Steamboat Springs (Images of America). Dieser Artikel ist nicht verfügbar.Steamboat Springs (Images of America)

Known as Ski Town, U.S.A., for its deep powder and its growing crop of winter Olympians, Steamboat Springs was named nearly two centuries ago by French trappers. Hearing the "chug, chug" of one of many hot springs, they supposed they had reached navigable waters. For centuries, the area's abundant fish, game, and mineral springs drew the Yampatika, a Ute subtribe. In the 1870s, a rush of settlers came, first for precious metals, followed by more renewable riches--the lush summer pastures--and next the extraction of carbonized forests (coal) millions of years old. Ironically, real wealth ultimately fell free from leaden winter skies, and this Routt County community experienced a boom like few places on earth. Winter sports, including ski jumping, with some world records, made Steamboat Springs famous worldwide.

Authors David and Cathy Ellis are professional ornithologists and authors of nearly 200 scientific articles and books. They write here about David's first love, the valleys of the Yampa and Elk Rivers and the surrounding mountains. Enlisting the Tread of Pioneers Museum, the Museum of Northwestern Colorado, and smaller collections, they weave an alluring tale of war paint and longhorns, gold and grass, and above all--a blanket of snow.