In the early and mid-nineteenth century, when the western United States was in a seemingly unending state of flux as people competed for dominance over the land and its resources, three men moved to what would eventually become southeastern Colorado and…

George Bent (1843–1918) was a half-white, half-Native American soldier who fought in multiple battles for the Confederacy during the Civil War and for the Cheyenne people in various wars of the late nineteenth century. His life reflects the shifts in…

The Koshare Scouts is primarily made up of Boy Scout troop 2230 in La Junta, Otero County, that has studied Native American lore and performed tribal rituals since the 1930s. This imitative white group is part of a long American history of “playing…

La Junta City Park is a prime example of a New Deal project on Colorado’s eastern plains. As a result of work carried out between 1933 and 1941, a poorly drained park became the city’s primary outdoor recreation space, complete with stone walls, benches,…

Lincoln School was an important early school complex on the 300 block between West Second and West Third Streets in La Junta. Built in three phases, the complex started in 1883 with a stone building, was enlarged in 1903–4 with a red brick addition, and…

The historic fur trade era in the Colorado region, which began in the early nineteenth century, ushered in a period of direct contact between Native Americans and whites. By this time, the hides and robes provided by Colorado’s furbearing animals had…

Otero County is located in southeastern Colorado and covers 1,270 square miles of rolling plains and the fertile Arkansas River valley. It is bordered by Pueblo County to the west, Crowley and Kiowa Counties to the north, Bent County to the east, and Las…

The Torres Cave Archaeological Site is a rock shelter in the wall of a canyon south of La Junta. Excavated in 1977 by the Denver chapter of the Colorado Archaeological Society, the site was probably occupied over several centuries as a seasonal Plains…

William Bent (1809–69) played a pivotal role in the early development of Colorado. He initially came to the area as a fur trapper but became a liaison between whites and Native Americans via his trading fort on the Arkansas River near present-day La…