EV Ranch, Colorado

A cattleman’s story

In 1923, Pat Johnson arrived at Piceance Creek, Colorado, the son of a hired hand from Texas. He spent his entire life building the EV Ranch — starting with nothing, absorbing neighbouring properties over six decades, and leaving 85,000 acres of Colorado high country to the generations that followed. His grandson Ty Schultz commissioned a Rural Maps map to capture all of it. The cabin where Pat and his wife honeymooned in 1945 still stands, though barely. Ten or so crumbling homesteads are scattered across the ranch — each one the story of someone who tried and left. One still had a note pinned to the table with a knife: ‘Two miles to water, two miles to wood. I’m going back to Missouri and I’m staying for good.’ All of it is now on the map. The map will outlast the cabin.

About a week after the survey visit, the Lee Fire — the fourth largest wildfire in Colorado history — came within fifty yards of the ranch boundary. The map remains.