Located about eleven miles south of Aspen in Castle Creek Valley, Ashcroft was established in 1880 as a silver mining camp. It quickly grew to more than 2,000 residents and briefly rivaled Aspen, but it was already declining by the late 1880s because the…

Aspen, located along the Roaring Fork River west of Independence Pass, is the county seat of Pitkin County. Now one of the state’s most iconic hubs for culture and recreation, Aspen began like many Colorado towns—as a small mining camp, founded by Henry…

Established in 1979, the Aspen Art Museum is a noncollecting museum that focuses on exhibitions of contemporary visual art. It grew out of a long tradition of contemporary art in Aspen and has displayed the work of modern masters such as Willem de…

Built in 1889 by Jerome B. Wheeler (1841–1918), the Hotel Jerome was Aspen’s original luxury hotel. After the 1893 silver crash destroyed the town’s economy, the hotel survived as a boardinghouse and slipped into comfortable shabbiness. When Aspen…

Located just west of Independence Pass at an elevation of about 10,900 feet, the town of Independence was established in 1879 and boomed briefly in the early 1880s, reaching an estimated population of 1,500. In the mid-1880s, the town’s harsh climate and…

Pitkin County, named after former Colorado governor Frederick Pitkin, is located in west-central Colorado, spanning 973 square miles of mountains and the Roaring Fork River valley. It is bordered by Garfield and Eagle Counties to the north, Lake and…

Walter P. Paepcke, a Chicago businessman, was pivotal in developing Aspen into a resort known for its exceptional skiing and as a hub for intellectuals, artists, politicians, and celebrities. Paepcke’s efforts have made Aspen stand out among Colorado’s…

The merchant and investor Jerome B. Wheeler (1841–1918) built the Wheeler Opera House in Aspen in 1889, making it the third-largest opera house in Colorado at the time. As Aspen declined after the Panic of 1893 and the demonetization of silver, the…

The Wheeler/Stallard House is a three-story Queen Anne style residence built in 1888–89 by Jerome B. Wheeler on the west side of Aspen. Edgar and Mary Ella Stallard occupied the house from 1905 to 1945, when Walter Paepcke acquired it for use as overflow…