Historic Huntsville

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Historic Huntsville

Castle Rock, Colorado 80109, United States

Created By: Yogi Bear's Jellystone Camp-Resort in Larkspur Colorado

Tour Information

A tour of the places, lives and events of the pioneers who settled Jellystone in the early days of the Colorado Territory. You can walk around to some of the places or just click through the sites to see what happened. Some of the points of interest are inaccessible by walking.


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What You'll See on the Tour

The town of Hunstville found its beginnings in the arrival of DC Oakes in 1859 to what is now Jellystone. Oakes was one of the first pioneers to Colorado. It is said that the town was laid out by Sarah Coberly. Huntsville existed from arou... Read more
John Fremont was one of the first explorers to come through this region. Sent by the U.S. government, he made several trips out west. In his second expedition in 1842, his team traveled up this valley and stayed a few days by the rock forma... Read more
DC Oakes was one of the first pioneers to come to the Colorado Territory. He arrived in 1858 and then brought his family in 1859. Oakes settled on the land that is now occupied by Jellystone, I-25 and East Plumb Creek at the base of Hunt Mo... Read more
Olive Martin Oakes was married to DC Oakes. She was a hardy pioneer woman in her own right. She wrote a number of letters home, most of which survive to this day and tell us a great deal about pioneer life. She was very close friends with S... Read more
Most of Huntsville was located east of the campground at the base of Hunt Mountain along East Plumb Creek. In this 1914 photograph, we see W.A. Bennet, husband of DC & Olive Oakes' daughter Laura, standing at the location of the Oakes c... Read more
DC (Daniel Chessman) Oakes brought one of the first sawmills to Colorado in 1859. It used a large steam boiler mounted on wheels to power the saw. Rather than haul trees to the sawmill, Oakes would move the sawmill around the property as h... Read more
In 1864, the residents of Huntsville became concerned for their safety so 150 people banded together and built their own fort. It took them three days to build the fort and, upon completion, the towns people lived in it 24 hours a day for ... Read more
Sarah Coberly arrived in Colorado in 1859 and was the first white woman pioneer in this region. She first lived near Dakan, but eventually moved to Huntsville where she operated a hotel called the Coberly Halfway House - because it was half... Read more
Imagine for a moment that you are a 12 year old girl. Your parents and seven younger brothers & sisters are pioneers to Colorado. Then, your father died. That's what happened to Elizabeth "Lizzie" Fields.  Her mother tried to cobble ... Read more
Sarah Coberly had two daughters. On of them, Hersa, married Silas Soule, one of our forgotten pioneer heroes. Silas Soule was born in Maine to abolitionais parents. During the "Bloody Kansas" times, his family moved to Kansas to help make i... Read more
In addition to lumber, clay was also in abundance on the Huntsville property. This led to the development of several clay mines in the late 1800's. Some of the mines were below ground, but others were above ground. This image of the clay m... Read more
This is the only remaining structure from the town of Huntsville. The wood has been core-dated to the fall of 1873, making the construction date possibly 1874. The cabin was built by William Krull and later incorporated into a larger house.... Read more
John Hammond ran a turkey farm on this land in the 1940's-1950's. There were reportedly over 4,000 turkeys here at one time. In this picture, Mr. Hammond is shown on his farm. Based on the position of Hunt Mountain in the background, this p... Read more
Hunt Mountain was named for the fourth territorial governor of Colorado, Alexander Hunt. The town of Huntsville was also named after him. In a bit of serendipity, Governor Hunt later bought the ranch land on the top of his namesake mountain... Read more
There have been two major floods in the past 150 years along Plum Creek. In 1864, a major flood destroyed much of Denver. The flood waters came from Cherry Creek and Plum Creek. The Plumb Creek part of the flood also wiped out much of the t... Read more

 

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