The East Fork of the Arkansas River originates on the north slope of Mount Arkansas as a trickling stream above timberline and percolates down a drainage of willows and wildflowers near the Climax mine on Fremont Pass. It will meander nearly 1,500 miles, through towns like Leadville, Cañon City, Fowler and Holly, and will be exploited in numerous ways before leaving Colorado and flowing into Kansas and on to the Mississippi River. (Mike Sweeney, Special to The Colorado Sun) What is a river?

It depends on your point of view. Sun reporters have fanned out along the Arkansas River, from the headwaters near Leadville to the border with Kansas, to learn what the river means to people in the places it runs through. The series begins with Michael Booth’s dispatch from high in the Mosquito Range

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