The Pike's Peak Gold Rush

The gold that George Jackson found here did not stay a secret for long, and it arrived at a perfect moment. The eastern United States was still reeling from the financial panic of eighteen fifty seven, and thousands of people were desperate for a fresh start. When news spread of gold in the Rocky Mountains, it set off one of the great migrations of the American West, remembered as the Pike's Peak gold rush.

The name was a bit of a misnomer, since the real strikes were up here near present day Idaho Springs, Black Hawk, and Central City, well north of Pike's Peak itself. But Pike's Peak was the landmark everyone knew, so wagons rolled west painted with the slogan Pike's Peak or Bust. Jackson's placer find in January, followed by John Gregory's lode discovery near Black Hawk that spring, turned a trickle into a flood.

Historians estimate that perhaps one hundred thousand people set out for the goldfields in eighteen fifty nine. The hopeful travelers called themselves fifty niners, after the year. Many of them turned back, disappointed, and far fewer actually reached the mountains.

But enough stayed to build towns, dig mines, and lay the foundations of what became the Colorado Territory just two years later.