In the 1870s, miners prospecting in Colorado's San Juan
Mountain Range settled into a picturesque area called San Miguel
Park. By 1878, a desire for permanency led these settlers to turn
the camp into a town, which was incorporated that year under the
name Columbia.
The arrival of a post office in 1880 put this
Colorado town on the map both literally and figuratively. However,
the post office eschewed the name Columbia in favor of the more
creative Telluride (named for an ore of the nonmetallic element
tellurium), and for the first decade of its existence, the village
was caught in the grips of an identity crisis. The confusion over
the name of Columbia/Telluride was finally resolved in 1887, when
a petition signed by the majority of the town's taxpayers won
approval for the name Telluride.
As families began to join the miners, so grew a need to
accommodate the educational needs of their children. A two-story
brick schoolhouse was established for the 37 school-age children
in Telluride in 1885, and it still stands today.
On July 24, 1889, Butch Cassidy, Tom and Bill McCarty and Matt
Werner rode into town and robbed the San Miguel Valley Bank of
more than $20,000. The occurrence launched the gang’s now
legendary career, and secured for Telluride a permanent spot in
American folklore.
The Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, built by Russian-born
Otto Mears, reached Telluride on November 23, 1890, with the first
trains arriving three days later on Thanksgiving. Adding to the
town's prosperity were gold strikes in the mid-1890s, and
Telluride's population increased to more than 3,000.
Two catastrophes marked the turn of the century at Telluride.
In 1901, a disastrous fire left 28 men dead at the Smuggler-Union
mine. That winter, three avalanches in the course of one day
buried the Liberty Bell mine, resulting in 16 deaths and 10
injuries. The disasters activated the Western Federation of Miners
to demand better working conditions, and clashes between labor and
management prevailed from 1901 to 1904, culminating in a 14-month
strike.
Telluride hit its peak as a mining town between 1905 and 1911,
bringing in more than $16 million in gold and silver. After that,
production declined, especially during World War 1, and the area
achieved near-ghost town status.
In 1931, the Rio Grande Southern discontinued its passenger
trains, and by 1951, its freight trains as well. Mining
experienced a brief comeback in the form of Telluride Mines,
Incorporated, during World War II, but this enterprise withered by
the 1960s.
The first hint of Telluride's future as a tourist attraction
came in the 1960s, when jeep owners began taking visitors along
abandoned mine and lumber roads into the back country. Snowmobiles
let these entrepreneurs adapt the excursions for the winter
months, creating a new, if modest, tourist industry for the town.
By the 1970s, developer Joseph T. Zoline brought a plan for a
major ski resort to Telluride, after previous success in Aspen.
The development of Telluride Ski Area, considered by many to be
among the best ski mountains in North America, somehow did not
gain the instant appeal of some other Colorado resorts, allowing
Telluride citizens more control over the direction the town would
take as it developed.
Telluride residents were determined that history not
repeat
itself. They understood the dangers of dependency on a single
industry, which had led to Telluride's previous decline with the
downturn of mining. Instead, the town has taken on the role of
host for a number of illustrious summer festivals, including
world-class jazz, bluegrass, film and wine events - among many
others - which have brought the area new recognition as a creative
gathering ground.
