Lake Ladora - Before the Army Came

A stop on Rocky Mountain Arsenal Wildlife Loop, a free self-guided tour.

Look across Lake Ladora and imagine the land before 1942: irrigated fields, farmhouses and windbreaks of trees. About 200 families lived on the land that became the Arsenal. Most farms were small, 20 acres or less, but some were large. Swiss-born Gottlieb Egli and his wife Rose farmed more than 500 acres, watering their crops from the Sand Creek Lateral, a branch of the High Line Canal.

After Pearl Harbor, the Army bought the farms to build its chemical weapons plant, and families had to leave. The Egli farmhouse, a bungalow from around 1910 near Lake Mary, is the only farmhouse still standing on the refuge. Old irrigation ditches and the lines of trees that once sheltered homesteads still mark the prairie if you know to look.

Today the 1.8-mile Lake Ladora Loop Trail follows the shore through grass and cottonwoods. Pelicans, grebes and many kinds of ducks visit in the warmer months.

Getting here: Drive or walk east to the parking area off 64th Avenue at Havana Street, where the Lake Ladora Loop Trail begins.

Did you know?: Rose and Gottlieb Egli raised eight children in their farmhouse before the Army bought the land.

Photo op: From the trail on the west shore, frame the lake with a line of old cottonwoods along the far bank.

More on Wikipedia: Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge · High Line Canal

Lake Ladora - Before the Army Came

Stops on this tour