s all right.

 

Isabel Mace [00:42:53] Uh, I wonder if we did a short before that for somebody. I’d have to go through the records. Do you know, Lynne?

 

Lynne Mace [00:43:01] No. This is… it’s an interesting question, I don’t know. It would be very interesting to find out.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:43:05] Well, maybe some TV crew… oh, was there TV, then?

 

Isabel Mace [00:43:09] Well, yeah.

 

Lynne Mace [00:43:09] Well, yes, this was for TV.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:43:11] Yeah, this was for TV.

 

Isabel Mace [00:43:14] This was shot for TV.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:43:14] Oh, of course. Well, what I was thinking, they might have seen then a show. Well, anyway, they found you.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:43:20] So they only filmed here one winter?

 

Isabel Mace [00:43:23] One winter here. And then for two more winters, Stuart went out to the coast.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:43:27] Oh, that’s when he went.

 

Isabel Mace [00:43:28] Took the dogs out to the coast. And a lot of the work was done on the set with artificial snow, and up at Lake, um, Mammoth Lake. They would take the dogs up to Mammoth Lake and do a lot of the scenery shooting.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:43:46] Um, but I do remember, because I took a slide of it, they must have done some summer scenes because I remember Ralph Melville ended up being an extra.

 

Isabel Mace [00:44:01] Well, you see, they shot all one summer of “Sergeant Preston.” And they had one dog, one or two dogs.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:44:07] Okay. Because they also shot down by the river.

 

Isabel Mace [00:44:10] Yeah.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:44:11] When the railroad came in.

 

Isabel Mace [00:44:12] Yeah. Yeah. They shot down by the river, and someone was here not, well, in the last six months, their uncle or somebody was down there and working with that and fell in the river. I can’t remember who that was, because, you know, you don’t think about these things for so long, and then someone hits you with that. You’ve got to start thinking back.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:44:30] Sure. Just one little incident.

 

Isabel Mace [00:44:32] What was it?

 

Ruth Whyte [00:44:35] And in fact, that’s the picture that… the last picture of the railroad that came into town. Remember? I think you picked that up?

 

Larry Fredrick [00:44:42] Right. I’ve used it in a couple of slideshows. I believe so.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:44:45] Yeah. That’s when they were filming “Sergeant Preston.”

 

Larry Fredrick [00:44:47] Oh, okay. Okay.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:44:50] From what I remember.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:44:51] Yeah, well, that was a diifferent, uh… Yeah, I know which one we’re talking about. Um, so did you see any difference? Did people know it was Ashcroft when they watched “Sergeant Preston”? Did you start getting people to…?

 

Isabel Mace [00:45:04] They didn’t concentrate… for that show, they weren’t concentrating on the buildings. They were concentrating on the scenery, the dogs going and coming.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:45:15] Did they have any of the old buildings in the background?

 

Isabel Mace [00:45:17] Not really. They might have had it right in the background, but they were just, uh…

 

Ruth Whyte [00:45:21] Did they give you, uh, a copy of what was filmed here?

 

Isabel Mace [00:45:26] What do we have, Lynne?

 

Lynne Mace [00:45:27] We have some.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:45:28] Really? I’ve always wanted to see some of those.

 

Lynne Mace [00:45:30] On a reel to reel, I think. I’m hoping on this, we’re going to get it out and get it organized.

 

Ruth Whyte [00:45:34] That would be fun.

 

Larry Fredrick [00:45:35] It would be fun. A lot of people at the Historical Society say, “Well, if that’s the case…”