Pikes Peak History: Railways, Poetry and the Race to the Clouds

A Denver choir on an early passenger train, a writer carrying a mountain view into a poem, and racing drivers testing a winding road: Pikes Peak has drawn people upward for very different reasons. Their stories give the scenery another dimension before you even begin the ascent.

Rail travel, poetry and motorsport are three distinct chapters in the mountain’s visitor history. Reading them together helps you see how the same place became a destination, an image in a familiar song and a demanding race course.

1891: a Denver choir reaches the summit by train

According to the Cog Railway’s own history, a church choir from Denver rode the first passenger train to reach the summit on June 30, 1891. An earlier attempt that day had turned back because of a rockslide.

The railway company had been founded in 1889, with construction beginning soon afterward. Spencer Penrose became its owner in 1925, well after the first summit passengers. The line later moved beyond its steam era and underwent a major renovation completed in 2021.

The interruption on that first day makes the railway’s opening feel less like a date on a plaque and more like a journey people actually took. Engineers had built a route to the summit, yet a rockslide still determined which passengers could complete the ascent that morning.

1893: a visit becomes the beginning of a poem

Katharine Lee Bates visited the Pikes Peak region while teaching in Colorado Springs in the summer of 1893. The view from the mountain helped inspire the work that became “America the Beautiful.” The National Park Service’s account traces the connection between her travels and the poem.

The poem was first published in 1895. Its familiar musical setting came through its pairing with Samuel A. Ward’s composition, with words and music published together in 1910. The mountain visit and the song’s development were separate moments, rather than one finished work appearing at the summit.

Bates’s story is a reason to spend a moment looking before reaching for your camera. Notice which part of the scene holds your attention: a line of ridges, the light across the landscape or the breadth of the view. You may remember that detail more clearly than the number of photographs you take.

1916: a mountain road becomes a racing course

The Pikes Peak International Hill Climb was founded in 1916 by Spencer Penrose. The event developed into an international motorsport competition, with drivers tackling a course the organizer describes as 12.42 miles and 156 turns.

The race gives the road a second identity. On an ordinary sightseeing day, its turns reveal changing views and a sense of the climb. During the hill climb, the route becomes a timed competitive course. Race attendance has its own schedule and access arrangements, separate from a normal tour.

Choose how you want to experience the mountain

A railway trip and a highway tour are different bookings. The Cog Railway departs from Manitou Springs. iLimo’s Pikes Peak tour from Denver uses the highway and combines the mountain outing with Garden of the Gods and time in Manitou Springs.

The highway itinerary is subject to road and weather conditions, so the summit is not guaranteed on every departure. Check the current tour description when planning the day, and choose the rail option separately if that particular chapter of the mountain’s history is what you want to experience.

You do not need to remember every date to carry these stories into the visit. Notice the effort behind the railway, the view that inspired a writer and the road’s place in motorsport. Then leave time for the part of Pikes Peak that catches your own attention.