Sidebar by Ed Quillen
Wildlife – July 2002 – Colorado Central Magazine
Even though marmots are relatively common in our mountains, they don’t appear much in our history or lore.
There’s a tale I read somewhere once upon a time, and it goes like this:
Somewhere in southwestern Colorado, Otto Mears was building a railroad with a crew of French-Canadian tie-cutters, who regarded marmots as a delicacy for dinner. Indeed, they were so fond of marmot stew that they were distracted from their work; they were off hunting marmots instead of turning trees into cross-ties. So Mears hired a few Ute boys to kill every marmot in the area. That removed the gastronomic distraction, and the lumberjacks went back to eating beans and bacon, and thenceforth focused on their work.
Good story, but search as I might, I couldn’t find it anywhere. The Denver & Rio Grande’s San Juan Extension (over Cumbres Pass) was built in 1880-81.
In April of 1880, the company did advertise in Montreal newspapers for: “De BONS BUERONS disposes a aller au Colorado gagner de $3 a $5 par jour, en coupant des ties en bois de pin blanc.” (Good wood cutters disposed to go to Colorado to earn from $3 to $5 a day cutting white pine ties.)
Martha’s paternal grandmother, Edna MacIver Patterson, was from Canada, and had little use for her francophone countrymen because, among other things, “They eat muskrats.”
So it seems likely they’d also enjoy marmot, and the Colorado railroad builders of 1880 were hiring French-Canadian tie-hacks. But that’s as far as I could make the story work.
Mears was not in charge of construction on the San Juan Extension (he was building toll roads west of Saguache then), and search as I might through the railroad lore here and at the Salida Regional Library, I couldn’t find any accounts of a marmot massacre along the narrow-gauge from Antonito to Chama and Durango.
On the railroads that Mears built (two short lines north from Silverton, and the 170-mile Rio Grande Southern from Ridgway to Durango via Lizard Head Pass), he might have employed French-Canadian tie-cutters. But these were built after the Utes had been pretty well removed from Colorado in the early 1880s, so it’s unlikely he could have hired Ute boys to hunt marmots. Also, I couldn’t find anything about marmots or hired hunters, Ute or non-Ute.
The tale may well have a basis in history, even if it’s unlikely that Mears was involved. But I haven’t been able to find the story of the French-Canadian tie-hacks and the Colorado marmots, even though I’m sure I read it somewhere. If you know where to find it, let us know.