It was a warm spring morning over a decade ago when Jim Bullecks headed out for a walk in William Fr. Hayden Park on Green Mountain. Bullecks had been involved with cleanup efforts on the sloping ridges of the open space behind his Lakewood home and had set out on a solo cleanup trek.
As his eyes scanned the mountain park for bits of trash and scrap iron, he came across a surprising piece of history poking up from the rabbit brush.
"I found two or three of these old projectiles, which looked like they might be old artillery shells," Bullecks said. "They had exploded. They were just wrecked."
With a military background, he hedged a guess the objects were from before World War II and set them up on his porch as curio. After donating them to a collection, the projectiles were reported to the Colorado Department of Health and the Environment (CDPHE), and they gave Bullocks an unexpected call.
"They informed me that these items were from the former artillery range Camp George West," Bullecks said. "Prior to that call, I had no idea that these were from the Colorado Army National Guard."
Owned by the Hayden family, Green Mountain was periodically leased by the Colorado Army National Guard for pre-WWII military training between 1903 and 1939, which included everything from small arms to live-fire artillery training on the north and east sides of the mountain.
The projectiles recovered by Bullecks are among several that have since been removed from the north slopes of the popular Lakewood recreational area. CDPHE confirmed that all recovered projectiles have been 75-millimeter shrapnel described as "explosive shells filled with small metal balls."
After several of these projectiles were found by the public, the Army National Guard recovered at least 10 additional items during investigations of the site. The last report of recovered military projectiles came in 2022 when hikers stumbled across an exploded shrapnel shell sticking partially out of the ground. The Jefferson County Sheriff's Office bomb squad was quickly on the scene to remove the item.
While a cleanup project of the park is currently in the works, the city of Lakewood recently reminded the community on social media that, "While no new munitions have been discovered recently, it's important to stay alert."
Since the Army National Guard conducted a surface sweep along the trails and hiking paths on the north side of Hayden Park in 2011, CDPHE said the likelihood of munitions hazards on park trails is very low. It is also unlikely that a projectile would detonate on "casual contact" but park users should take precautions.
History of Camp George West
The Colorado National Guard established its first facility known as the State Rifle Range in 1903, just 3 miles east of Golden. As the site developed, it became the main supply facility for the area. It was officially renamed Camp George West in 1934 after State Adjutant General George West, who was known for founding Golden and establishing Golden's first newspaper, the Colorado Transcript, now the Golden Transcript.
The site was established to provide training for Colorado National Guard units, and Green Mountain was selected due to its proximity to Denver along with the open space it provided for safe rifle practice. It was used by national guardsmen along with rifle clubs and the general public. The Colorado School of Mines even awarded academic credits to students who completed military training at the range.
While the site was used exclusively during the summer months, the range was a hubbub of activity, hosting camps and even a mimic war in 1913 that spectators from Denver attended. As the Rifle Range developed, training facilities were added in addition to everything that supported the use of the site such as a caretaker's residence, mess halls with kitchens, and officers' clubhouse and bath and latrine facilities.
After the war years, the site became a primary supply and storage facility for the Colorado National Guard as commercial and residential development encroached closer on the site. The physical size of the site stayed relatively stable until the 1980s when half of the location was converted to the state for solar research and development.
Today, Green Mountain is used by the public as a recreational site. Hikers, runners and mountain bikers utilize the trails that crisscross the more than 2,400 acres of open space, enjoying sweeping views of downtown Denver and the peaks of the Rocky Mountains to the west.
Clean-up efforts get underway
Clean-up of William Fr. Hayden Park is underway as CDPHE works with the Army National Guard, the City of Lakewood, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and West Metro Fire to address risk to the public under the military's Non-Department of Defense Owned Non-Operational Defense Site program, an initiative to identify old training areas where munitions may have been used.
While currently in the planning stages, the cleanup effort will take part in two phases: the removal of munitions on the surface and below ground. The project will take several years and access to Hayden Park may be restricted in some areas. CDPHE doesn't have an estimate for when the cleanup will be complete.
The initial clean-up phase will include a systematic sweep of the mountain with tall grasses and other vegetation being cut down for clear access if needed, the agency said. All surface munitions discovered will be removed and technicians will likely use metal detectors to identify any suspicious objects at ground level. The next phase will utilize geophysical mapping of the site and advanced metal detectors to identify any objects underground that should be removed. Once identified, munition technicians will remove items by hand.
Ordinances found on Green Mountain are detonated on site by certified munitions experts, confirmed CDPHE. Debris is then inspected for safety before being shipped off-site for recycling, said the agency.
The munitions in the park could include live munitions fired during training that either did not fire as they should have or were practice munitions known as "dummy rounds." These shrapnel are referred to as "unexploded ordnance" or "explosives of concern" because they could still potentially explode if improperly handled.
"The most important message is for park users to stay on the trails," said Stacie Oulton, a public information manager with the city of Lakewood. "That's the park rule, and it protects the park's resources from damage and preserves it for future generations. It will also help protect park users from potentially coming across munitions debris."
Anyone who uses the park should be aware of the three R's of munitions safety: recognize, retreat and report. If an object in the park is suspected to be a munition, CDPHE said it should be regarded as highly dangerous. It is recommended to leave the vicinity of the object immediately and to not disturb it in any way. Debris should be reported immediately to local law enforcement so it can be handled properly.
Information about the cleanup as it progresses will be posted at the site's trailheads and communicated by the City of Lakewood. For more information on what to do if encountering a suspicious object in the park, check out the William F. Hayden Park on Green Mountain website and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment's page on Former Camp George West Artillery Range.
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