Bing had a picture, and noted that the area had been named by a surveyor...I clicked on the link and discovered the following anecdote:?ÿ
In August 1859, two surveyors who helped to set up Colorado City explored the site. One of the surveyors, Melancthon S. Beach suggested it would be a "capital place for a beer garden". His companion, the young Rufus Cable, awestruck by the impressive rock formations, exclaimed, "Beer Garden! Why, it is a fit place for the Gods to assemble. We will call it the Garden of the Gods." -Wikipedia
Some parents should be shot for giving their children names like this.
Colorado surveyors will find the obituary of Mr. Beach rather interesting. @gene-kooper
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/16257904/melancthon-sayre-beach
Huh. I grew up and started my survey career in Colorado Springs. My family has been in that area for 60 years and I've never heard this story. Cool find!
It's not surprising that one of the surveyors was thinking of beer....
All this time I thought there were 10 different kinds of surveyors: those who understand binary, and those who do not.
There are two kinds of people, those who group everyone onto two categories, and those who don't.
Then there was the guy who said there are three kinds of people, those who can do math and those who can't.
Oh, the things you can learn only because of something that happens on SurveyorConnect.
I was wondering why any parent might name their newborn Melancthon. Eventually, I found that Phillip Melancthon was a famous German Lutheran involved in the Protestant Reformation. His surname at birth was Schwartzerdt. He changed his name to the Greek version of the meaning of his birth name, black earth. Thus, the creation of Melancthon.
Meanwhile, it turns out that Rufus, his partner in surveying, was probably a red head. Rufus is a Latin term meaning red headed.
