4 GUIDEBOOK OF THE WESTERN UNITED STATES. 



broad streets, great manufacturing plants, large stores, numerous 

 business blocks, commodious hotels and residences, and beautiful 

 boulevards and parks. 



The exploration that led to the founding of the city of Denver, 

 like those that led to the founding of many other cities, is shrouded 

 more or less in mystery. Gold was certainly the lure that brought 

 the explorers here, but when and where gold was first discovered in 

 what is now Colorado are not certainly known. There are many 

 legends that the precious metal was found in the foothills and the 

 mountains of Colorado prior to 1850, but most of these legends are 

 vague and unreliable. What appears to be the first authentic ac- 

 count of an exploration in this vicinity is a story that a party of 

 Cherokee Indians, in the spring of 1849, went to the Pacific coast by 

 way of the old trail up the Arkansas Valley across the Squirrel 

 Creek divide (just east of Palmer Lake), and down Cherry Creek 

 to the South Platte at the site of the present city of Denver. The 

 story goes that the Indians found some gold in the Rocky Mountains 

 but not enough to deter them from continuing their trip to Cali- 

 fornia. When they reached the coast they did not find gold as 

 abundantly as they had expected, so they returned to Georgia, fully 

 convinced that there were opportunities in the Eocky Mountains just 

 as promising as they had seen in California. 



In 1858 the Cherokees again organized a gold-seeking expedition, 

 which was joined by many white men. This party, which was known 

 as the Green Eussell party, went to Cherry Creek, where the Indians 

 had found some gold on their previous visit. They prospected along 

 Cherry Creek and South Platte Eiver, and many people flocked to 

 their camp. Little gold was found, but the camp persisted, and sev- 

 eral settlements sprang up on or near the site later occupied by the 

 city of Denver. The first town established in this vicinity was on 

 South Platte River 6 miles above the mouth of Cherry Creek. It 

 was called Montana and consisted of about twenty log cabins, but 

 it did not survive a year. The first town on the actual site of Denver 

 was called St. Charles. It was organized September 24, 1858, and, 

 like most towns of this period, it existed at first only on paper; it 

 was not until October that the first structure was erected. This struc- 

 ture consisted of a few logs piled up and surmounted with a wagon 

 cover, and this was probably the first building on the site of Denver. 

 About the middle of October Georgians established a town on the 

 west side of Cherry Creek which they called Auraria, after a small 

 mining town in Georgia. 



The town of St. Charles made no progress until the 17th of No- 

 vember, when Gen. William Larimer and Richard E. Whitsett ar- 

 rived there and rechristened it Denver City, in honor of Gen. J. W. 

 Denver, the governor of the Territory of Kansas, which then in- 



