Weekly Register-Call/ Gilpin County News

And the Lincoln Hills Country Club

Throughout its 82-year history, Wink’s Lodge has been a hidden Colorado jewel. Located in Gilpin County just west of Denver, Winks Lodge is nestled in the pines of the Arapaho-Roosevelt National Forest. The Lodge was named after builder, founder, and hotelier Obrey Wendell ‘Winks” Hamlet. Winks and his first wife Naomi began construction on the original buildings which comprise the historic Lodge in 1925. Winks and Naomi Hamlet, and later Winks and his second wife, Melba, were happy proprietors of the Lodge and offered seasonal room and board continuously from 1928 until Winks’ death in 1965. The Hamlets also managed and rented vacation cabins in the area. Wink’s Lodge is located in the Lincoln Hills Country Club, which originally extended over 100 acres on both sides of the existing railroad. The first African-American development of its kind, Lincoln Hills was fully accessible by train and auto in the early years of Colorado tourism .

Lincoln Hills was an astonishing accomplishment achieved in an era of oppression, segregation, the depression and then war. The roaring 1920′s in Colorado included governors and mayors who were known Ku Klux Klan members. The Lincoln Hills Development Company in Denver was created by African-American visionaries Robert E. Ewalt and E.C. Regnier. William Pitts was an African-American developer and master builder. The group began conceiving a mountain recreation and summer home subdivision known as “Lincoln Hills Country Club” in 1922, and lots were surveyed. The recreation area was located on the Denver and Salt Lake R.R., along South Boulder Creek between Rollinsville and Pinecliffe, Colorado. Built on the historic Moffat Road mail route, Lincoln Hills had two dedicated stops on the rail line that linked Denver with Salt Lake City. The train is now operated by the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad and AmTrak.

Established in 1916 for African-American girls, the Phyllis Wheatley branch of the YWCA of Denver began Camp Nizhoni in the early 1920s. The Phyllis Wheatley YWCA leased and then purchased lots, and moved Camp Nizhoni to Lincoln Hills in 1927. The summer camp was home to girls from prominent African-American families across America until the 1940s.

The Sayre ranching family signed the formal Land Plat of 1928, which included parts of a remnant Placer mining town called Pactolus. The town was named after the Pactolus River in Anatolia – in which the mythological King Midas washed his hands of the curse which turned everything he touched to gold. By the 1930′s and after WWII, the Lincoln Hills area saw exciting growth by a burgeoning African-American middle class in need of places to recreate, and to commune with the trees and a trout-filled South Boulder Creek. A full service resort, there was live entertainment at Winks’ Tavern. In addition to owning and operating the Tavern, Winks was also the local game warden, Sheriff, and steward of the land.

During the long, cool, summer season, the Lincoln Hills resort attracted as many as 5,000 people on the weekends. Many famous African-American entertainers and musicians from the 1930′s-1950′s would play at the Tavern and stay at Winks Lodge. The Jazz music was a scaled-down intimate “bluesy” style. Acoustic and unplugged, the semi-remote scene was nourished by visiting musicians of the Big Band Era, including artists who performed in Denver at Benny Hooper’s Casino Dance Hall on Welton Street, and at the Rainbow Ballroom at 5th and Broadway. By several accounts, guests at Winks Lodge included singer Lena Horne, and Band Leaders Duke Ellington and Count Basie. A haven for local and national intellectual leaders, Winks Lodge also became a summer Salon of sorts. The mood was created in cadence with the trees by Harlem Renaissance writers such as Zora Neale Hurston and many others who gave private readings at the Lodge.

The unassuming architecture of the Lodge and the cabins which are still standing are exemplary of the Colorado vernacular “Rustic – Stick and Shingle Style.” The Lodge is a three-story structure built into the hill, facing southwest, about a quarter mile up the mountain from one of two rail stops at Lincoln Hills. The base plinth of the Lodge and north walls are built of native rubble granite stone and authentic river rock.

A short stairway takes one to the front door, which is located at the corner of the building. One enters the parlor of the main floor through an extensive, wraparound porch built of hand-hewn pine beams and posts. Once inside, one sees a timber and log beam which spans a substantial parlor with a bold, stone fireplace. The upper floors are reached via an internal staircase decorated with period photos and an original wall painting on plaster al fresco. The upper story houses six bedrooms, and one shared bath. The roof is a hybrid combination of gabled mountain chalet, and a series of hipped and shed roofs. Each elevation or facade of the structure has a different exposure, and is designed accordingly in both formal and informal patterns typical of the Shingle

Style. This building art form was based on an ethos in harmony with nature. The architecture represents an independent streak – away from the Plantation Villa or Colonial box. The American Shingle Style was developed in the 1880′s in the free states of New England, including Massachusetts, Maine, New York, and Rhode Island.

Through the efforts of Bertha Calloway, a Camp Nizhoni alumnus, Winks Lodge was accepted on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980. From 1985 through 2005, the Lodge was a well-loved and well-cared for summer home for a Texas couple, Rob and Martha Tomerlin. With an acquisition grant awarded by the Colorado State Historical Fund, Beckwourth Outdoors purchased the Lodge in April of 2006. Based in Denver’s Five Points neighborhood, the Club was founded in 1993. Named in honor of the bi-racial African-American mountain man, fur trapper, explorer, frontiersman, army scout and War Chief of the Crow Indians, Jim

Beckwourth (1798-1866), Beckwourth Outdoors’ mission is to cultivate the passion and joy of adventure as shared by James P. Beckwourth, a Colorado multicultural pioneer. Our goal is to build a community that fosters inclusion while serving as the nexus for outdoor engagement and cultural enrichment.

Winks Lodge functions as a living testament to the Denver entrepreneur and visionary who created it. At present, it is open for tours by appointment only. Once it has been fully restored, the Lodge will be available to the public for a variety of programs, including Conferences and Workshops, a Local History Learning Center, Nature Preservation and Outdoor Activities, Leadership Retreats, Special Events and Reunions. For more information, contact Beckwourth Outdoors, 700 East 24th Avenue, Denver, CO 80205-3188. Phone: 303-831-0564, email: info@beckwourthoutdoors.org, or check out their website: www.beckwourthoutdoors.org.