Louis L'Amour set his novel, Passin' Through, on the ranch that he and his wife Kathy bought in 1983. Nestled in the La Plata Mountains, the ranch flanks an historic road that was probably the path followed by Father Escalante during his historic expedition from Santa Fe to Utah in 1776.

Storyteller's Sanctuary
by Amy Laughinghouse

Cold was the night and bitter the wind, and brutal the trail behind. Hunched in the saddle, I growled at the dark and peered through the blinding rain."

So begins "Here Ends the Trail," a short story by one of America's most prolific and popular writers, the late Louis L'Amour. The author of more than 100 novels, including such classic westerns as Hondo and How the West Was Won, he brought to life some unforgettable protagonists, many of them lonely men with hard pasts, searching for shelter or more than that-a home.

L'Amour eventually found his own peace in an historic log cabin nestled in the La Plata Mountains outside Durango, Colo., where he immersed himself in the solace of nature with his wife Kathy and their children, Beau and Angelique. "He liked to go there to be in the elements-to hike, to chop up the oak brush, to examine the terrain, and see what lived there," recalls Kathy, whose husband was 75 when they bought the ranch in 1983.

Though the cabin was ostensibly a getaway from their main residence in Los Angeles, L'Amour still rose at 5:30 every morning and pecked away at his IBM Selectric for six or more hours a day. "He loved sitting at the old pine table in the bedroom that he used for a desk, looking out at the meadow, the pond, the weeping willow, and the peony patch I planted," she says. In fact, L'Amour wrote several novels here before his death in 1988, including Passin' Through, which is set on the ranch itself.

Though he did finally put down roots, L'Amour knew what it was to be a wandering soul, for, like his heroes, he had taken the long road home. Born in Jamestown, N.D., in 1908, L'Amour left school in the tenth grade, striking out on his own to make a living just as the devastating stranglehold of the Great Depression began to grip the Midwest.

"He had a tough life," recalls Kathy, who married L'Amour in 1956. "He had gone to sea, worked in mines, worked on ranches, worked in the lumber country. He never had a home because his family was gone early on. He was alone for a lot of his life."

During those hard, lean years, L'Amour's job description ranged from longshoreman to professional boxer to elephant handler. But his wideranging travels brought him in contact with larger-than-life characters- legendary lawmen and outlaws, real-life cowboys, and Native Americans-whose tales, coupled with his grandfather's first-hand recollections of life on the Western Frontier, fueled L'Amour's imagination.

After World War II, where he served as an officer in the European theater, L'Amour saw his detective, mystery, and adventure stories winning acceptance and building followings in pulp magazines. At a friend's suggestion, he eventually began penning the Westerns which, given his background, he seemed destined to write. By the time Hondo-the story of a dispatch rider, later immortalized on film by John Wayne-was published in 1953, L'Amour was already a success.

Yet he continued to work ceaselessly, writing an average of three books a year and criss-crossing the country on research trips with his wife and children in tow. "Louis wanted to look and feel and taste and understand the terrain, the culture, the people, and their history," Kathy says.

But one place the family returned to again and again was Durango, Colo. "We started spending a big chunk of our summers here with the children in the 1960s," Kathy recalls. "It's just a perfect little town with wonderful old architecture. It sits between three Indian reservations, right in the middle of horse country, cow country, sheep country, timber country, mining country. It has gorgeous weather and beautiful terrain-everything we were interested in."

The only thing it didn't seem to have was the right ranch at the right price. For nearly 20 years, the L'Amours searched for their homeaway- from-home.

In the living room, a pair of knuckle arm sofas, dressed in a plaid Ralph Lauren fabric, flank a coffee table that is topped by a Navajo rug and antique Maidu and Yosemite Miwok baskets. "The Creation," a painting by Native American artist Clifford Brycelea, sits on the mantle.

"We just kept looking and looking, and one day, we drove down into this ranch, and it was covered in snow," Kathy says, conjuring images of that frigid winter afternoon in 1983. "It had a beautiful high ridge, a little creek running through it, and lovely meadows. We fell in love with it, made an offer in the spring-and bought it!"

The ranch originally consisted of 1,000 acres stretching along an old stagecoach road. There was a barn, a granary, and the log home itself, all built by a cattle rancher in 1881. It had been the site of Indian battles- and apparently gun fights, as well, because the L'Amours found the massive hand-hewn pine logs riddled with bullets.

Inside, paneling covered the logs. The L'Amours removed the paneling to discover discolored logs, crumbling chinking, and a few other surprises, as well. "People used to stuff all kinds of things in there to fill that deep hole-fabric, old newspapers, letters-anything that was at hand," Kathy explains.

The L'Amours assembled a team-architect Edward Carson Beall, project architect Frank Balogh, and contractor Jim Messersmith- to oversee the necessary renovations. In addition to removing the interior paneling, sand-blasting the logs, and re-chinking the home inside and out, the L'Amours installed new windows, converted one of four upstairs bedrooms into two bathrooms, enlarged the master bath to house a tub, and added a garage that connects to the home via a covered breezeway.

They also erected a dramatic fireplace of local stone, accented by a wide pine mantle made from a tree they found on their own property, and raised the height of the opening between the living room and the dining room. "My son is 6'4" inches-and he's nearly seven feet tall when he's got on his hats and boots," Kathy explains. "So Beau stood there while we measured and cut the entrance," she recalls with a laugh.

And, of course, to house a portion of Louis' extensive library, the L'Amours had to add bookshelves- lots of them. "He had to have books," explains Kathy's friend Susan Brown, an accomplished actress as well as an interior designer whom the L'Amours enlisted to help decorate the home.

Though L'Amour was 75 when he and Kathy bought the ranch, he still rose at 5:30 every morning and wrote for hours at his desk overlooking the old barn. "He was a man with a passion for his work," Kathy explains, noting with pride that all 122 of his books are still in print. "His favorite book was usually the one he was working on that day," she says with a laugh.

<< BACK TO MAIN PAGE