CHNC: Over 900,000 Pages and Going Strong!

The Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection recently reached over 900,000 pages of historic Colorado content.  Since launching our new online database a little over a year ago, CHNC has added over 219,000 new pages.  Our latest addition of newspaper content included additional issues of the Palisade Tribune (Mesa County), the Salida Mail (Chaffee County), the Mountain Mail (Chaffee County), the Colorado Daily Chieftain (Pueblo County) and the Steamboat Pilot (Routt County).  We also added two new titles, the Turret Gold Belt (Chaffee County) and the St. Elmo Mountaineer (Chaffee County), courtesy of our partner, the Salida Regional Library.

The Turret Gold Belt was published between 1899 and December 1909 and almost outlasted the town itself.  The town of Turret, located about 13 miles north of Salida, was established around 1896 and with the slowing mine production residents began to leave around 1901. In its heyday the town boasted a population of about 500.  The town’s best producing mine at the turn of the century was the Turret-Independent, owned by two women.

The St. Elmo Mountaineer, was published from August 28, 1880 to 1895.  The paper at one point boasted that it was “edited in the clouds, at the highest point of any paper in the county.” The town sits at 10,000 feet.  Unfortunately only 4 issues of the Mountaineer have been located and digitized in CHNC.  We would happily digitize more issue if they could be located.  

Thank you to all of our partners that continue to grow the Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection. If you are a user of CHNC don’t forget to check back often, as we are continually adding more historic content.  We can’t wait to add our next 100,000 pages!

CHNC is brought to you by the Colorado State Library.  If you have questions about CHNC, please contact Leigh Jeremias, ljeremias@colordovirtuallibrary.org