By Gail Zanett Saunders

In the early morning hours of Ouray County’s golden age of mining wagons and pack trains filled Ouray’s streets with smells and noise. Everything from lumber, coal, food, and equipment needed to be hauled up steep trails; the most valuable ore was found in higher elevations. And, in the evening, the wagons rolled back into town and burros and mules with pack-saddles of ore dropped off their heavy loads. Between the late 19th century and early 20th,...