Colorado Springs Brief History

A City In The Shadow of Pikes Peak

Starting at the beginning (or what we discovered about our history).

In 1871, Colorado Springs was born. The first town stake was placed at the corner of Pikes Peak and Cascade Avenues. General William Palmer looked at Pikes Peak and told the surveyors to sight off of it and Pikes Peak Avenue was created.

From the very beginning, Colorado Springs was a city dedicated to a fantastic quality of life. As Marshall Sprague wrote in Newport of the Rockies: The Life and Good Times of Colorado Springs:

In 1871, General William Jackson Palmer… built on the sheltered warm side of Pikes Peak … a resort where sedate temperate people from back east could enjoy life in tranquil comfort. The General named his village Colorado Springs though the springs were in Manitou Springs five miles away. (xxi)

General Palmer desired to build his city with good taste in mind. The original “Fountain Colony” as it was called was created to control the development of the Colorado Springs community. Palmer went so far as to include a temperance  clause in all of the original deeds to Colorado Springs Real Estate.

The New Colorado Springs Gold Rush

Colorado Springs Real Estate sales have changed in the past 100 years.

Imagine buying a residential lot in “The Fountain Colony” for $50.00. Imagine buying a business lot for a $100.00. These are the prices that General Palmer sold downtown Colorado Springs lots for in 1872. After the gold rush in Cripple Creek in 1891, prices went up a bit and have never recovered. The gold rush turned the little Fountain colony into a very wealthy town. Many of the homes on Nevada Avenue were built with gold money.

The original gold rush may have been the mines in Cripple Creek, but today the Colorado Springs real estate market is the new gold mine.  Although you can’t get much for $50.00 today, Colorado Springs real estate is still a great opportunity for a different type of gold rush.