Catching Up On The Travel Blog 2020 - Leadville, Colorado - National Mining Museum

We had been planning a trip to Peru to visit the high-altitude ruins at Machu Pichu when we returned from Egypt in 2020.  Of course, the Covid crisis prevented that, so a visit to the much higher town of Leadville, Colorado would have to substitute.

 

We arrived late in the afternoon of Sept 24, 2020, but not too late to tour the National Mining Museum and Hall of Fame.

Leadville was a boom-town more than once in the 19th century as gold was discovered and mined, then silver, and of course, lead.  With a population peaking at around 30,000 it was the second largest city in Colorado.

There is an excellent view of downtown from the hill beside the museum.

The well-preserved Dexter miner's cabin is nearby at the Healy Museum.  A less pretentious cabin can be found near the Carnegie Library a couple of blocks away along with a stamp mill from the mining era.

We toured the Mining museum and walked past a few other attractions before heading out of town to a couple of mining sites where little or nothing would remind of you of the boom days.

 

 

 

There is quite a bit of interesting history here.  Wikipedia offers this note on the early days:

As the population boomed, by 1878 Leadville had the reputation as one of the most lawless towns in the West.  The first city marshal was run out of town a few days after he was appointed, and his replacement was shot dead within a month by one of his deputies.

 

There are still almost 3,000 residents in Leadville and we found an excellent dinner at the Treeline Kitchen downtown.

There are more pictures at the Flickr Album, of course.