Last year over the holidays, Valerie Bishop Moore was cooking while "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" played on the TV. Her father made a request.
Jim Bishop wanted nothing to do with the Grinch.
"He said, 'Valerie, I need you to turn this off,'" the daughter recalled. "I was like: why, Dad? He said, 'This is just too negative for me. I don't like this.'"
In his final years, the old man seemed done with negativity.
News Jim Bishop, one-man builder of Colorado landmark Bishop Castle, has died Savannah Eller [email protected]
His family didn't hear him talking politics or any of his all too familiar conspiracy theories. They didn't see him ranting outside the castle he built in the mountains southwest of Pueblo, Bishop Castle. Over the decades, the roadside attraction became as famous as the creator and his spectacle, his loud rants in front of eager, recording audiences ready to upload.
Yes, YouTube renders Bishop a Grinch.
And yes, he was done with the character -- and, perhaps, whatever character he became at the castle.
"He wasn't much for entertainment anymore," Valerie said.
Close 1 of 24 Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
For almost 50 years, Jim Bishop has been building Bishop Castle stone by stone. Bishop Castle is located in south central Colorado on State Highway 165 in the Wet Mountains of Southern Colorado. The 72-year-old was able to defy a terminal cancer diagnosis and is now back at the castle continuing his project of decades. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
For about 50 years, Jim Bishop has been building Bishop Castle stone by stone. Bishop Castle is located in south central Colorado on State Highway 165 in the Wet Mountains of Southern Colorado. The 72-year-old was able to defy a terminal cancer diagnosis and is now back at the castle continuing his project of decades. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
The Falconaires play for a large crowd on a beautiful evening at Wolf Ranch on Wednesday, July 27, 2016. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
photo of Phoebe and Jim Bishop at Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
A large cathedral takes up one floor of Bishop Castle. Iron work, stone, wood and stained glass are used in the large room that can rented for weddings. Wednesday, July 28, 2016. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
A dragon head decorates the top of the stone structure. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
A large cathedral takes up one floor of Bishop Castle. Iron work, stone, wood and stained glass are used in the large room that can rented for weddings. Wednesday, July 28, 2016. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
A castle visitor walks down several floors of winding staircase built of stone and iron. Wednesday, July 27, 2016. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
A castle visitor heads down a set of winding rock stairs that are several stories tall at Bishop Castle. Jim Bishop has spent nearly 50 years building the castle by hand. The castle has always been free to the public. Wednesday, July 28, 2016 . photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Phoebe Bishop, wife of Jim Bishop photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Bishop Castle
Jim Bishop has singlehandedly been building Bishop Castle since 1969.
1 of 24 Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
For almost 50 years, Jim Bishop has been building Bishop Castle stone by stone. Bishop Castle is located in south central Colorado on State Highway 165 in the Wet Mountains of Southern Colorado. The 72-year-old was able to defy a terminal cancer diagnosis and is now back at the castle continuing his project of decades. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
For about 50 years, Jim Bishop has been building Bishop Castle stone by stone. Bishop Castle is located in south central Colorado on State Highway 165 in the Wet Mountains of Southern Colorado. The 72-year-old was able to defy a terminal cancer diagnosis and is now back at the castle continuing his project of decades. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
The Falconaires play for a large crowd on a beautiful evening at Wolf Ranch on Wednesday, July 27, 2016. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
photo of Phoebe and Jim Bishop at Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
A large cathedral takes up one floor of Bishop Castle. Iron work, stone, wood and stained glass are used in the large room that can rented for weddings. Wednesday, July 28, 2016. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
A dragon head decorates the top of the stone structure. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
A large cathedral takes up one floor of Bishop Castle. Iron work, stone, wood and stained glass are used in the large room that can rented for weddings. Wednesday, July 28, 2016. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
A castle visitor walks down several floors of winding staircase built of stone and iron. Wednesday, July 27, 2016. photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
A castle visitor heads down a set of winding rock stairs that are several stories tall at Bishop Castle. Jim Bishop has spent nearly 50 years building the castle by hand. The castle has always been free to the public. Wednesday, July 28, 2016 . photo by Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Phoebe Bishop, wife of Jim Bishop photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
Jerilee Bennett,The Gazette
Bishop Castle photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette
It was another quiet hour Thursday, early in the morning, when Bishop died. He was 80.
"I was hoping it was the same old getting-sick-and-he'll-pull through-it-again thing," said Bishop's son, Daniel.
That was Bishop's history -- always pulling through.
Through a mental breakdown that landed him in a psych ward for several nights. That was after the disappearance of his beloved cocker spaniel, Bessie. Not long after, in 2016, Bishop pulled through cancer and brutal rounds of radiation that shrunk him, making him a shell of his former bodybuilding self, his back hunched, his skin sagging and dirt-stained from all those years of hauling rock for his castle.
