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Alexander Cummings

Appointed by President Andrew Johnson in 1865, Alexander Cummings (1810–79) was the third governor of the Territory of Colorado. Originally from Pennsylvania, Cummings gained his office as governor in 1865 largely because he served the Union during the…

Colorado Constitution

The Colorado Constitution establishes the basic framework of the state’s government. Written and ratified in 1876, it has served as the state’s original and only constitution. As in other states, ultimate power rests with the people and is exercised by…

Edward M. McCook

Edward Moody McCook (1835–1909) was a prominent lawyer, soldier, and politician who served as the fifth and seventh governor of Colorado Territory (1869–73 and 1874–75). A successful Union cavalry general during the Civil War, McCook became friends with…

Indigenous Treaties in Colorado

Treaties with Indigenous people played a major role in the conquest and formation of Colorado. Backed by the constant threat of military force, the series of treaties and agreements signed between the federal government and various Indigenous…

Little Arkansas Treaty

The Little Arkansas Treaty refers to a pair of treaties signed between the US and Indigenous nations in Kansas in mid-October 1865: one with the Southern Arapaho and Southern Cheyenne nations and one with the Comanche and Kiowa. Of the two, the treaty…

Samuel Elbert

Samuel Hitt Elbert (1833–99) was the sixth governor of the Colorado Territory (1873–74) and was elected as one of the first justices on the Colorado Supreme Court after statehood in 1876. The son-in-law of territorial governor and businessman John Evans,…

Teenokuhu (Friday)

Teenokuhu (ca. 1822–81), known to English speakers as “Friday” or “Friday Fitzpatrick,” was a nineteenth-century Northern Arapaho leader. As a boy, Teenokuhu (Arapaho for “sits meekly”) was separated from his band and adopted by Thomas Fitzpatrick, a…

The Civil War in Colorado

Colorado’s role in the American Civil War (1861–65) was part of a broader geopolitical contest: control of the American Southwest. The war began in 1861, just two years after the Colorado Gold Rush and mere months after Congress established the Colorado…

The Reynolds Gang

The Reynolds Gang, formally members of Company A of Wells’s Battalion, Third Texas Cavalry, was a group of about fifteen Confederate cavalrymen who conducted raids and robberies in the South Park area near the end of the Civil War. Initially considered…

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

Signed on February 2, 1848, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the Mexican-American War (1846–48). In the treaty, the Republic of Mexico agreed to cede 55 percent of its territory, some 525,000 square miles, to the United States. This land eventually…

William Gilpin

William Gilpin (1815–94) served as the first governor of Colorado Territory in 1861–62. A gifted speaker with a flair for the dramatic, Gilpin was a firm believer in Manifest Destiny and in Colorado’s importance to the young American West. As governor…