THE NEW DAY IN COLORADO 



able to den,! more effectively with the Indian, who was 

 the common enemy and an obstacle to settlement and 

 development. There was little in these early conditions 

 to encourage the hope that a great and populous State 

 could be established amid the mountains and plateaus. 

 Mines, cattle, and border traffic were not alone sufficient 

 for the making of civilization. Beyond these crude in- 

 dustries the future was speculative. The country was 

 unexplored, the resources undeveloped, the conditions 

 untried. The transformation which swiftly followed 

 upon this period of doubt converted the frontier commu- 

 nity into one of the most brilliant and promising of 

 American States. 



The dawn of the new day was heralded by the whistle 

 of the locomotive. The dissolution of the Union armies 

 had turned the faces of many thousand veterans towards 

 the trans-Missouri region, and of these Colorado re- 

 ceived its full share. The wonderful era of railroad- 

 building perhaps the most dramatic page in all our in- 

 dustrial history had just begun. These circumstances 

 conspired to give a new and powerful impulse to the ter- 

 ritory at the base of the Eocky Mountains. Large cap- 

 ital joined hands with the increasing stream of immi- 

 grants, and Colorado entered with amazing vigor upon a 

 stage of real and far-reaching development. More im- 

 portant than the finding of gold was the discovery of 

 the fact that the highest forms of agriculture would 

 flourish with the aid of irrigation. When this had been 

 demonstrated by the pioneers there was no longer doubt 

 about the future greatness of the State or the character 

 of its civilization. Denver and a few other settlements 

 began to take on the appearance of permanency, and 



151 



