Section House Restoration, Colorado

We need HardCorps volunteers to get us over the finish line to restore the iconic Section House atop Boreas Pass!

PROJECT PARTNER: Pike-San Isabel National Forests and Cimarron and Comanche National Grasslands

SESSION DATES: September 1-6, September 8-13, and September 22-27

PROJECT SUPERVISOR: TBD for Session 1! Ian “IO” Oeser (Session 2 & 3)

CREW LEADER: Mary Curran!

Project Site Description & History

Colorado is known for its picturesque mountain passes, and our next project is set at the fabled Section House located on the expansive Boreas Pass just south of Breckenridge along the Continental Divide. Stationed at a breathtaking 11,500 feet, Section House, along with the historic wagon era Ken’s Cabin, is one of the original stops along the Denver South Park & Pacific narrow gauge railway that ran from Denver to Leadville from the late 1800s into the early 1900s. It was also the highest narrow gauge railroad in the United States at the time, allowing for a boom in commercial mining during the formative years at the turn of the century.

Built in 1882 to house railroad workers and their families during the peak of the mining era, Section House is comprised of the one and one half story log cabin with multiple rooms that can sleep up to 12 people. By the 1937 Section House was abandoned and fell into disrepair, suffering from the years of storms and avalanche terrain surrounding it in the rugged Colorado Rockies. In 1993 the Forest Service and Colorado Historic Society teamed up to resurrect Section House, completing major restoration work through 1996, saving it from near collapse only a few years prior. Section House is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is popular rental for winter enthusiasts seeking hospitable accommodations while recreating at Boreas Pass.

HistoriCorps invites you for one of our landmark HardCorps projects of the season that will test your fitness and resilience, and we hope you will join us in continuing a strong legacy of preservation work at Section House!

Scope of Work

HistoriCorps is committed to educating and training volunteers in preservation skills, with an overarching mission of inspiring a preservation ethic in all those involved. Learning and working alongside expert HistoriCorps field staff, volunteers and applying the traditional skills necessary to restore Section House:

• Replace metal roof and repair or replace decking
• Daub entire log wall exterior
• Rehabilitate windows and exterior doors
• Replace damaged floorboards in bunk room
• If time allows, repair or replace horizontal siding and stain accordingly

Click here for more information and registration!