Las Animas, CO

Las Animas reflects a style of brick depot frequently erected by the Santa Fe in Kansas and Colorado in the first decade of the 20th century, before the more angular "county seat" style was adopted. Built in 1908, the depot reflected a slight revision of the design used a few years earlier in that the front bay window was rectangular instead of half-hexagonal (see Rocky Ford, CO for an example of the earlier style, built 1907). The rear of the depot also featured a "carriage porch," which was occasionally but not always applied to this style of depot. By the late 1980's, the Las Animas depot had passed into private hands, and unfortunately does not appear to have been well cared for. The Las Animas freight depot is visible in the trees to the left of the passenger depot in the above photo.