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Animas Canyon Toll Road

The Animas Canyon Toll Road was built in 1876–78 to connect the mining town of Silverton to the coal beds and agricultural produce of the Animas Valley near what is now Durango. The roughly thirty-mile wagon road operated for about five years before it…

Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad

Rising about 2,800 feet over its famously scenic forty-five-mile route, the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad was originally built in 1881–82 as part of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway’s effort to reach the mines of the San Juan Mountains…

San Juan County

San Juan County was established just before Colorado became a state in 1876. It initially stretched from the Utah border in the west to its present border in the east. The next year, the first state assembly allocated most of San Juan County’s western…

Silverton

Silverton is a historic mining town established in 1874 in Baker’s Park in the heart of the San Juan Mountains. After the Denver & Rio Grande Railway (now the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad) reached the town in 1882, the surrounding…