Long before there was a front desk, a chophouse, or a poker room on this stretch of road, there was a cattle pasture. A rancher named Bob Womack had spent years insisting there was gold under the grass on his family's ranch, and most of his neighbors treated it as a running joke. In October 1890, Womack found the ore that proved him right, and within eighteen months a town that had barely existed had a population pushing past ten thousand.

A District, Not a Single Mine

What makes Cripple Creek's history different from most Western gold towns is how long the boom lasted. Rather than one strike and a quick collapse, the district kept producing for decades. By the time output peaked in the early 1900s, more than $500 million in gold had been pulled from the hills around what's now Bennett Avenue, at prices from that era — a figure that still shapes how the town talks about itself today.

Mining money built more than shafts. It paid for a downtown of brick and stone buildings, an opera house, and a rail line connecting the district to Colorado Springs. Several of those original buildings, including the one this resort now occupies, are still standing under landmark protection.

Locals at the time described the influx of prospectors as a tide — thousands arriving in a matter of months, drawn by the same strike. It's part of where this resort's name comes from.

The Long Quiet Stretch

Gold prices and mining costs eventually caught up with the district. Production slowed through the mid- 1900s, and by the 1970s Cripple Creek had settled into a much smaller town, more tourist stop than boom town, with its Victorian storefronts drawing summer visitors but little else.

1991 and the Return of the Tables

That changed in 1991, when Colorado voters approved limited-stakes gaming for three historic mining towns: Cripple Creek, Central City, and Black Hawk. Cripple Creek's approval came with a condition tied directly to its history — new construction had to preserve the historic street facades along Bennett Avenue, which is why the district still looks the way it does even with a modern casino floor behind every storefront.

Ownership broke ground on this property a few years after that vote passed, choosing a lot on Bennett Avenue that had sat as a boarded-up assay office since the 1960s. Today's resort keeps the original brick facade required by the district's landmark rules, with the gaming floor, spa, and pool deck built behind and above it.

What's Left to See

• The Cripple Creek District Museum, housed in a former railroad depot a short walk from Bennett Avenue.
• The Mollie Kathleen Gold Mine, which still runs underground tours down an original mine shaft.
• The narrow-gauge Cripple Creek & Victor Railroad, following part of the original 1890s rail grade.
• The Victorian storefronts along Bennett Avenue itself, most still carrying their original building dates.

If history is part of why you're making the trip up the mountain, our front desk can point you toward self-guided walking routes that cover most of this in under two hours — easy to fit around a spa appointment or a dinner reservation.