Steelworks Museum

The Steelworks Center of the West, is a non-profit organization focused on preserving the history of the coal and steel industry in the Western United States. Based in Pueblo, Colorado and formerly known as the Bessemer Historical Society, which took its name from the community of Bessemer, site of the Colorado Coal and Iron Bessemer Works which was named after the Bessemer process for making steel invented by Henry Bessemer.Colorado Coal and Iron Company merged with the Colorado Fuel Company to form Colorado Fuel and Iron Company (CF&I) in 1892.The Steelworks Center of the West owns and operates the Steelworks Museum, the Steelworks Archives (formerly the CF&I Archives), and the Steelworks Park that is currently under construction in Pueblo. They provide continuing education of the steel industry's impact on the region through the preservation of historic archives, artifacts, and buildings of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, and through related activities leading to the industrialization of the Western US. They collect, preserve, and exhibit documents and artifacts from the steel and mining industry, Pueblo’s Bessemer neighborhood, and from the employees and families of employees who have worked either at the steel mill or in the coal and iron mines of Southern Colorado.

The Minnequa Steel Works Office Building and Dispensary are historic buildings in Pueblo, Colorado. The main office building served as headquarters of Colorado Fuel and Iron Company. The medical dispensary building served as a medical clinic for treatment of minor injuries and illnesses, and in later years, as both clinic and personnel office for the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company. Opened in 1902, the six-room Spanish Mission style building contained waiting, drug, consultation, surgical and storage rooms, in addition to sleeping and office quarters for attending physicians. In 1902, as the company payroll exceeded 5,000 employees, the Dispensary handled an average of seventy-five cases daily. As employee numbers grew, medical staff also began treating families of employees. The building was used as a medical building for mill employees until the early 1990s. The Minnequa Steelworks Office Building, built in 1901, served as company headquarters until the early 1990s. Here, many office functions occurred including purchasing, finance, payroll, engineering, and other administrative functions. The building complex was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2002, amended to the National Level of Significance of the National Register of Historic Places in 2008, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2021. Owned and operated by the Steelworks Center of the West, the medical dispensary building is the home of the Steelworks Museum of Industry and Culture, which opened on January 19, 2007. The museum's exhibits include the local history of coal mining, steel production, railroads, labor, and the impact of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company on the region. The main administration building will serve as the second phase of the Steelworks Museum of Industry and Culture in the coming years.

Bessemer, Colorado was a city in Colorado that was incorporated in 1886. The community was named after Henry Bessemer, an English inventor. It was one of four adjacent towns settled after the Colorado Gold Rush of 1859. The communities of South Pueblo, Central Pueblo, Pueblo, and Bessemer were later merged to create the modern City of Pueblo, Colorado. Bessemer was an independent city until 1894 and was the last city to join Pueblo. The former community of Bessemer is sometimes now referred to as the Bessemer neighborhood. Its also known as the Bessemer area. The Bessemer area is home to both Bessemer Academy (an elementary school) and Bessemer park.

The Colorado Fuel and Iron Company (CF&I) was a large steel conglomerate founded by the merger of previous business interests in 1892. By 1903 it was mainly owned and controlled by John D. Rockefeller and Jay Gould's financial heirs. While it came to control many plants throughout the country, its main plant was a steel mill on the south side of Pueblo, Colorado and was the city's main industry for most of its history. From 1901 to 1912, Colorado Fuel and Iron was one of the Dow Jones Industrials. The steel-market crash of 1982 led to the decline of the company. After going through several bankruptcies, the company was acquired by Oregon Steel Mills in 1993, and changed its name to Rocky Mountain Steel Mills. In January 2007, Rocky Mountain Steel Mills, along with the rest of Oregon Steel's holdings, were acquired by EVRAZ Group, a Russian steel corporation, for $2.3 billion. Through the process of vertical integration, the company came to own more than just the main steel plant. Over the course of a century, CF&I operated coal mines throughout southern Colorado, as well as iron mines in Wyoming and Utah, limestone quarries, smaller mines for other materials going into the steel making process, and the Colorado and Wyoming Railway. In Redstone, Colorado, hundreds of coking ovens converted coal into coke.The Mcnally, Cameron, Robinson and Walsen Mines located in the area of Walsenburg, Colorado, were just a few of the mines owned by the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company. The Colorado Supply company store was also owned and operated by CF&I. They also came to control many furnaces throughout the country, including E. G. Brooke in Birdsboro, Pennsylvania.

St. John's Greek Orthodox Church is a historic church building in Pueblo, Colorado. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2002.It is a beautiful Classical Revival-style church. It has two-story Ionic columns.

