Efforts are ongoing to resurrect the historic log house of George M. Pullman, the famed sleeper railcar maker who lived in Colorado during the 1860s. The Pullman House was originally built near Golden in 1860 by Pullman as a way station at the crossroads leading to the most famous gold fields in the region. Pullman and associates who assembled its land, the Cold Spring Ranch, together with neighboring parcels into 1,600 acres, which became among the best-known way station ranches in Colorado Territory. Pullman used this ranch and other businesses to raise the money he needed to realize his dream of creating the famed Pullman Palace Car Company.
The Pullman House is a legend of Golden's heritage, with a remarkable journey and story to tell. It was built as a way station of the Colorado Gold Rush, made of hewn pine logs of the mountains. For 105 years this building stood, passing through the hands of George Pullman, a prominent hotelkeeper, and two Jefferson County Sheriffs. It was enlarged to 5 times its original size, and became many different colorful things. It served as a way station for stagecoaches, team-drawn wagons, trains, and automobiles. It was even a station along the tramway line that is now the RTD W (West) line light rail. Where pioneers once paid in gold dust became a place to buy television sets. The march of modernization spelled doom for the frontier structure in 1965, and three newspapers including the Rocky Mountain News and Denver Post proclaimed its destruction. However, the logs of the original structure in fact survived, having been numbered, dismantled and spirited up to the mountains of Central City, where they lay in state for 32 years. In 1997 they were returned to Golden, then lay in storage at Camp George West until they were seriously burned in an arson fire in 2009. And yet the old growth pine was not wiped out, with logs salvaged from the wreckage, and efforts continue by the Golden Landmarks Association to rebuild the cabin as its gold rush era self. The adventure of the Pullman House travels on!
The National Trust for Historic Preservation has launched an effort to preserve the historic Pullman Village, the company town George Pullman built outside of Chicago, as a national treasure. Its goal is to work with the National Parks Conservation Association, elected officials, community organizations, and local residents to designate Pullman as a unit of the National Park System. Find out how you can support this effort! A further look into historic Pullman Village, the company town George Pullman built outside of Chicago starting in 1880. Now a designated National Historic Landmark district. Quite a far leap from a frontier log ranch house! The non-profit foundation
who have worked since 1960 to save, preserve and restore the many
historic places in Pullman Village. Copyright © 1997-2022 by Richard Gardner |
