Nature
Notch Mountain, a 13,243-foot summit in Colorado’s Sawatch Range, rises sharply above Lake Patricia and Cross Creek and faces Mount of the Holy Cross. Its greatest historical importance lies in that position: from its slopes and summit, the neighboring peak’s cross-shaped snowfield appears dramatically, helping make it one of Colorado’s early mountain icons. After the snow cross was first published in 1869, William Henry Jackson photographed it from Notch Mountain in 1873, and Thomas Moran sketched the same view the next year for a later oil painting. Their images helped inspire pilgrimages in the late 1920s and 1930s, and a 1924 stone shelter built for visitors still stands.
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Colorado · United States
