Ranching & Native American Heritage

Explore Our Rich Frontier Past

San Juan Skijoring

Weathered by snowy winters and sunny summers, but preserved by local storytellers and curators, our collection of frontier artifacts and historic homesteads awaits your discovery. Historical points of interest and museums can be accessed by strolls around our business districts and scenic drives around the area.

Ouray County Ranch History Museum

A project that began in 2002, with recording interviews of local ranch family histories, evolved into the Ouray County Ranch History Museum in 2006. Spending its first 10 years in the Colona schoolhouse, the museum moved Other Historic Activities artifacts, both large n Take a self-guided historic walking tour of downtown Ridgway and small, into the Ridgway Depot building, where an expansive n Investigate the historical grave markers of Ouray County’s most famous residents at Cedar Hill, Dallas collection has grown with regularly donated artifacts. A sampling of the museum’s exhibits

Park and Colona Cemeteries include: family history n Arrange for a tour of the Historic Beaumont and Western Hotels in Ouray exhibits, a schoolroom, a Victorian-era bedroom, the land & water room, a n Search out haunted history kitchen, a pantry, a tool and tack room, and a n Visit the realistic old west section highlighting the town buildings in the Western movies created

Museum of the Mountain West in Montrose in our area. The museum has future plans to build a new museum complex, which is set to occupy 9.5 acres of long-term leased land north of the Depot building, between the Ridgway Library and the Uncompahgre River. When the new ranch museum building is complete, the Railroad Museum will have the opportunity to move

Artifacts – Kane Scheidegger fully into the Depot, creating a large campus of Ridgway’s ranching and railroad heritage. Ouray County Ranch History Museum 321 Sherman St., Ridgway, CO 81432 970.316.1085 www.ocrhm.org

Ouray County Fairgrounds

These fair and rodeo grounds are more than 125 years old, but have been renovated to provide a comfortable community gathering place for a variety of events. Just south of the intersection of highways 550 and 62, the outdoor facilities and indoor event center host barbecues, classic car shows, holiday bazaars, conferences, and workshops. The two most popular events, attracting competitors and spectators from far and wide, are the Ouray County Fair & Rodeo with its horse and bull-riding competitions and livestock shows and San Juan Skijoring with its horse-pulled skier and snowboarder races on a snow track.

Ouray County Ranch History Museum

Native American Culture

Many geographic features in the Uncompahgre Valley, where Ridgway is located, are named in the language of the Utes, the area’s early inhabitants. The valley and the river that runs through it are named Uncompahgre, which has sometimes been translated to hot water spring and red water. While few artifacts of their culture remain in the Ridgway area, the Ute Indian Museum is at the southern edge of Montrose, a short drive from Ridgway on Highway 550. Visit this cultural center to see artifacts and learn about the Ute people and nearby archaeological sites. TRAVEL TIPS: Visiting historic sites and our family-friendly museums is a wonderful way to inspire your kids’ imaginations. Give each child a camera and let them be your family photojournalist during your trip; you may be surprised what their eyes pick up.