Journal 65: Cuchara Connections: Influential People with Ties to the Valley

High in the Culebra Range, where the Sangre de Cristo Mountains bend into green valleys and quiet forests, Cuchara sits at an unexpected crossroads. It may look like a peaceful mountain village, but for generations it has been a meeting place for remarkable lives. Authors, musicians, scholars, business leaders, and wanderers have all drifted toward these winding roads and whispering pines. 

Some came seeking rest, others inspiration, and many, refuge from a louder world. Whether their time here lasted a summer, a childhood, or a fleeting but unforgettable visit, each one carried a piece of Cuchara into their story and left a thread behind in the fabric of this valley. Though there are many, this article highlights six influential figures and the unique paths that led them, in ways big and small, to Cuchara, Colorado.

Helen Wagner, Actress

Best remembered for her remarkable 53-year portrayal of Nancy Hughes on As the World Turns, Helen Wagner holds the record for the longest continuous role ever played by a single actor in television history. (1)    Yet in Cuchara, few realized that the quiet woman in sunglasses strolling through the pines each summer was a television legend.

Her family from Lubbock, Texas first discovered Cuchara Camps in 1931, when Helen was still a young woman. (2)    She fell in love with the mountains and returned year after year, finding in Cuchara a peaceful counterbalance to the bright lights of New York studios. Her bond with the valley grew so deep that in 1954 she and her husband, Robert Willey, chose the little Cuchara Chapel for their wedding, becoming only the second couple ever married there.

Even at the height of her television fame, Wagner slipped back into Cuchara whenever she could, cherishing the anonymity the village offered. Only later did locals realize that their unassuming summer neighbor had been one of the most enduring figures in television history. She was Cuchara’s “most famous resident,” quietly among them all along.

B. J. “Red” McCombs, Entrepreneur

A Texas billionaire with a taste for bold ventures, Red McCombs was known nationwide as the co-founder of Clear Channel Communications and as an owner of major sports franchises including the Minnesota Vikings and San Antonio Spurs. But in the 1980s, amid all his high-powered pursuits, McCombs “discovered” the Cuchara Valley and it struck a chord that never left him. (3)  

He soon became a familiar presence, purchasing ranchland and commercial parcels and investing heavily in the Cuchara ski resort during its most vibrant years. Ever the showman, McCombs brought a bit of Texas swagger to the mountains: he raised Longhorn cattle on his local ranch and famously drove a longhorn-adorned vehicle in Cuchara’s Fourth of July parade, a sight locals still recall with a smile. It was the only parade where the horns were wider than the street.

Even after the ski area closed, his commitment to the community endured. McCombs remained a generous benefactor, at one point donating the old Cuchara Inn property to a charitable organization. (4)   His involvement added a dash of bravado, and a touch of national spotlight, to this quiet mountain valley, proving that even titans of industry found refuge and inspiration in Cuchara’s high-country charm. For all his wealth, it was the high country that felt like treasure. 

Lawrence Welk, Entertainer

Long before reruns of The Lawrence Welk Show became a staple of American nostalgia, its host was already beloved in Cuchara. At the height of his fame as a big-band leader and television star, Welk slipped away at times to the cool mountain air of the valley, becoming a visitor throughout the early to mid-1960s. (5 & 6)  

Residents still recall how the ever-gracious bandleader would glide across dance floors with local ladies at community gatherings, his trademark charm on full display. More than one resident still swears he had smoother moves in cowboy boots than most men manage in dress shoes. Young musicians considered it a stroke of luck to cross his path; Welk never seemed too busy to listen to an impromptu audition or offer a word of encouragement.

His gentle manners, warmth, and willingness to mingle made him a cherished part of Cuchara’s summertime rhythm. (7) Even decades later, locals remember those seasons fondly as the “good old days,” when a national entertainment icon could simply be Lawrence, enjoying the mountains and the people who welcomed him.

Clayton Henri Staples, Artist

Clayton Henri Staples grew up on a Wisconsin farm but quickly found his way into the wider world of art. (8)   After early studies in Minneapolis, he spent his late teens traveling with a Chautauqua company, lecturing and sketching landscapes across the country. (9)   A prolific painter, Staples produced work in watercolor, oil, still life, maritime subjects, and landscapes throughout his career.

