Horace “Silver King” Tabor (1830–99) rose from a smalltime prospector to one of the wealthiest men in Colorado because of his luck in Leadville’s silver mines. He became tabloid fodder through his romantic liaisons with Baby Doe Tabor and his fall from…

One of Colorado’s original seventeen counties, Lake County is a mountainous, 384-square mile county in the west-central part of the state. Leadville, a historic mining town ringed by tall peaks near the headwaters of the Arkansas River, serves as county…

The Leadville National Fish Hatchery was established in 1889 at the base of Mt. Massive and has raised fish to stock the country’s inland waterways for more than 125 years. After successfully eliminating a whirling disease outbreak in the early 2000s,…

One of the most famous mines in Colorado, the Matchless Mine in the Leadville Mining District produced millions of dollars’ worth of silver for its owner, Horace Tabor, in the early 1880s. The mine is perhaps best known, however, as the home of Horace…

Pine Hall is the only historic false-front wood building remaining in Granite, a small town along the Arkansas River about halfway between Buena Vista and Leadville. Built in 1896 as a community center, the building later housed a variety of commercial…

The Tabor Grand Opera House, constructed by the state’s famed Tabor family, was one of the city’s primary cultural institutions during the late 1800s. The Grand Opera enjoyed a period of popularity and success before falling by the wayside, a story that…