Stratton Pueblo (Manitou Springs, Colorado)

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The Stratton Pueblo, a.k.a. the Loop Pueblo. A row of buildings, once part of a streetcar terminal complex, that were remodelled to resemble an Indian pueblo in the late 1920s by their then owner, the Myron Sratton Foundation.

History:

The oldest building in what would become the Stratton Pueblo (the two-story one at the middle of The Loop Mexican restaurant) was built circa 1894, originally as the "Manitou Restaurant".

The first streetcar line to reach Manitou from Colorado Springs was completed in the early 1890s by the Colorado Springs Rapid Transit Company, and originally ended at the D&RG depot on Manitou Avenue. Circa 1895 Michael Leddy's Manitou Electric Railway and Casino Company built a spur line, known as the "Dinky Trolley", which ran from the D&RG depot, up Manitou and Ruxton Avenues, to the Cog Railway depot in Iron Springs.

Circa 1901, Cripple Creek gold mining magnate Winfield Scott Stratton purchased the CSRTC and renamed it the "Colorado Springs and Interurban Railway". He also purchased the property that would become the Stratton Pueblo to use for a new streetcar terminal, as well as the portion of the Dinky Trolley's track between the new terminal site and the CS&I's previous endpoint at the D&RG depot.

Upon Stratton's death in 1902, ownership of the CS&I passed to the Myron Stratton Foundation, a newly-created philanthropic organization named after Stratton's father.

Over the next quarter century the area surrounding the intersection of Manitou Aveune and Ruxton Avenue developed into a thriving shopping district. The Foundation took full advantage of this by building several storefronts on its property, including most of the buildings comprising the current Pueblo.

Streetcar service to Manitou ended in 1926, after which the complex was devoted fully to retail space. In an effort to maintain its commercial vitality after the loss of the streetcar traffic, and to make it more attractive to tourists, the Foundation remodelled it in the faux-pueblo style in which it can still (mostly) be seen today.

The remodelled complex originally included two small buildings shaped like teepees (the so-called "Tepee Court"), located just to the east of the current Pueblo.

The Stratton Spring was drilled for the complex in 1936.