What we know
Mountain above Palmer Lake, earlier 'Ben Floss Mountain' (PLHS, 'Lucretia Vaile,' S-0002). Volunteers (Gilbert Wolf, Floyd Bellinger, George Sill, Jesse Krueger and his sons) built the star on its face, first lit in mid-December 1935 (OCN write-ups of PLHS talks, S-0112). PLHS gives the star's site as 14 acres 'just West of the Town' on a 58 percent slope, facing a bearing of 111 degrees, and names Rod VanVelson and Jane VanVelson-Potts's 'Star Light, Star Bright' (1980) as its history (S-0002). The point is the summit; the star is on the east face. Countess Murat's cottage stood 'below Sundance Mountain.' A fringe place.
Where it was
USGS GNIS summit 'Sundance Mountain', 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-0112: Our Community News (ocn.me), Monument: items on the Chamber's meeting house (the Gwillimville schoolhouse)
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.