BRECKENRIDGE, 150 Years of Golden History

Eureka! This cry of prospector Ruben J. Spaulding on an August afternoon in 1859 rang against the granite walls of the Continental Divide. Its echo prompted a horde of would-be miners to pour over skyscraping mountain passes into what became Breckenridge, Colorado.

From that day through decades beyond, riches in high-quality placer gold grains, flakes and nuggets of such unsurpassed beauty that they ended up in museums flowed in dizzying abundance from the Breckenridge gold fields.

Breckenridge ranks as the first town to erupt on Colorado's gold-rich Western Slope during the 1859-launched gold rush. The heady site of Colorado's first Western Slope gold strike in 1859, the town also witnessed Colorado's first known ski outing. Carving and steaming spruce planks into skis, two Norwegian prospectors set out from a hastily-built fort in the new gold country to look for mineral wealth in February, 1860 and scored Colorado's first ski event plus a stunning gold discovery.

The town now charms visitors with its wildflower-dappled mountain summers, its Victorian architecture and the lure of its champagne-powder skiing.

Special features of the BRECKENRIDGE book include:

Ground breaking historical finds on the 1859 prospectors. They arrived much sooner than previously thought.

Pioneer profiles. Little known personalities who stood briefly in the limelight.

Early-day skiing on heavy, 12-foot boards with leather bindings.

A first-ever history of the Breckenridge Ski Resort, from the folksy 1960s to present.

All this makes for a lively literary journey through the 144 pages of BRECKENRIDGE, 150 Years of Golden History. Award-winning historian and author Mary Ellen Gilliland also provides dozens of often yet-unpublished, but always intriguing, antique photographs.