On the morning of Aug. 15, 1876, Judge Amherst Stone left Golden on a northbound Colorado Central Railroad train to Boulder, where he was expected to formalize a ruling that would put the financially troubled railroad into receivership. He never arrived. Just north of Ralston Creek, near the site that would eventually be known as […]
The shooting deaths of two different gamblers made headlines in the brand-new state of Colorado in early August 1876, though only one would still be the stuff of legend 150 years later. James Butler “Wild Bill” Hickok was killed in the boomtown of Deadwood in the Dakota Territory on Aug. 2, though it was more […]
The telegraphic dispatch, dated Aug. 1 and sent from Washington, D.C., appeared in newspapers across Colorado and the nation the following day. “The President, in accordance with the provisions of an act of Congress, approved March 3, 1875, has issued his proclamation declaring and proclaiming the fact that the fundamental conditions imposed by Congress on […]
The official canvass of the Colorado Territory’s referendum approving a state constitution was completed at Gov. John Routt’s office on July 24, 1876. The final tally was 15,443 votes for the constitution and statehood, and 4,030 votes against. Routt, the Civil War infantry captain appointed territorial governor by President Ulysses S. Grant the previous year, […]
