As close-in water sources (such as Clear Creek) became increasingly polluted, Golden sought “pure” water from more remote sources. In 1904, the City built a pipeline from Beaver Brook, several miles to the west. The pipeline filled a reservoir atop Lookout Mountain (approximately where we now see a cluster of antennas).
There were problems with this system: sometimes the lines froze, sometimes the reservoir froze, and sometimes the reservoir went dry. When this happened, the old pumping station on Clear Creek was put into service and the water mains were filled with polluted creek water. (Hey, it’s better than nothing, right?)
120 Years Ago
In 1906, the City was trying to improve capacity and resiliency of the Beaver Brook system. The Colorado Transcript was an inveterate booster of all City improvement efforts, but this time there was just too many errors to ignore…