He was shrunk but far from defeated during a fragmented interview in 2016, then age 72. "Carcinoma means incurable," he said while hauling more rock. "Incurable my ass!"
A disease in his childhood was thought to be incurable. "He wasn't supposed to live past the age of 5," said his youngest child, Donita.
Lifestyle Meet the man behind Bishop Castle, whose Colorado creation is a source of public envy and private ruin By seth boster [email protected]
It was Bishop's first time pulling through, one formative moment of a tough upbringing in Pueblo. He'd get tough all right; the high school dropout would sculpt his body in the gym, putting on a show by curling 150-pound dumbbells.
Donita heard about another formative moment: a visit with family to Seven Falls, the Colorado Springs attraction that came with a fee.
"It was a really big deal, because they didn't have any money," Donita said. "He was maybe 10 years old, this is the '50s. He was climbing around, and someone sees him and says, 'Little boy, get down from there!' It embarrassed him and embarrassed his family."
Bishop Castle would be different. It would be the adventurous, free attraction that a poor boy's family needed. And it would be free of rules -- no one to stop climbing or walking the iron pathways between towers, however notoriously hair-raising.
"It means freedom," Valerie said of the castle's legacy. "And that if you set your mind to something, you can do anything. Anything is possible."
Who would've thought one man could build this soaring edifice with nothing but his hands, pickup truck and makeshift pulley system? Not the onlookers at the start of construction in 1969.
It started as a stone cottage, a quiet place in the woods for Bishop and his wife. Then someone commented on the arching design appearing to be a castle.
"In the very beginning, it was just about seeing what he could do," Daniel said. "Just seeing how far he could stack it up. And just the naysayers. 'What are you doing up here, Jim? You're just wasting your time.'"
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Daniel was born in 1973, around the time his dad finished the castle after days and nights of hauling rock from high in the mountains and low in canyon creek bottoms. The U.S. Forest Service took notice, warning him against the scavenging. There were bouts, too, with the Internal Revenue Service regarding taxes; with the county regarding code infringements; with the Department of Transportation regarding highway signs.
"The highway signs were a big push for him going fanatical," Daniel said in a previous interview. "He saw signs for ski resorts, the big-business, big-money places, and he couldn't understand why there couldn't be signs for people who couldn't afford to ski."
The man's mind seemed to slip through the years, through the years of more round-the-clock rock hauling and tower building and shouting.
"Physically, it only made him stronger," Daniel said. "Mentally ... it turned him into somewhat of a maniac."
Finances back home were but one sacrifice.
News Bishop Castle: One man's vision springs toward sky By seth boster [email protected]
"He sacrificed a lot of the time he would've spent with us," Valerie said. "And I know he felt like when Roy died, he had sacrificed Roy."
In 1988, Bishop was clearing trees around the castle when one fell on his second son. Roy died at the age of 5.
There would be a tower that Bishop would never finish building up, Roy's Tower. There would be a beautiful glass roof -- "to catch his tears," Bishop's wife of 50 years, Phoebe, said in a previous interview.
He would fight tears by working more and more. Sometimes he would fight his son, who was similarly short-tempered then; Daniel had his own demons after Roy's death.
Bishop would fight until the tears won.
"He didn't cry about a lot of things," Donita said, "but Roy and my mom would do it."
Phoebe died of cancer in 2018. Days later at the castle, Bishop was seen in rare silence. He was sitting and watching visitors who might've preferred to catch another conspiracy-fueled rage. Bishop just sat there with his little dog, Pumpkin.
He could never sit for long, of course.
Bishop got back to work, back to hauling rocks against the advice of any doctor treating a patient with Parkinson's disease. Bishop fixed a winch on his truck, which would become lopsided in his mission to haul the biggest rock he ever hauled.
"I retired him four years ago when he started running off the road; his Parkinson's had taken his motor skills away," Daniel said. "I had to take the truck away from him. I thought he was gonna fight me."
Finally, Bishop was done fighting.
He was done with negativity, done with the politics and conspiracies and the Grinch. He seemed much more interested in his kids.
"He wanted to know what was going on in our lives," Valerie said.
News Seven Colorado destinations with an odd twist By Seth Boster [email protected]
As for Daniel, he's been overseeing the castle. He's been eyeing more work to do. He's looking to finish that unfinished tower, Roy's Tower.
"Of course this place has its own hard memories that have been hard for me," Daniel said. "But at this point in my life, I'm just glad to keep it going like he did."
That's what Daniel was doing one night this week, while his sister was at their dad's bedside.
Who was at the castle? the man asked. Daniel was, along with his wife and daughter, Valerie replied.
"They're taking care of it for you, Dad," she said. "He said, 'OK, well, I guess if everything is being taken care of, I'm OK to go."