HISTORY. Prehistoric remains, consisting of numerous cave-dwellings and the ruins of exten sive pueblos. similar in character to those dis cotered in New Mexico and Arizona, have been found in southern Colorado. In the second half of the eighteenth century a numher of expedi tions into the limits of the present State were 'undertaken by the Spaniards. The most im portant of these was the one headed by Francisco Escalante, who in 1770 traversed the southwest ern corner of the State, and explored the region of the Dolores and Gunnison rivers. But though Spain laid claim to the region, she made 110 at tempt to settle it. The country, a portion of which was included in the Louisiana Purchase (1803), wa; partially explored in 1800 by Lieutenant Pike, of the United States Army, and in 1819 by Colonel Loup. Further exploration was carried on by Fremont in 1842 and 1844, and before the Mexican War fur-trading stations had been built on the Arkansas and Platte rivers. In the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo (1848) Mexico relinquished her territorial rights in favor of the United States. Parties of pros pectors and emigrants from Georgia and Kansas entered Colorado in 1858. In t859 the discovery of gold near Boulder and Idaho Springs was followed by a large immigration and the sudden rise of the mining towns of Denver and Boulder. After sending representatives to the Legislature of Kansas, 'Arapahoe County,' as the region was then called, together with lands taken from Nebraska and New Mexico, was organized into the Territory of Colorado on February 28, 1861. From 1864 to 1870 wars were carried on with the Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians. The Utes
ceded the mountain and park regions between 1863 and 1SSO. In 1864 and 1868 unsuccessful attempts at organizing a State Government were made. The final enabling act was passed by Congress on March 3. 1875, and on August 1, 1876, Colorado, the Centennial State, was ad mitted into the Union. Gold-digging was on the decline in 1878, and many mining towns were being deserted, when it was discovered that from the masses of carbonates thrown aside by the gold-seekers, silver and lead might be extracted. Immigrants flocked to Leadville, and soon the value of the lead and silver output came to be many times that of the yield of gold. As a result, the people of the State, in 1S92, declared enthusiastically for the free coinage of silver at the ratio of 16 to 1. Serious strikes broke out among the miners in 1894 and 1896-97, and re course was had t ) military force to restore order. From 1876 to NS'S Colorado was Republican in national politics, but in the three Presidential elections after 1885 the silver interests of the State made it decidedly Democratic. In 1896 and 1900 especially, the Democrats; Populists, and Silver Republicans, in fusion, controlled a large proportion of votes in the State.
Consult: Baneroft, History of the Pacific States, vol. xx. (San Francisco, 1890) : Hayes, Ncic Colorado and the Santa Fe Trail (New York, 1880) ; Tabor, ro/orudo as an Agricultural State (ib. ISS3) Fossett. Colorado: Its Gold and Slicer Mines, etc. (lb. 1880): The Resources, Wealth, and Industrial Dcrelopment of Colorado (Denver, 1883).