ST. RITA (1935)

Nederland sprouted in the 1870s as a mining supply town, earning its name in 1874 when investors from the Netherlands bought Breed's Mill and Mine. Although founded because of rich silver deposits in nearby Caribou, Nederland did not thrive until the 1900s, when it became a major tungsten mining center. During the World War I tungsten boom, a Nederland mission was established by Regis Barrett, a Benedictine from Boulder. When the demand for tungsten collapsed in the 1920s, the mission closed.

Neither silver nor tungsten attracted James J. Regan, OP, a Dominican stationed at St. Dominic parish in Denver. He fell in love with the scenery, with jubilant Middle Boulder Creek gushing through the rustic mining town at the base of the snowcapped Indian Peaks. Father Regan, as chaplain of the Catholic Daughters of America, persuaded them to purchase Nederland's old Antlers Hotel, an 1897 frame lodge far less elegant than its Colorado Springs namesake. The Catholic Daughters and the Dominican converted the rambling two-story hotel to Mont Rita, a chapel and camp for Catholic girls, to complement the nearby boys' camp at St. Malo. In summers, Sunday Mass was celebrated on the spacious open air hotel porch. This camp for girls aged ten to sixteen opened in 1932, closed from 1943 to 1946 because of the war, and closed permanently in 1954 when the Daughters bought another camp.

The Antlers Hotel has disappeared, but the chapel Father Regan began building on the site in 1932 still stands. "If you will put enough green stuff in the collection basket," Father Regan told his parishioners, "I'll build you a chapel." Over various summer vacations, Father Regan, the Hailey family of Nederland, the Zarlengo clan of Tolland, and Martha Logan of Rollinsville spearheaded construction of the rustic pine log chapel completed in 1935. Inside, it seated seventy-five and featured fine stained glass windows designed and built by parishioner Gilbert Postlewait. The tiny 1930s chapel was doubled in size in 1962 to seat 200, when it was winterized with the help of an old furnace donated by the Nederland Community Presbyterian Church.

Summer tourists, winter skiers at Eldora, and locals persuaded the Benedictines and other orders to keep St. Rita's open all year. In 1977, Gabor Cesh erected a bell tower on the quaint log church and hung an old locomotive bell, donated by the Order of the Christophers, a contingent of Catholic railroad men.

What began as a summer "chapel of convenience" for campers and tourists is now a year-round parish for about 130 households and many tourists. Since 1978, Thomas J. Sherlock, CPPS, has served as pastor, celebrating a 10 o'clock Sunday Mass in the winter and a 9 o'clock service in summer. "Even in dead of winter, we have ninety people at Mass," reported Father Sherlock of the Society of the Precious Blood in 1988, "and in the summer we have 180 to 200." He added that the Christmas Eve Mass has become a cherished tradition in this small mountain town. And in summers, the rustic chapel standing alone above Barker Lake on a hill of wildflowers reminds tourists and locals of the Creator behind this heavenly setting.