After retiring in 1950, Staples and his wife, Esther Fredeen, settled in the mountain community of Cuchara Camps, Colorado, where the surrounding forests and peaks became his daily inspiration. He opened the “Cuchara School of Art” in his barn-studio, teaching summer classes and painting the valley’s snowcapped ridges and winding streams. (10)   

Staples also left a lasting imprint on the community. At the Cuchara Chapel, he carved the words of Psalm 121, “I will lift mine eyes unto the hills” into the ceiling beams, a testament to his spiritual connection to the landscape. Though he moved to Colorado Springs in 1961, after roughly eleven unforgettable years in Cuchara, he continued to return often, support local art events, and influence emerging artists in the valley. (11)   In Cuchara, Staples found not just a subject for his canvases, but a place that shaped and was shaped by his artistic life.

Paul C. Mangelsdorf, Harvard Scholar

One of the most influential botanists and geneticists of the 20th century, Mangelsdorf led Harvard’s Botanical Museum and reshaped scientific understanding of how domesticated corn first came to be. Beginning in the 1930s, he and his family found their summer haven in Cuchara, where they eventually built a generous mountain retreat that they affectionately named “Lynmarand.”

More than just a getaway, Lynmarand evolved into a kind of high-altitude think tank where scholars, colleagues, and curious minds gathered beneath the pines. (12)   Besides Mangelsdorf, this esteemed group of Harvard scholars who met annually in Cuchara was A. Hunter Dupree, the respected author and historian of science and Charles T. Lanham, a decorated Army General, philosopher, and advisor to the President of the United States. To locals, they were just the quiet men with books; to the academic world, they were giants.

For Mangelsdorf, Cuchara became a sanctuary for thinking. The quiet of the valley offered the space he needed to wrestle with big questions about maize genetics, many of which he refined while looking out over those wooded slopes. The insights he sharpened during those summers didn’t stay in the mountains; they went on to shape global plant science and influence agricultural policy around the world.

Gary Bridges: Author

A novelist, educator, and former Air Force pilot, Gary Bridges discovered in Cuchara not just a home, but a wellspring of creative energy. After years of teaching accounting, he turned to storytelling, drawing deeply from the beauty and history of the valley around him. (13)   And like many before him, he found the mountains more convincing than any writing workshop. 

In 2006 he released The Cuchara Chronicles, his debut novel of historical fiction named in honor of the village itself. By 2019 he was already drafting his ninth book. (14)   Many of his works like The Wahatoya, Out of Purgatory, and others braid the legends and landscapes of the Spanish Peaks into their narratives, grounding regional history in compelling fiction. 

Bridges and his wife, Shawn, an artist, eventually settled permanently in Cuchara, where the mountains, forests, and quiet continue to stoke their artistic lives. (15)   Though his readership is primarily regional, Bridges has become a literary keeper of Cuchara’s stories, preserving its lore one novel at a time. (16)  

Great Lives and Quiet Places

When you look at the lives of these six remarkable individuals, an actor and entrepreneur, artist and scholar, musician and novelist, you begin to notice a shared pattern. Each one lived in a world shaped by fame, deadlines, audiences, expectations, and the relentless pull of public attention. Yet when they sought rest, clarity, or simply a return to themselves, they did not retreat to penthouses, luxury suites, or the familiar noise of big-city privilege. They came here to Cuchara.

Cuchara offered something prosperity could never purchase: quiet without loneliness, beauty without spectacle, and community without intrusion. Here, the mountains do not care who you are and the aspens applaud everyone the same. Fame dissolves in the scent of pine needles, and influence shrinks back to its proper size beneath a sky full of stars.

For Helen Wagner, it was anonymity, and for Red McCombs, it was a place where ambition could breathe. For Lawrence Welk, it was friendship without pretense and for Clayton Staples, it was landscapes that somehow deepened his soul. For Paul Mangelsdorf, it was a sanctuary for thought and for Gary Bridges, it was a wellspring of story. 

In a world where notoriety builds walls, Cuchara opened a door, a small one, perhaps, but perfectly placed at the edge of a forest path, beside a river bend, or within the quiet walls of a chapel.

