THE COMPLICATED HISTORY OF VALMONT BUTTE, A POTENTIAL SMALL-SCALE GEOHERITAGE AND GEOMORPHOSITE

When the city of Boulder, Colorado, purchased Valmont Butte and adjacent property, it knew it was getting a topographic landmark, a geologic nugget, a cultural jewel, and a piece of local economic history. Nine years later, the intertwining of these legacies complicates the future of this potential geoheritage site and geomorphosite. The “butte” is a high narrow ridge, more than a mile in length, created by erosion of relatively soft Cretaceous shale from around a shoshonite dike and its hornfels aureole. The outcrop is unique on the plains of Boulder County in that linked igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic rocks are exposed together. Because of its nearly 200-foot relief and its location at a stream confluence, Valmont Butte has long been a landmark and a gathering place. Several Native American entities identify the butte as a sacred site. In the mid-1800s, pioneers settled around the butte and established a cemetery. Later, minor quarrying took place on the butte, and the adjacent land underwent multiple industrial uses, including fluorspar and gold ore milling operations. Valmont Butte is an easily accessible landmark that presents an opportunity to preserve and learn from the intersection of geological, cultural, and historical events and to understand how their relative influences have changed over time, but costs associated with the site and conflicts between interested parties must be resolved, and the greater value of the site must be recognized by the groups seeking to define its future, including: the city, which wishes to retain ownership of the butte proper but to sell the adjacent land to recoup some of its costs for initial purchase and subsequent remediation of radioactive and heavy metal contamination; Native American representatives, who wish to preserve the butte as a sacred site, to acquire the adjacent land, to remove the mill, and perhaps to establish a cultural center; preservationists, who wish to obtain historical landmarking for the mill and perhaps to refurbish it; pioneers’ descendants, who wish to protect the cemetery, which is still in use, and who are concerned that development at the site would disrupt serenity and access; and neighbors, organic farmers, and downstream municipalities who are concerned that development could release airborne or waterborne contaminants that would impact them.