Colorado is now known for its incredible skiing, and Denver, its capital city, is also considered America’s craft beer capital. But long before the ski resorts and the breweries, Colorado was a hotbed for mining. The Pikes Peak Gold Rush, which kicked off in 1858, brought tens of thousands of people to the Rocky Mountains, many hoping to strike it rich. With that influx, all kinds of towns started popping up in the mountains in the years that followed, helped by the railroads built to transport people in and the gold and silver out. Other towns grew up around hopes of a thriving ranching and farming future – hopes that ultimately came to naught.
Some of those Gold Rush towns are still around, like Cripple Creek, offering high country adventure and charm. But others were abandoned, and all that’s left are remnants of the dreams in the form of dilapidated stores, abandoned schools, and long empty cabins. Walking past the old buildings, it’s fun to imagine what life was like more than 100 years ago in these places.
There are more than 1,500 ghost towns in Colorado, according to ColoradoInfo, although only over 600 visible remnants remain today. Many, though not all, are former mining towns in the mountains, and some have more to see than others. These five are some of the best for their preserved buildings, ease of access, and unique history.
St. Elmo near Buena Vista, Colorado
St. Elmo, touted as “Colorado’s most original ghost town,” is also considered one of the best-preserved ghost towns in the state. Now listed on the National Register of Historic Places, this mining town was founded along Chalk Creek in 1880 as Forest City. Because it was determined that the name was already common in the area, one of the founders reportedly renamed it “St. Elmo” after the title of the book he was reading. More than 2,000 people made their home here, and the town had its own railroad station, hotels, restaurants, stores, saloons, and more. In 1890 and then in 1898, fire devastated the town, and that was the beginning of the end. By the 1920s, the railroad stopped running, and by 1943, just two siblings from the Stark family, who had been there since nearly the beginning of the town, were the only residents. They turned many buildings into summer cabins…