And so the answer becomes clear: they chose Cuchara not because it was grand, but because it was real. In this mountain village, they found what their titles and triumphs could never give them a place to simply be human.(17)

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Footnotes

Parenthetical numbers in the text (e.g., 5) correspond to the sequentially numbered citations listed below.

1. Movie and Television Stars of Huerfano,” World Journal Newspaper, accessed November 30, 2025, https://worldjournalnewspaper.com/movie-and-television-stars-of-huerfano/#:~:text=Helen’s%20television%20persona%20was%20Nancy,award%20for%20this%20in%202004 

2. Movie and Television Stars of Huerfano,” World Journal Newspaper, accessed November 30, 2025, https://worldjournalnewspaper.com/movie-and-television-stars-of-huerfano/#:~:text=Helen’s%20television%20persona%20was%20Nancy,award%20for%20this%20in%202004 

3. Just 40 Years Ago,” World Journal Newspaper, accessed November 30, 2025, https://worldjournalnewspaper.com/just-40-years-ago/#:~:text=B,annual%20parade%20on%20the%20Fourth

4. Just 40 Years Ago,” World Journal Newspaper, accessed November 30, 2025, https://worldjournalnewspaper.com/just-40-years-ago/#:~:text=B,annual%20parade%20on%20the%20Fourth

5. Movie and Television Stars of Huerfano,” World Journal Newspaper, accessed November 30, 2025, https://worldjournalnewspaper.com/movie-and-television-stars-of-huerfano/#:~:text=Helen’s%20television%20persona%20was%20Nancy,award%20for%20this%20in%202004 

6. Nancy Christofferson, “The Late Great Chuck Wagon Restaurant,” The World Journal, July 30, 2010, https://worldjournalnewspaper.com/the-late-great-chuck-wagon-restaurant/

7. 8719 State Highway 12, La Veta, CO 81055,” Zillow, accessed November 30, 2025, https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/18719-State-Highway-12-La-Veta-CO-81055/194182806_zpid/.

8. Artist Biography & Facts: Clayton Henri Staples,” askART, accessed November 30, 2025, https://www.askart.com/artist/Clayton_Henri_Staples/103113/Clayton_Henri_Staples.aspx. 

9. Clayton Staples,” Mid-America Fine Arts, accessed November 30, 2025, https://midamericafinearts.com/featured-artists/clayton-staples/.

10. Clayton H. Staples – ‘Staples Art Studio, Cucharas Camps,’” Reuben Saunders Gallery, accessed November 30, 2025, https://www.reubensaundersgallery.com/clayton-h-staples-the-cuchara-valley-studio/

11. Artist Biography & Facts: Clayton Henri Staples,” askART, accessed November 30, 2025, https://www.askart.com/artist/Clayton_Henri_Staples/103113/Clayton_Henri_Staples.aspx?utm_source=chatgpt.com

12. Cabin in the Pines: Journal 33 – “How Cuchara Shaped Scientific History,” accessed November 30, 2025, https://cabininthepinescuchara.blogspot.com/2025/08/f.html 

13. https://baylorline.com/shawn-and-gary-bridges/#:~:text=finished%20,working%20on%20his%20eighth%20book 

14. “Shawn and Gary Bridges,” BaylorLine, accessed November 30, 2025, https://baylorline.com/shawn-and-gary-bridges/#:~:text=into%20his%20creativity%20until%202006,working%20on%20his%20eighth%20book 

15. Shawn and Gary Bridges,” BaylorLine, accessed November 30, 2025, https://baylorline.com/shawn-and-gary-bridges/#:~:text=have%20a%20quick%20and%20simple,and%20Gary%20is%20an%20author 

16. Gary Bridges,” The World Journal, April 22, 2021, https://worldjournalnewspaper.com/gary-bridges/

17. Author’s note: In preparing this article, the author used AI-assisted tools for research support, proofreading, fact-checking, and stylistic refinement. The narrative, analysis, and historical interpretations are the author’s own, and responsibility for accuracy rests solely with the author. The blog’s research methodology statement is available at:

https://cabininthepinescuchara.blogspot.com/2019/03/methodology-sources-and-use-of-research.html