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The Manitou Cliff Dwellings Museum exhibits relocated Anasazi Indian cliff dwellings. The Anasazi lived and roamed the Four Corners area of the United States Southwest from 1200 B.C. to A.D. 1300. The museum was established in 1904 and opened to the public in 1907.
The Anasazi did not live in the Manitou Springs area, but lived and built their cliff dwellings in the Four Corners area, several hundred miles southwest of Manitou Springs. The Manitou Cliff Dwellings were relocated to their present location in the early 1900s, as a museum, preserve, and tourist attraction. The stones were taken from a collapsed Anasazi site near Cortez in southwest Colorado, shipped by railroad to Manitou Springs, and assembled in their present form as Anasazi-style buildings closely resembling those found in the Four Corners. The project was done with the approval and participation of well-known anthropologist Dr. Edgar Lee Hewett, and Virginia McClurg, founder of the Colorado Cliff Dwelling Association.