CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ye Alpine Tavern
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| At the end of the line, deep in Grand Canyon, straddling the waters of Crystal Springs, and sitting at the foot of Mount Lowe was the Alpine Tavern. So named at its dedication on December 14, 1895, Ye Alpine Tavern was a modest yet imposing Swiss-style Mountain House nestled back into the hillside. It sported 12 guest rooms on its second floor, and had all the amenities of a regular hotel on the first level: kitchen, dining room, lobby, gift shop and business offices. |
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| The photo at the
top is another one of those colorized postcards based on a photo taken
obviously in the snow. What may not be obvious to most is that the steps
and bushes on the right side of the picture were cropped in to fill the
void that is part of the real picture (seen above).
The railway approach crossed the uppermost chasm of the canyon on one last trestle and landed at the steps of the Tavern. All the structures of the resort are located to the left of the rails. see map |
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As
seen from the other side of the canyon, the resort area straddles Crystal
Springs which flows from the side of Mount Lowe. The water cave can
be seen in the lower right of the photo on the right. The Alpine Tavern
is nestled in a fairy tale forest of pines, oaks, firs and hollies.
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The face of the
Tavern went through several changes over the years, many of them of
course taking place during the Pacific Electric days. And in 1925 its
name was officially changed to The Mount Lowe Tavern. |
| The facility had several amenities including its own print shop whose main product was a daily newspaper called the Echo. It wasn't really a daily newspaper. Actually it was a preprinted newsprint brochure of the Mount Lowe Railway left with one blank page on which the names and hometowns of the daily arriving guests were printed. There are several of these papers floating around the free world, and they have become quite a collector's item. |
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| The upper left photo shows the small gift shop and through those double doors is the dining room on a color post card (upper right). |
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| This is the lobby of Ye Alpine Tavern. It boasts a grand fireplace with cooking ovens and facility just to the left under the window. Above the fireplace is a broad beam donated for the construction by the company from which all the lumber was purchased. It reads: Ye Ornament of a House is ye Guest who doth Frequent it. Look just out the window and see the rocks on the mountain side–Mt. Lowe–up against which the hotel is built. Take a good look at the garb the people are wearing. Then look at the next photo... |
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| This is a shot of the same lobby probably about 25 years later, judging by the style of clothing. The same beam rests over the fireplace which is now adorned by the heads of animals and the newer, modern electric chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. |
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| The stay in the main building ran about $2.50 a night, but there were other out buildings that could provide more privacy, such as the six room bungalow in the left photo at the same rate as the hotel, or you could stay in the little canvas-sided housekeeping cabins that ran about $10 a week, seen right. During the 20's, these tent cabins were a common item in trails camps all across the Angeles Forest. | |
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There were other activities and amenities to be had, especially in the later days of the Tavern. Tennis courts, wading pools, and as seen in the photo above, a pack mule ride were all part of the fun package available at the Tavern. The above colored postcard shows the mule train on the trail near the summit of Mt. Lowe. It was in someone's photo album and is marked, "It recalls last summer on Yosemite Trails [signed] Lora," and is dated Feb, 1910. The mules used to follow a trail called the Mount Lowe Eight. It was a course that ran from the Tavern around to the summit of Mt. Lowe, down around the other side, over to inspiration point, down Castle Canyon to Mt. Echo and back up a return route to the Tavern. This pattern formed a large figure 8, and was so named the Mount Lowe Eight. What was nice about the ride is that it never saw the same piece of real estate twice. see map |
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| And of course our 1914 Metz Roadster finished the trip too. The above shot takes a good look at Ye Alpine Tavern, so says the sign hanging above the car. There's a scale–probably a penny for your fortune–to the far right, a phone booth sign with a bell on it in the center background, and the train at the left standing idle at its end-of-line. These trains were reversible, that is, the operator simply pulled the overhead trolley by an attached rope from one end of the car to the other, then took his control handle from that end back. He would just crank it up and go back down the way he came up. The seats were also reversible. The backs could be flopped over allowing the passengers to always be facing in the forward direction. |
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This is strictly a conjecture of this author: There are virtually no known photographs of the Alpine Tavern while it was under construction. This may be due to the fact that it was such a financial burden to Prof. Lowe that he was not able to either finance or promote its photography while being built. Or perhaps even the most enthusiatic of photo enthusiasts did not take the pains of hauling their equipment all the way back to the site for photos, at least until it was done and there was something worthwhile to photo. A lot of photography was taken on the front side since it was easily accessed and the project was new. It was also visible down the hill, so it was more attractive to photographing while under construction. Its possible the novelty wore off. As a matter of fact there are no shots of the whole Alpine Division until completion. Most of the interesting mechanical installations were done within the first three miles. |