In 1909, 7 Minute Spring was drilled adjacent to the site of the former Manitou House Hotel. Aptly named, the newly drilled spring produced a geysering event erupting into the air every 7 minutes.
Through the years, the 7 Minute Spring site has undergone many changes. Around 1920, a ramshackle building surrounded the spring offering concessions and curios. A sign read: “Mansions 7 Minute Spring”, indicating a tie with the nearby Mansions Hotel, built in 1875, located just west of Manitou’s current fire station.
In the 1930′s and 40′s, the site took on a more rustic look. Enclosed in a log structure, 7 Minute Spring was still the main attraction among the curios and trinkets, but now a miniature railroad could be found encircling the property.
The 7 Minute Spring site eventually fell into disrepair. A few modest attempts were made to restore the spring, none were very successful until the site was developed into 7 Minute Spring Park in 1993. The centerpiece of the park is a gazebo incorporating an 1880′s design of a structure that once sheltered Ute Iron Spring on Ruxton Avenue. The park also features an outdoor amphitheater, sculpture garden and beautiful views of the surrounding mountains. 7 Minute Park is the crowning jewel in the legacy of achievements brought to the community by the Mineral Springs Foundation.
Font Artists:
Bill Burgess – 7 Minute Springs Font Artist
The two 7 Minute Spring fonts were done in collaboration. One by myself and one by Don Green, both in collaboration with Maxine Green. It seems that our proposals had tied in the competition, and the committee decided to provide two fonts. They decided that Don’s piece would contain a spout in order for people to fill pitchers and jugs to take home. My sculpture was to simply display the water, and be located inside the building. While working independently, we each took a cue from the lines and angles of our mountains and designed structures that would give strong accents to the flow of water. I made my design to accentuate that downward flow by having a pool near the top from which water would overflow onto ramps down two sides of the structure On these ramps I installed glazed ceramic “washboard” plates arranged perpendicular to the fall of the water. This fracturing of the water gave it more visually interesting reflections and shadows, while also providing a different texture to the surface.
Because of insufficient mineral water the font was later moved to the grassy area in front of the building and fitted to run with city water.
Bill Burgess
Bill Burgess on YouTube
Maxine Green & Don Green – 7 Minute Springs Font Artists
The health giving waters of Manitou’s famous mineral springs filter through deep underground cracks, crevasses, and rock faults picking up various minerals and colors that add an individual and distinctive taste to each of the eleven working fountains in the town. This imagined subterranean passage, served as the stimulus for the metal sculpture out of which gushes the Seven Minute Spring. The conglomeration of shapes, lines, rust colors and mineral coating of the steel are intended to evoke the mysterious and tortured paths the water follows in order to reach its rather explosive arrival above the fountain’s distinctive blue ceramic basin and ripple band of tiles to the base.
Don Green
I was given the opportunity to design the ceramic components of the Seven Minute Spring’s two designs, one done by Don Green and the other done by Bill Burgess. The basin and the ripple designed tiles on each sculpture are glazed with a light blue color to compliment the weathered, oxidized patina of the metal forms, one the sculpted font, done by Green and the other by Burgess that is designed as an aesthetic extension to the font.
The high fire glazed tiles grace the sides of each construction and add interest and unity to each sculpture while the basin lends ease of filling the containers brought by the visitors who come to this part of the Memorial Park. The gazebo adjacent to the Seven Minute Spring is used for many activities and brings visitors there to enjoy the array of flower gardens as well as an opportunity to taste the various differences of each mineral spring in the unique historic village of Manitou Springs.
Maxine Green