Walking along Main Street, the only paved street in Silverton, at daybreak I realized this former Colorado silver mining town is one of the best examples of a bygone era.
I half expected to see an old prospector stumbling around after losing his fortune the night before in a less-than-reputable establishment. Sadly, I had no such luck. The scene would have been vastly different more than a century ago, when nearby Blair Street was lined with over 30 brothels and saloons.
Silverton, which was established two years before Colorado statehood in 1876, is not a ghost town. Real people do live here. Some 637 at the last census.
In fact, the stately county courthouse and townhall gives it a big city feel when compared to Silver Plume (population 170) and Rico (population 265), which share a similar mining history. Perhaps best of all is the architecture. By and large, Silverton’s cityscape wasn’t defaced with hideous postwar additions. Most everything is Victorian or Edwardian.
Living here requires a love for the mountains — the town sits at 9,318 feet in elevation and is surrounded in every direction by the San Juan Mountains — and everything that comes with life in the High Country of Colorado, including the general sense of isolation. For better and worse. The latter can be true in the winter, when driving to Durango, the closest city, can be an excursion. Sometimes the isolation is even forced upon inhabitants. Earlier this year at…
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