Pinkerton Hot Springs - Durango, CO
Posted by: 
ArmyFamily4
N 37° 27.068 W 107° 48.311
13S E 251862 N 4148615
The soda water from Pinkerton Hot Springs promised to cure all diseases. The water was bottled and graced many a Durango table in 1892.
Waymark Code: WMB4R0
Location: Colorado, United States
Date Posted: 04/05/2011
Views: 24
The spring was named after James Harvey Pinkerton settled in the area now known as Pinkerton Hot Springs during the summer of 1875. He raised dairy cows with his wife, three sons, and four daughters. Throughout the year they produced and sold dairy products in mining camps in the San Juan Mountains. In the spring of 1876 they sold 116 pounds of butter for a dollar a pound to the miners north of Silverton.
Hot Springs throughout the San Juan Mountains, like Pinkerton Hot Springs, are fed by ground water that percolates downward through the earth. As it descends, the water comes in contact with magma deep within the earth. The heated water then rises and returns to the surface in the form of hot springs.
This hot spring started out on the other side of the highway. It used to come out of the hillside and flow down the drainage ditch. In winter, you could see the steam rising, in summer it just looked like a rusty orange stream. When people stopped to examine it they created a traffic hazard because there was nowhere to really park on the west side. So a few years back when the state re-paved the highway they piped the spring water under the road and into a vertical section of pipe on the other side, so it flowed out the top of the pipe. Then they built a cone of cement blocks around the pipe so the water flowed over them. In time the blocks became totally covered with mineral deposits. It is quite nice looking, just not quite as "natural" as you might think.
(The previous paragraph was taken from
here.)