Dive into Colorado history at these 5 National Historic Landmarks in and near Pueblo

The National Park Service has designated over 2,600 National Historic Landmarks since 1960 and 28 of those landmarks are in Colorado.

National Historic Landmarks are buildings, districts and other landmarks determined to be historically significant in the United States. Some of the most famous National Historic Landmarks include the Lincoln Memorial, the Golden Gate Bridge and the Martin Luther King Jr. Historical Park.

Are you a history buff looking for nearby National Historic Landmarks? Here are five sites within a few hours' drive of Downtown Pueblo.

Colorado Fuel and Iron Administrative Complex

Colorado Fuel and Iron Company's administration complex, 215 Canal St., joined the list of National Historic Landmarks in 2021, making it Pueblo's first National Historic Landmark.

The designated area includes the 123-year-old Spanish Mission Revival-style CF&I headquarters, a medical dispensary building that now serves as the Steelworks Center of the West Museum, Steelworks Park and even an underground tunnel.

CF&I employed 22,215 people at its peak in 1957. The company's steel mill in Pueblo, built in 1872, was the first mill west of the Mississippi River. CF&I recruited a diverse workforce, leading to 42 different languages being spoken at the mill by 1917, Steelworks Museum curator Victoria Miller said.

"We have local mom-and-pop shops that came about because of the people that brought their cultural preferences and food here," said Christina Trujillo, executive director of the museum. "We have our traditions and we have our schools because of the efforts and the foundation that were laid by CF&I."

Bent's Old Fort

A trip to the 1840s is only a 73-mile drive away from Downtown. Bent's Old Fort, located northeast of La Junta, is a reconstruction of the fort where indigenous tribes, beaver trappers and other travelers traded goods 180 years ago.

Charles Bent, William Bent and Ceran St. Vrain established Bent's Old Fort in 1833 along the Arkansas River — then a boundary between the United States and Mexico. Today, visitors to the reconstructed fort can expect to interact with the site's living historians.

Living historians at Bent's Old Fort dress, act and interact as if they are living in the heyday of the fort. More information about Bent's Old Fort can be found on its official website, nps.gov/beol/index.htm.

Ludlow Tent Colony

In 1915, CF&I owner John D. Rockefeller Jr. announced his institution of an employee representation plan ensuring an eight-hour workday and opportunities to voice employee grievances among other reforms. The plan emerged following the loss of life at the Ludlow Tent Colony site the previous year.

The United Mineworkers of America's Ludlow Tent Colony site in Las Animas County is where striking CF&I coal miners stayed with their families following eviction from company-owned housing in September 1913.

Estimates of the time — including those from the Denver Express, New York Times and United Mineworkers of America — estimated the number of residents living in the tent colony to be between 900 and 1,300 individuals, according to a draft of the tent colony's National Historic Landmark nomination.

On April 20, 1914, months of CF&I guards and Colorado National Guard members clashing with striking miners led to several deaths, including the deaths of two women and eleven children, at the site. Today, a monument exists honoring the victims of what became known as the Ludlow Massacre.

Camp Amache

Over 120,000 Japanese Americans were unjustly incarcerated in the United States during World War II. Camp Amache in Granada, Colorado, was the incarceration site of 10,000 individuals between 1942 and 1945.

In addition to being one of 28 National Historic Landmarks in Colorado, Camp Amache was formally established as a National Park earlier this month. The formal establishment was made possible through President Joe Biden's March 2022 signing of the Amache National Historic Site Act.

"After visiting Amache and meeting with survivors and descendants, I was moved by their resilience and the way in which Colorado communities came together during and after the injustice to support Japanese Americans," Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland said in a 2022 news release.

Cripple Creek Historic District

About $400 million worth of gold was found in Cripple Creek, Colorado, between 1891 and 1975, according to a 1975 form prepared for the National Register of Historic Places by historian Joseph Scott Mendinghall.

In 1899, the Cripple Creek Historic District was home to nearly 500 mines producing a combined $20 million worth of gold. Since the 1991 legalization of gambling, several buildings in the historic districts have operated as casinos, according to a timeline on Cripple Creek's website.

There's also the active open-pit gold mine that began operations in 1995 at the historic Cresson Mine site in Cripple Creek. More information about the Cripple Creek Historic District can be found at visitcripplecreek.com.

Other National Historic Landmarks near Pueblo include Pike's Peak, Raton Pass near the Colorado-New Mexico border and the Denver Civic Center Historic District, among others. A comprehensive list of National Historic Landmarks can be found on the National Park Service website.

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Pueblo Chieftain reporter James Bartolo can be reached at JBartolo@gannett.com. Support local news, subscribe to The Pueblo Chieftain at subscribe.chieftain.com.

This article originally appeared on The Pueblo Chieftain: 5 National Historic Landmarks worth visiting in and near Pueblo