Twenty five previous residents of the Rocky Mountain Arsenal and alumni of the Adams City High School filled the top of a bright two decker bus last week as they renewed old friendships and took a trip filled with memories. The excursion was one of two tours that Saturday morning, co-sponsored by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife and the U.S. Army as a part of the Adams City annual reunion.

Four hundred families lived and farmed the land before the United States Government built the Rocky Mountain Arsenal.

Tour Guide Ernie Maurer, who once resided on the Arsenal in his youth, used his knowledge to point out old homesteads and spots of interest. Because of the danger of snakes the group viewed the area from the bus.

The first stop was the Visitor Center where a new gift shop opened in January of 1995. Funds from this non-profit store are used to support school children who come to see the Refuge. A corn patch was located where the Center is now and after 1941 was used as the officer's club. In 1989 the building was turned over to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Traveling on 7th Avenue, named for December 7, 1941, the day Pearl Harbor was bombed, the bus went by the spot where Big Ed's road-house was located in the 1920's and 30's. The first floor was the living space for the family and the basement held a tavern.

The next place on the tour was the site of a German prisoner of war facility.

When the bus passed a big lake former residents told of picnics by the lake and the dangerous undercurrents where several people drowned while swimming. Upper and Lower Derby Lakes were developed in 1883 by the Highline Canal to catch and return fish. Due to contamination the canal no longer runs through the Arsenal.

The trip led by the site of the Rose Hill School which served as the administration building for the POW camp during World War II and afterwards became the officer's club. The schoolhouse was demolished in the 1970s to make room for Stapleton's north-south runway.

The group traveled by the spot where the Voca Valley Schoolhouse, a single room structure was built. It remains only in the recollection of the former residents.

The bus went by Rattlesnake Hill, then passed the site of the Metcalf homestead, and by the Lucas Homestead place. The group saw the Householder residence, one of the two original dwellings still standing on the refuge. The house was the first home in the area to have indoor plumbing and electricity.

Long before the Arsenal was farmed there were Indians who camped on the land. The tour saw the land where a quarry once provided native Americans stones to use for tools; the location of Indian campfire pits, and the Indian summer camp site which was used around AD300 to AD1100. Indians developed the campground because they could see far off into the distance, in case of danger.

The last spot on the trip was where children in the 1920s to the 1940s attended the Long Branch Public School.

Many deer were seen throughout the trip running with their white tails waving in the breeze or standing watching the bus. The land was green from abundant rains.

It was difficult for the residents to locate their old homesteads because the terrain has been completely changed but during the tour neighbors shared their remembrances of happier childhood days.

One former resident talked about the arrowheads that were found at the old Indian campgrounds. Another told of a family that tried to raise peanuts on the land, but it didn't work. A man related that the big blue post office is now located where his house once stood. "It's a monument to our house," he laughed.

A cabbage patch owned by Andy Anderson was remembered where cabbage was cut by the bushel.

Mary Ann Willard remembered that her parents had fruit trees, cherry, apple, peach, plum and some cottonwood trees. The house was moved into Derby when the government declared that farmers had to vacate the land or they would be moved with bulldozers. It was a national emergency and no money was given to them until sometime later. It caused intense hardship for farmers who were forced to move in with relatives.

Marge Farney Morroni was one of two women who declared that they had worked at the Arsenal making bombs.

Bygone inhabitants were asked to provide pictures and information on where their homesteads had been located.

It was a day mixed with happy and bitter memories for former residents of the Rocky Mountain Arsenal.