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Redstone Coke Oven Historic District

1899 establishments in ColoradoCoke ovensHistoric districts on the National Register of Historic Places in ColoradoIndustrial buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in ColoradoIndustrial buildings completed in 1899
NRHP infobox with nocatNational Register of Historic Places in Pitkin County, ColoradoRedstone, ColoradoUse mdy dates from August 2023
Old coke ovens, Redstone, CO
Old coke ovens, Redstone, CO

The Redstone Coke Oven Historic District is located at the intersection of State Highway 133 and Chair Mountain Stables Road outside Redstone, Colorado, United States. It consists of the remaining coke ovens built at the end of the 19th century by the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company. In 1990, it was recognized as a historic district and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Two hundred were built, because the coal in the surrounding mountains was ideal for refining into coke. At their peak, they were producing almost 6 million tons a year. The development was the beginning of the modern settlement of Redstone. There are very few coke ovens of their type remaining in the West; the ovens are themselves the only remnant of the sizable coking operation in the area, the largest at the time in Colorado. Within ten years of their construction the ovens fell into disuse when the mines closed. Their support steel was removed during the scrap metal drives of World War II, and later they were used as living space by hippies who moved into Redstone. The possibility that some might be demolished to build a gas station eventually led Pitkin County to acquire the land in the mid-2000s, and since then some have been restored.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Redstone Coke Oven Historic District (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Redstone Coke Oven Historic District
State Highway 133,

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N 39.181111111111 ° E -107.24138888889 °
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Redstone Coke Oven Historic District

State Highway 133 17807-17949
81623
Colorado, United States
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Old coke ovens, Redstone, CO
Old coke ovens, Redstone, CO
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Redstone Historic District (Colorado)
Redstone Historic District (Colorado)

The Redstone Historic District is located in and near the unincorporated community of that name in western Pitkin County, Colorado, United States. It includes the original community of Redstone as built by Colorado Fuel and Iron (CFI) for the coal miners it employed. In 1989 it was recognized as a historic district and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Redstone was originally a company town. John Cleveland Osgood, CFI's president at the time, spent lavishly to create quality housing for miners and their families, as well as various other public buildings, in an effort to forestall unionization. Architect Theodore Boal designed simple yet attractive structures by adapting various Victorian architectural styles. The district includes as contributing properties Osgood's estate, Cleveholm, and the Redstone Inn. At first very populous and successful due to the high production capacity of the nearby coke ovens, Redstone was almost abandoned within a decade when it became too costly to transport coke from the remote community to CFI's new steel mill. A handful of residents remained, keeping Redstone from becoming another one of Colorado's many ghost towns. Some of its original buildings were demolished over the years. Eventually the town rebounded slightly and today is home to a small arts community; many of the remaining buildings have been restored. It is one of the few intact company towns remaining in the state.

Redstone Castle
Redstone Castle

Redstone Castle, also known as Cleveholm or Osgood Castle, is a mansion south of Redstone, Colorado, United States. It is a large timber frame structure built in the early 20th century as the home of John C. Osgood, founder of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, in a simplified version of the Stick style. In 1971 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places, the first property in Pitkin County to be listed. It was later additionally listed as a contributing property to the Redstone Historic District. The castle was at the south end of the planned company town of Redstone, meant by Osgood to be an improvement over the usual housing and conditions in Western mining towns of the late 19th century. Just across the Crystal River were the coke ovens that processed coal mined higher up in the mountains and loaded onto a rail line. Miners and cokers in the town lived in cottages with electricity and running water, considered luxury items at the time. At his mansion, Osgood, at the time one of the country's richest men, entertained guests like Theodore Roosevelt, John D. Rockefeller and King Leopold of Belgium, who joined him on hunts. The lush interior features European antique furniture and work by Gustav Stickley and Louis Comfort Tiffany. Its design was supposedly based on the ancestral home of Osgood's wife Alma.Redstone's prosperity ended within a decade, after Osgood lost control of the company, and he spent less time there. He returned to the property in the late 1920s to die. His wife tried to convert the house into a resort, but the Great Depression made that economically unviable; however, later owners were able to run it as a hotel into the 1990s. A recent owner who tried to refurbish was indicted in a financial fraud scheme, and the Internal Revenue Service sold it to compensate victims in its first-ever online auction of seized real property. It was sold again in 2016, and after a renovation, owners Steve and April Carver opened a ten-room boutique hotel in the castle in November 2018. It is also open for daily public tours. The 2006 film The Prestige used the castle as a location.