While living in Aspen between 1946 and 1975, he was the carte blanche designer of modern town shaper Walter Paepcke during the transition from mining and ranching to skiing, but few realize how Bayer’s pivotal contributions to midcourse Aspen shaped what town is today.
Tag: History of Aspen
Posted inHistory
Ute removal policy comes to a head in the 1887 ‘Colorow War’
. “It was not desirable to let these civilians encounter the Indians. We were holding the crowd back on the south side of the Gunnison, until the Indians had passed 13 miles distant. In three days, the rich land of the Uncompahgre was all occupied, towns were being laid out and lots being sold at high prices.”
Posted inHistory
Drive here please, said Aspen in the Quiet Years: Aspen’s history by car, part two
In a time when second homes were few and short-term rental referred to skis, Aspen abided comfortably with cars. A legendary, mischief-making doctor brought a sports-car race to town in the early 1950s.
Posted inHistory
Pioneer pluck in Hunter Creek
After meeting the man who’d earlier laid out the claim at the top of today’s Little Nell where the first silver ore outcroppings were discovered, Staats eyed straight across to Smuggler where the same lime and silver had surfaced. By his reckoning, rich claims should be found in Hunter Creek.
Posted inHistory
Aspen’s rich history of befouling the Fork
As Aspen evolved from a bucolic high-mountain meadow to an industrial city, pollution began to flow directly into the Roaring Fork River and its tributaries.
Posted inHistory
Pitkin’s boastful gulch
The first prospectors up Lincoln Creek in the early 1880s faced avalanches, unstable explosives, cave-ins, and odyssey-like distances to marginal medical care.
Posted inHistory
Aspen’s skiing history: an evolving timeline
In February 1880, B. Clark Wheeler ‘skis’ into town from Leadville on Norwegian snowshoes to complete the first survey of Ute City. He renames the town Aspen.
Posted inHistory
Boys of summer: Baseball stoked the passions of early Aspen
During the 1880s the high number of hardy young men in town took to the new game, mirroring the rising popularity of the sport
Posted inHistory
The Aspen Public Tramway: the first “bucket” on Aspen Mountain
The Aspen Public Tramway, rising from the bottom of Aspen Mountain to Tourtelotte Park, was a precursor to today’s Silver Queen Gondola, known by many locals as “the bucket.” The tramway, little known to local history buffs, was built to haul silver ore, but it also carried a few adventurous passengers.