The photographs, employed throughout the present booklet as illustrations, carry credit lines which should be plain to all except where initials have been used. DKP stands for Daniel K. Peterson; CHS, for Colorado Historical Society, and DPL, for the Western History Collection of the Denver Public Library. My own part in the production of this work needs no explanation. My first visit to a ghost town was in 1904 when, as a toddler, I was carried on horseback by my father to Alice (then a thriving little spot). Alice was my father’s headquarters for building a reservoir system from five high mountain lakes that emptied into a sixth. These lakes (one, _Lake Caroline_) lie some four to six miles beyond Alice. Since that distant day I have never ceased to travel to Colorado’s mountain towns, and I frequently describe myself as a “hillbilly.” No matter where I have been, it has always been the mountains of faraway lands that have had the greatest drawing power for me—the Jotunheim range of Norway, the Highlands of Scotland, the Alps in France and Switzerland, the Apennines in Italy and the Himalayas in India. Yes, I can say along with Keats: _Much have I travelled in the realms of gold,_ _And many goodly state and kingdoms seen...._ * * * Yet none speaks so well of romance untold As our high ghostly towns, still and serene. THE ALICE POST OFFICE STILL STANDS [Illustration: George J. Bancroft, 1904; D.P.L.] [Illustration: MAP] ⇐_PLAN OF TOURS_