Vote for Leadville as Best Historic Small Town
September 30, 2021Help Leadville win 2021 Best Historic Small Town. We’ve been nominated for the USA TODAY 10Best Readers’ Choice Travel Award! Please vote daily until Monday, Oct. 25, 2021. The 10 towns with the most votes will win.
Discover Our History
It’s no surprise Leadville was included as a candidate. Leadville, a Victorian-era mining town and home of the unsinkable Molly Brown, offers a taste of authentic western heritage through its gold and silver rush days. Below are some of the many attractions Leadville offers for history buffs. 📷: @alicia_viezcas
Visit Now
Healy House Museum and Dexter Cabin (Open year ’round) – Discover two of Leadville’s earliest houses for a glimpse of life in a booming silver-mining town. See lavish Victorian furniture, including objects belonging to Horace and Augusta Tabor, and a beautiful Victorian garden.
Leadville Train (Open through the holidays until Jan. 15, 2022) – Hear about the fascinating history of the railroads, ghost stories, and tales of the wild as you ride the scenic Leadville Train through the San Isabel National Forest.
Mineral Belt Trail (Open year ’round) – Walk or bike this ADA accessible paved 11.6 mile trail in summer. Cross-country ski or fat bike or snowshoe it in winter! This loop around downtown Leadville passes authentic mining structures and signs that tell fascinating history. 📷: @hehuang81
National Mining Museum and Hall of Fame (Open year ’round) – Tour replicas of caves and mines. Check out the masks past miners wore to breathe and the carbide lamps that lit their way. See photos of the people who’ve run American mines for decades.
Temple Israel (Open through October) – Built in 1884, Temple Israel is the oldest of the area’s frontier synagogues. After a fire in 2006, the building was historically restored to near original condition. It now serves as a museum and research institution that documents the lives of Jewish pioneers during Leadville’s mining boom era. 📷: @_jean_rimbaud
Visit Next Spring
These attractions reopen for the season in May 2022:
Cemetery, Ghost and Safari Tours – Take a walk back in time and learn about Leadville’s amazing history with local historian Roger Pretti. Author of Lost Between Heaven and Leadville: Specters, Spooks and Shades of the Departed in a Colorado Silver Camp, he leads fun, fact-filled tours.
Heritage Museum – Browse this fine collection of Leadville memorabilia, including a model of Leadville’s ice palace and mementos of the 10th Mountain Division heroes who trained at nearby Camp Hale.
House with the Eye – Explore what Leadville’s charming Victorian homes would have looked like inside during the Silver Rush boom days. 📷: @millefiorifavoriti
Matchless Mine – Visit the place where one of Leadville’s most notorious silver kings, Horace Tabor, struck it rich and where his mistress-turned-wife died alone and penniless in 1935. See the original mining shaft and headframe used to pull Tabor’s extraordinary wealth from the ground. Then, tour the newspaper-lined shack where Baby Doe lived out her days.
Tabor Home – Tour the home of silver king Horace Tabor and his first wife, Augusta, built around 1877 and moved from its original site on Harrison Ave. to its present location to make room for the Tabor Opera House.
Tabor Opera House – Experience the splendor of this majestic opera house, once billed as the finest theatre between St. Louis and San Francisco. The Tabor is home to the most significant collection of historic stage scenery in North America; the New York Times recently featured this 2020 discovery.
Twin Lakes Interlaken Boat Tours – Take a scenic narrated boat tour of Twin Lakes. Tours include both the upper and lower glacially formed lakes and a tour of the historic Interlaken resort, established in the late 1800’s as a getaway for wealthy mining tycoons. 📷: @jessssnapshots
Please Vote Daily
Please come explore our rich history and please vote each day! Thank you!
