What we know
Sandstone formation on the Air Force Academy where early settlers 'carved their names in stone'; on a 2011 Palmer Lake Historical Society walk members read 'the names of early settlers scratched into the rock,' some from the 1870s, and one found his great-grandfather's (PLHS newsletters, 2011 and 2012, S-0002). It gave its name to Lawrence Lehman's Cathedral Rock Ranch, 'the biggest single piece of property' in the 1954 Academy site (News, June 16, 1954, S-0146); Academy freshmen now run to it at the end of Recognition (Wikipedia, S-0150).
Where it was
USGS GNIS pillar 'Cathedral Rock', El Paso County (2021 Colorado file, S-0007). Good to a few hundred feet.
Sources
- S-0002: Palmer Lake Historical Society website (palmerdividehistory.org)
- S-0006: USGS Geographic Names Information System, Colorado file, 2021-08-25 edition
- S-0007: USGS GNIS DomesticNames, Colorado (current edition)
- S-0016: Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection (coloradohistoricnewspapers.org)
- S-0048: Wikipedia: "List of ghost towns in Colorado," the populated-places lists by county, county articles, and articles on vanished places
- S-0146: Husted in the Colorado newspapers, 1870–1956: headline sweep (CHNC)
- S-0150: Wikipedia articles on landmark landforms: "Castle Rock, Colorado" (rev. 1375089669), "Cathedral Rock (Colorado)" (rev. 1365424290), "Corral Bluffs" (rev. 1362716791), "Dawson Arkose" (rev. 1321242418)
Sources are named in the text above. Numbers such as S-0080 refer to our source list. Most newspaper quotations were read in the Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection. Long quotations from recent books are shortened here.