Town of Mancos, Colorado Location in Montezuma County and the state of Colorado Location in Montezuma County and the state of Colorado Website Town of Mancos The Town of Mancos is a Statutory Town positioned in Montezuma County, Colorado, United States.
The town of Mancos is positioned in southwestern Colorado, near the Four Corners, at the base of Mesa Verde National Park, and holds the trademark for "Gateway to Mesa Verde".
The town was established in 1894, near the site where early Spanish explorers first crossed the Mancos River.
The Mancos Valley has been settled since at least the 10th century, although various harsh conditions in the mid to late 13th century saw the region and its multitude of small villages abandoned by the Ancient Pueblo People (Anasazi).
The Mancos region is dotted with inventoried and uninventoried archeological sites, including both isolated homes and shelters and small village complexes.
Mancos Valley inhabitants were probably among those who withdrew to the cliff dwellings on Mesa Verde, perhaps for defensive purposes, due to climate change, or as part of concentration policy of possible invaders and occupiers of the region.
Somewhere in the town is the point at which the expedition crossed the Rio Mancos on its way to California from Old Mexico.
Part of the initial Ute Reservation in 1868, Mancos was part of the San Juan Cession of 1873, and cattle ranchers began settling the Mancos Valley in the 1870s, providing cattle to the quarrying camps of the San Juan and La Plata ranges.
At the time it was founded, Mancos served as the major commercial trading center for easterly Montezuma County, rivaling the town of Dolores to the northwest.
In the 1890s, Mancos was platted and assembled as a stop along the Rio Grande Southern Railway assembled by Otto Mears - Colorado's southwestern barns pathfinder, connecting Durango to the east, and the Telluride quarrying districts to the north, via Dolores.
Local farmers and ranchers began constructing irrigation canals to bring water from the Mancos River to cropland and pasture in various parts of the Mancos Valley in the late 1870s and 1880s, and by the beginning of the 20th century a large network of irrigation ditches and laterals was operating and continues to operate (with improvements) today.
In the mid-2000s, a large project, the Mancos Valley Salinity Control Project, was funded by various sources, including the US Bureau of Reclamation, the Natural Resources Conservation Service, and small-town irrigation and water companies and districts.
Incorporated in 1894, Mancos town government quickly asserted itself, banning fast riding and driving (of wagons) in town the next year, as well as building boardwalks.
The abandonment of the barns in the 1950s allowed US 160 to be rerouted to follow the present Railroad Avenue, leaving Grand Avenue, the town's chief street, as a company route; an earlier route of US 160 is now County Road J, south of the river and most of the town.
The establishment of Mesa Verde National Park also encouraged early expansion of Mancos.
Several Mancos sites from about the turn of the 20th century are listed on the state or nationwide register of historic places.
The first two are on the Colorado State Register of Historic Properties, the remaining are on the National Register of Historic Places: The Bauer House was assembled in 1889 for George Bauer, a Mancos pioneer merchant who assembled the town's first store in 1881, a banker, and a stonemason.
Attempts to problematic a separate Mancos County from the easterly portion of Montezuma County in the mid-20th century failed.
Agricultural development, and to a certain extent, tourism, benefited from the Mancos Project of the US Bureau of Reclamation in the 1950s, which created Jackson Reservoir north of the town, today the site of Mancos State Park.
This universal also supplies water for the town, a non-urban water district, and Mesa Verde National Park.
In recent years the expansion of Durango has spread to Mancos, making the town something of an art colony.
Numerous affairs are held in the town each year, including Mancos Days the last weekend in July, a motorcycle rally over Labor Day weekend, and a balloon festival in September.
Much of the farm and ranch territory in the Mancos Valley has been subdivided into non-urban residentiary and "hobby ranch" properties in recent years, as is happening in much of Montezuma County.
Several primary subdivisions immediately adjoining to Mancos are in various stages of evolution and are expected to greatly increase the town's populace by 2015, despite some slowdown due to economic conditions.
The Mancos Library District constructed a new enhance library in 2008, positioned on a former electrical generating station site south of the Mancos River.
According to the United States Enumeration Bureau, the town has a total region of 0.6 square miles (1.6 km2), all land.
Mancos is positioned in the Mancos River valley at an altitude of approximately 7,000 feet (2,100 m).
The Mancos River was titled by Spanish explorers (Rio de los Mancos - "River of the Sleeve") perhaps for the way the river, which rises in the La Plata Mountains northeast of Mancos, drains the valley and then flows into the narrow confines of Weber Canyon and Mancos Canyon, southwest of Mesa Verde, where it joins the San Juan River.
The town's horizon is dominated by the mass of Mesa Verde to the west, Menefee Mountain to the southeast, and the La Plata Mountains, a range to the east and northeast, in which the headwaters of the Mancos River originate.
Originally laid out as a barns town, Mancos stretches for approximately a mile along the river and on both sides of it, while newer areas lie north of the old barns alignment (now US 160, part of the San Juan Skyway and the Old Spanish Trail).
The Mancos River flows from east to west through the town, and then flows to the south into Mancos Canyon, on the west and south toe of Mesa Verde.
Northeast of Mancos is Mancos State Park positioned on Jackson Gulch Reservoir assembled by the Mancos Irrigation Project.
As is common in Colorado, many government services are provided by special districts, both inside the city-limits of the town of Mancos and outside in the county.
Among these are the Mancos Library District, Mancos Water Conservancy District and Mancos Fire Protection District (which also provides emergency medical services).
There are a several private airstrips in the vicinity of Mancos, but these are not open to the public; a former town airfield near Jackson Gulch Reservoir is sometimes still marked on maps.
State of Colorado, Department of Personnel & Administration, Colorado State Archives.
"Profile of General Population and Housing Characteristics: 2010 Demographic Profile Data (DP-1): Mancos town, Colorado".
National Register of Historic Places in Montezuma County, Colorado American Dreams, Inc.
Town of Mancos official website Municipalities and communities of Montezuma County, Colorado, United States
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Towns in Montezuma County, Colorado - Old Spanish Trail (trade route)Towns in Colorado
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