Well good friday morning. People in several American Communities waking up to widespread damage from severe weather. One of those storms producing whipping winds, Strong Enough to topple a school. People in the town say it happened fast. A person was inside that school when the roof was ripped off. This morning shes talking about that terrifying moment. Overnight mother natures fury on full display. For real. What appears to be a large tornado forming over hamburg, pennsylvania. Look outside. Moments later a nearby Elementary School is leveled. What was there this morning is out here somewhere in the field. This morning book, black p blackboards and desks now visible from the sidewalk. The roof and walls gone. In it was raining. The lights went out and then there was a bang. The schools principal was inside when it happened. Pieces of insulation still stuck in her hair. Although i was thinking we dont have a ceiling light. Why am i seeing daylight. With classes beginning in six weeks t
Explorer. Have for as long as people lived here, pikes peak has been a marketing tool, and we have used it to help identify this location. Pikes peak protrudes out onto the eastern plains. As wethe first 14er, call it, the first 14,000foot mountain when you are coming west across the plains towards denver, and that is a beacon, in many ways, for people traveling towards the mountains. I remember many times, growing up in the midwest, coming to colorado and know when youre almost there when you start to the distance. K in you can see it a hundred or more and it seems here, to pull you in as youre coming west. Now, we are at Crystal Reservoir on the pikes peak highway. We are about 9500 feet in and perhaps one of the best views in the world. In 1770 nine, when Thomas Jefferson and others were declaring independence on the east coast, this area was , and inby the spanish 1770 nine, Spanish Colonial forces came within a few miles of where we are now, exploring the region and searching for
Palmer saw possibilities, and i think it might be the mountains that he fell in love with, and it is right up against pikes peak and this wonderful place, that what he saw as the economic driver was the climate and the mountains, and the fact that peoples people like himself from the atlantic seaboard would be drawn here, so here for a few weeks or a month or to come and visit and decide to stay, that they would be drawn by the helpful climate and in natural beauty, so he saw this place potential. He built Colorado Springs along the rail line, and then the rail line connected further south, and this town in particular to be his home, and he always saw it as an anecdote, if you will, to eastern industrialization. For this young man who grew up in the second largest city in the entire country, he looked to the west, and we have this vast, open expanse of land, seemingly limitless, and he envisioned a place here where people could come and live warts stay and enjoy the healthy climate, en
Announcer it has national significance. It has a worldfamous view, and the fact that we are a natural landmark, i really love the description of the garden of the gods park as being, perhaps, the most striking contrast between mountains and plains in all of north america. The natural history, the history of the earth is almost like an here in Colorado Springs. What we are seeing here is the remnants of sand dunes, lagoons, the bottom of an ocean, and even glacial gravel, that has occurred from the last 3 million years, so if you walk in the Visitors Center out to the park, it is like a walk act in time. In about half a mile, you can go 300 million years ago. The first people that we know of in the pikes peak region were utes. And this was their homeland. The whole hike speak area was their homeland, and they would navigate it as part of their journey, because in the to be, we have parks that have been dated over 3000 years ago, and those journeys continue for many many centuries. 1800s
To better understand who Spencer Penrose is, i thought i would read a bit from his open jury in 1939. It says he was more than a capitalist, philanthropist, he was a spirit, a hearing such as the pikes peak region had never seen before and would never see again. He was a scholar and gentlemen, a rugged individualist, a man of heart, as vigorous and sturdy as the great pioneering west he loved. He knew his own mind, and he experienced it. Spencern words, who was penrose . I think of him more in terms of his legacy to the community. Most obviousof the legacies is that he built the hotel here in Colorado Springs in 1980 team, one of the finest resorts in the world right here at the foot of pikes peak. The other is he created a inndation, the Apple Orchard spanish, and that was named after his home where he lived at the hotel, and that foundation he started in 1937, 2 years before his death, with 21 million, and today, it has grown to 580 million, and over the years, they have given away o