The Watchtower

Twenty years ago, a Colorado woman built what she called a UFO Watchtower in the middle of nowhere, motivated by reports of strange sightings in the sky. A local joke at first, the roadside attraction has since hosted over 100,000 visitors in the San Luis Valley.

What draws so many people to the hot desert? The Watchtower is kitschy, for sure, but it also retains a hint of the surreal, thanks in part to the San Luis Valley’s spectacular geography. Not only that but the site is thought to be a spatial anomaly. Two mysterious vortexes, the story goes, frame the tower. Visitors are encouraged to leave something of themselves behind—as though tossing coins in a fountain—with the promise of better things to come.

While many visit to see strange lights above the mountains, the unexpected attraction are the left-behinds, the personal mementos that haunt the space out front. Its inhabitants are castaway toys, trinkets, statues, and mannequins—the simulacra of modern life—no longer wanted.

This essay takes a peak at the strangeness of the Watchtower in the spirit of Rod Serling and Jean Baudrillard. Imagine a French postmodernist hacking an episode of Twilight Zone. Part of a larger project on the American uncanny.

Jahmes Finlayson is the narrator and finger piano player.