The Coronado Lodge, at 2130 Lake Ave. in Pueblo, Colorado, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2020.It was built "ca. 1940-41 by Ralph and Anna Ferris, the Coronado Lodge was part of a national boom in motel construction between 1940 and 1960 that reflected the nation’s growing automobile-based mobility and increased disposable income for leisure travel in the years following World War II. The Coronado Lodge is important for many reasons, most strikingly for its association with the history of African American travel and tourism during the era of segregation."It was deemed "an excellent example of Pueblo Revival-style mid-century motel architecture. The Pueblo Revival style produced an eye-catching appearance that appealed to travelers by evoking the history and romance of the Southwest. The style is particularly appropriate for Pueblo, which historically has had a large Hispano population with ties to New Mexico. The Coronado Lodge displays several distinguishing characteristics of the Pueblo Revival style including stepped massing, flat roofs with parapets, stuccoed adobe and concrete block walls, projecting vigas, portales with corbelled brackets, and flat-headed windows.""The Coronado Lodge is also significant for its association with the history of African American travel and tourism during the era of segregation. The motel offered accommodations to African American travelers since at least 1946 and advertised from 1957 to 1967 in The Negro Travelers’ Green Book, publication historian Gretchen Sullivan Sorin described as “the bible of every Negro highway traveler in the 1950s and early 1960s.” Most Colorado Green Book lodging facilities were small “tourist homes” in existing residences. The Coronado in 1957 became the second Colorado motel to be listed in The Green Book under owners Arthur H. and Hattie L. Copley and remained one of only three motels listed in it through 1967. The facility was integrated, welcoming both whites and guests of color prior to the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act."SIGNIFICANCE: Ethnic Heritage/Black, Architecture

St. Mary-Corwin Medical Center is a medical facility with a Flight for Life base, cancer and stroke center and residency program located in Pueblo, Colorado. It is a part of the CommonSpirit Health network. It specializes in orthopedics, cancer care, emergency services, robot-assisted surgery, breast care and women's services.

Pueblo Catholic High School was a Catholic high school in Pueblo, Colorado, under the Roman Catholic Diocese of Pueblo. The school closed in 1971.The first Catholic school in Pueblo opened on Michigan Street in 1875 as St. Patrick High School, it was renamed in 1935 to Pueblo Catholic High. In 1950 A new Pueblo Catholic High School building was completed on Lake Avenue.

The old First Methodist Episcopal Church, also known as First Methodist Episcopal Church, South, is a historic redbrick Southern Methodist church building located at 400 Broadway in Pueblo, Colorado. Designed by George W. Roe in the Romanesque Revival style of architecture, it was built in 1902. In 1939 it became the Trinity Methodist Church. Bought by the George F McCarthy Funeral Home in 1954, it is now the George McCarthy Historic Chapel and is used for funeral services. On November 14, 1979, it was added to the National Register of Historic PlacesIt is a one-and-a-half-story stretcher bond brick building. The church was organized in 1871 and had its first building, the Corona Chapel, built in 1877 at what is now 217 Midway.

Runyon Lake (formerly known as Fountain Lakes) is located in Pueblo, Colorado. It was originally used as a dredge pond for the Rocky Mountain Steel Mill, it is approximately 35 acres in size, and is fed by the Arkansas River. It is used solely for fishing and is stocked by the Colorado Parks and Wildlife. Boating is restricted to hand launched craft under 15 feet in length (including float tubes and personal pontoons). Boats may be propelled by hand, wind, or electric motors only. Ice fishing, swimming, open fires and camping are all prohibited.

Central High School is one of six public high schools located in Pueblo, Colorado, United States. A part of Pueblo School District 60, the high school was the second for the city of Pueblo, and was founded in 1881. It is the only high school to have two Medal of Honor recipients, William J. Crawford (Class of '36) and Carl L. Sitter (Class of '40).

The Charles H. Stickney House in Pueblo, Colorado, USA, was built in 1890. It was designed by New York architect William Halsey Wood, and Pueblo architect Frederick Albert Hale supervised its construction.It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.It was deemed significant "for its unusual Norman design uncommon in Pueblo, for its interesting use of materials, and for its association with Charles Stickney." Features associated with Norman architecture are the two towers, the arched entrance, and its applied shingled detailing.Charles H. Stickney (b. 1854) arrived in Colorado in 1880 and was a banker in Longmont. He sold his business there and moved to Pueblo in 1887. He joined Andrew McClelland in a business that year. He opened a new business, Charles H. Stickney Co. Investment Bankers, in 1892, which handled mortgage loans and bonds secured on Pueblo properties with corresponding bank First National Bank of Boston. In 1905 it added insurance and other services. He was active in the community, serving on the boards of the YWCA and the McLelland Library, and helping the First Congregational Church of South Pueblo build its church.The Orman-Adams Mansion, across Colorado Avenue from the house, is also listed on the National Register.