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Westcliffe
History
The historic Town of Westcliffe is the
county seat of Custer County, Colorado, United
States.
Westcliffe was created to support the mining
town of Silver Cliff nearby. Businesses grew up
and schools and churches were built. When the
silver boom ended, Westcliffe had established
itself and continued to thrive.
Lieutenant Zebulon Pike and
his handful of soldiers were the first American
citizens to go through the Wet Mountain Valley,
in 1806, but it it was more than two decades
before hunters and trappers discovered its
bounty, and another four decades before the
first permanent settlement was made. A wagon
road from the Valley to Canon City via
Hardscrabble Canon was opened in 1870, inviting
more settlers.
A German colony from Chicago, led by Civil War
veteran Gen. Carl Wulsten with a group of 250
people arrived in March 1870.
They were a splendid looking set of people,
including muscular athletic young fellows with
rifles strapped to their backs, and 20
fair haired, clear skinned German girls, all
young, good looking, and seemingly capable of
taking good care of themselves and making
excellent wives for those same gallant rifle
bearers.
The Tribune noted that "a serious drawback to
the development of the mining west was the fact
that the march of agriculture had not kept pace
with the feverish rush of the seekers after the
hidden treasures of the earth." Gen. Wulsten saw
the possibilities in providing cheaper food on
the spot, saving the miners the exorbitant costs
of that which was transported in from long
distances. The baggage car of the train carried
a large sign: "Westward The Star of Empire Takes
Its Course."
Where the railroad tracks ended, the group
shifted to covered wagons, with a military
escort from Ft. Lyons, and six-mule teams. The
new town was named after Vice President Schuyler
Colfax who had expedited the government
assistance and transportation to the Wet
Mountain Valley. The group arrived at their
destination, fifteen miles west of today's
Westcliffe, on March 17, 1870.
The newcomers were welcomed with cheers,
speeches and cannon salute by residents of
then-Fremont County. But Denver's Rocky Mountain
Herald was "painfully agitated about the Wulsten
colony" and said:
The Greeley colony of Yankees on the Cache-a-la-Poudre
will offset the Germans in Wet Mountain valley,
and keep the thing level. Likely as not there
will be several thousands more of 'black
republicans' in the territory before fall.
Really our democratic friends must get used to
these things and take them calmly.
Wulsten wrote of the venture in the 1879 county
history:
In 1869 [Wulsten], propelled by a desire to
ameliorate the physical condition of the poorer
class of Germans, who were condemned by a cruel
fate to work in greasy, ill-ventilated and
nerve-destroyed factories of the great city of
Chicago, formed a band of about a hundred into a
colony, took them and their families out of the
nauseous back alleys and cellars of the
over-crowded Garden City and brought them to "El
Mojada." But short-sighted is man, and his ways
do "gang aft aglee." This was in the spring of
1870. The organization of this colony stood
until fall, when it collapsed.
Evidence of mineral wealth was found which
should have made the founding of an agricultural
and industrial colony upon the co-operative plan
a success instead of a failure.
The colonists were industrious farmers and
Colfax Colony might have succeeded if a promised
amendment to the Homestead Act had passed,
allowing groups as well as individuals to file.
When it didn't, the Colonization Company folded.
Failure can also be attributed to an early frost
ruining crops, mismanagement of funds, and the
almost impossible switch from Chicago sweat
shops to Custer County farming. As the town
foundered, businessmen in Denver sent
supplies--twice--but when a powder keg exploded
in December, so did the town. More families had
followed the first group, but only a few
adjusted and stayed on after Colfax disappeared.
The colonists went their own ways, many of them
staying in the county and becoming successful
and respected citizens.
Carl Wulsten, one of those who did stay, was
called "Professor." He was a scholar and
graduate of Berlin University, an assayer,
chemist and science writer, and Custer County's
first surveyor. He died from chronic bronchitis
in 1913, age 79, and is buried at Rosita.
Also in the year 1870, Richard Irwin, for whom
the camp of Irwin in Gunnison County was named,
discovered a lode near Rosita Springs. Earlier
finds had been made but were never developed.
The "good-looking float" Irwin found in June
wasn't as easily found in the feet-deep snow
drifts barring his way when he returned on a
stormy December night. The vein was located and
specimens sent to the Denver Mint.
At that time, Custer County was the southern
part of Fremont County, from which it was
separated on March 9, 1877 by the state
legislature. It was named after General George
A. Custer who had died at the Little Big Horn in
June 1876. A statue of the General was erected
in a town called Custer City with much fanfare
and festivity June 11, 1902.
Part of the Custer City festivity was the actual
building of the town. The houses and buildings
were built in sections and shipped from Pueblo
to Custer City. Newspapers disagreed on the
number of pre-fabricated buildings erected that
day--anywhere from 40 to 100. They included a
never-used depot, hotel, bank and newspaper
office; "neither have the saloons, churches and
schools been overlooked," said one newspaper.
There were telephones and fire hydrants.
The newspaper never got off the press. The town
was barely defined before the expected train was
rerouted. One big day, one short life and Custer
City was gone. So was the impressive statue of
General Custer. The Denver & Rio Grande served
the valley with both a standard gauge and a
narrow gauge. Dr. William A. Bell, General
William Palmer's English friend, had a definite
interest in bringing the railroad in: he owned
the land on which the station and rail yards
stood. His land was west of Silver Cliff, and he
named it Westcliffe after his English birth
place, Westcliffe-on-the-Sea. The first
passenger train arrived on his land in May 1881,
and from then on it provided regular service and
Westcliffe prospered.
The variety of minerals was the base of the
economy; mineral production is still important
although less so today than agricultural crops,
livestock, lumber and recreation. The cattlemen
began bringing in herds in 1868. Their numbers
increased with men from the defunct Colfax
colony, and agriculture blossomed as mining
declined. Many early ranchers, in addition to
running cattle, raised mules for the mines.
Over the next several years, silver mines were
opening throughout the West. In 1880 in Custer
County alone, close to $2 million in silver was
mined, there were scores of producing mines and
prospector holes and the wages of hundreds of
men came directly from these mining operations.
In 1880 things could not have looked brighter.
Silver Cliff, with a population of 5,040, was
the third largest town in Colorado falling
behind only Denver, with 35,629 residents and
Leadville with 14,820.
With so much silver coming on the market, the
white metal became a burning national political
issue. The Sherman Silver Purchase Act 1890
lessened the position of silver compared to
gold, but guaranteed that the government would
continue to purchase huge reserves of the metal.
By June 1893 the price of silver had declined
and the Crash begun. Miners in places like
Silver Cliff, Tin Cup, Aspen, and Creede lost
their jobs and deserted their communities.
The U.S. silver industry never has fully
recovered.
A hundred years after the mining frenzies, the
Valley has nothing to show for all that greed
and gusto but the old glory holes and the
denuded hills. Yet it's population continues to
grow, compiled of many individuals from all over
the US and worldwide, whom are enjoying the
multiple recreational activities amidst the
incredible beauty and peaceful surroundings of
the Wet and Sangre de Cristo Mountain ranges.
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Coldwell Banker
Metro Brokers
Liberty Assoc. 
