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Iris Colorado

Photos Mike Sinnwell October 2018

Some places are just fun. This is one of them. Everywhere you look you can find something interesting. Plenty to see and lots of area to roam around.

The town was first called Union Hill, it was renamed after the post office said the name was too long.  Two stories persist as to why it was named Iris. One because of the profusion of wild irises growing nearby and the other was because of a ten-year-old daughter, named Iris, of a well-liked miner. I suspect it was because of the wild Irises.

Back in the 1890s a series of towns grew up in the low sagebrush covered hill country near Gunnison when gold was discovered. Prospectors poured in from older mining districts and Iris was born.  The town of Iris had several stores and saloons along "main street". A single phone line from Gunnison provided contact to the outside and mail was delivered 3 times a week.  There is not much left of Iris today. This was the sister city of Chance in Gunnison County.   Both were established in 1894 and over 1,000 miners were in the combined towns.   A telephone connection existed between the two towns.   Iris died by 1902.   Ore just wasn't that good.